Arbiters of taste at the Internet McDonalds

With the creation of GMail, the release of Android, the development of it’s own smartphone, the less than glorious launch of Buzz, and the unveiling of sketches for it’s new tablet, Google seems to be the new everything for the interweb.  In fact, they seem to be taking over.  And it’s been a truly amazing ride. After all, let’s not forget that Google started as a search engine, and now they are producing hardware, developing software, and practically running the racket of online advertising.  How is it they’ve done all this, while Yahoo is still just a search engine that’s seemingly fumbled away it’s chances of being twitter, facebook, godaddy, and google, is simply remarkable. While both have been successful, Google has clearly emerged as the most influential, and while there are many reasons why, i think one comes to everyone’s mind right away.

Simplicity.

I remember the days of Yahoo, MSN, AltaVista, and the countless other search engines, with their cluttered pages, tons of links, and nascent business offerings, all standing between you and your searches. Google got rid of the noise, and made their homepage nothing but a logo and a search field. The simplicity was shocking, and so successful that their name became synonymous with ‘online search’.  Their simplicity led to a revolution in the way people approached the web, as both users and developers. But just because simplicity is good, doesn’t mean Google is doing it well.

Of course, to see simplicity done well, you go to the benchmark: Apple. Over the years, Apple has refined both usability and simplicity in their web presence. And while we designers love Apple, the view them as anything but a niche is a mistake. Apple will never be the #1 company, even though they continue to put out the most polished machinery and OS in the industry. Unfortunately, the masses rely on cheaper and poorer performing software and hardware, and we as designers, must understand ‘how the other half works’.

Now Microsoft is certainly not known for it’s revolutionary design, but Google’s approach is a thousand times worse. While their approach to usability is ground-breaking, and has led to many important revelations, their complete disregard for design is nothing short of frightening.  Their logo is nothing short of an abomination, seemingly designed by someone whose design skill started at ‘bevel and emboss’ and ended at ‘drop shadow’. The color scheme is completely thoughtless and indistinct, but luckily it serves to mask out just how terrible the typeface is itself. For a company promoting a new paradigm, they seem to embrace the bland cloak of corporate thinking with a logo that was clearly designed cheaply and most likely by someone at the office’s young relation.  And now comes the Google Buzz logo, with it’s complete lack of originality has already been called a complete rip-off of the UNO logo.

Google got rid of the noise, and made their homepage nothing but a logo and a search field. The simplicity was shocking, and so successful that their name became synonymous with ‘online search’.

Now when it comes to organizing their data, Google has embrace the craigslist philosophy of minimal design and maximum information.  Google organizes this massive amount of information in a smart manner, but it’s presentation is severely lacking. Their reliance on A/B testing has produced the most vanilla of all websites, where a change in logo treatment is seen as miraculous and inspirational, no matter how kitsch. With their focus on usability, what they’ve essentially done is reduce their design to the lowest common denominator. Instead of crafting design FOR the masses, they’ve embraced design BY the masses, but ripped from any discernible style or personality so as not to offend anyone.

Subsequently, the result tastes like fast food… and not even good fast food. it’s bland, it’s boring, it works, but it ain’t enjoyable.  It’s like eating saltines and mayonaise, or some futuristic, tasteless, organic paste. And the results seem to come at us in a similar way, when the order is complex. The results of many advanced or detailed searches often feel like the burger, fries, lettuce, tomato, ketchup and soda have just been thrown in the bag together. Is this the Internet we want our children to consume?

Their interface for Google Adwords isn’t any better. Apart from the constant tweaks and changes, the lack of style for any of the links makes finding secondary and tertiary elements incredibly confusing.  And where did that green come from that they used for so long?  Here we see how a reliance on A/B testing has resulted in a confusing user experience, and has give rise to a site that looks like it’s still in the planning phase.  Yet somehow Google can pass off these in-progress wireframes as the pinnacle of web usability, despite the fact navigation between screens and accounts in Google Adwords is clunky and difficult at best.  Compare this confusing mess with the beauty and usability of a site like Basecamp, and you’ll see how design can be minimal, functional, AND beautiful.  For whatever reason, Google has chosen to ignore this aspect, instead choosing a lifeless, colorless, yet ever-changing world. What they’ve created is a virtual desert, with shifting sand, but few landmarks. How this is the pinnacle of usability baffles me.

Even Microsoft has seen the error of their ways, and has begun investing more time and effort into better design. The Bing.com homepage, with its beautiful, rotating, background images is a wonderful use of both design and technology… something I rarely say about a Microsoft product. With their sterile new competition gaining ground on Windows, Microsoft has truly made an effort to present a better user experience as of late, even though it does so without the wonderful, overarching aesthetic of Apple. Hell, at least they’re trying to make things look good (and keep us designers employed).

Google’s boring, corporate style stands the polar opposite of Apple’s ethos, and fittingly, these companies seem poised to do battle over the hearts and minds of Internet users.  BusinessWeek posted an interesting read about exactly that.  What we’re seeing with the Android platform is the fruition of Linux and the heralding of a true rival to Microsoft.  In fact, I would not be shocked if Bill Gates’ ‘retirement’ from Microsoft was him getting out before the Microsoft brand began to see its share of the market shrink significantly, along with perhaps some of his genius reputation.  Microsoft won’t disappear by any means, but the war between Apple and Microsoft now has a new competitor… one who is stealing from Microsoft (and Blackberry) and fighting Apple. 

This distinction is important. Apple users are devoted to the point of fanaticism. They will never leave Apple, no matter how much control Apple has assumes. The fact Apple has censors apps, controlled the means of media distribution, and killed Flash has not gone unnoticed, but rather has been greeted with some sort of reluctant, elitist acceptance. Apple-haters, on the other hand, love the open-source platform, but HATE HATE HATE Apple’s hefty pricetag, small marketshare, and know-nothing Apple users telling them they know better.  They will never switch to Apple, yet they still need a place where they can develop freely. For that, Google and Linux be praised. With the rise of the cloud and web-based computing, it’s only a matter of time before the Interweb becomes the OS. We saw hints at that with the brief rise of NetBooks last year, but sadly we’re not quite there yet with the web OS, which is why NetBooks were largely a disappointment.  Just give it time, and a tablet format…

What concerns me more is this: If the Internet becomes the OS, and Google is the leading portal and leading developer of this OS, will this turn the Internet into Google? Will using a Google-based OS make the web look like Google?  Will their algorithms begin viewing design as a detriment? Will design across the Internet become victim to Google’s ‘internet for dummies’ design ethos? 

And it begs the question… Have we simply traded up to a bigger, badder AOL experience?

Whatever our wishes, it’d be foolish to think Google will heed anything us designers would suggest. Creative directors with more experience and more talent than myself have presented this very argument in Google’s boredrooms, and the result was the same each time… The creative director quit.  Its just so sad that a company with the tools and potential to introduce the world to excellent design chose to NOT be leaders in this industry, despite leading in so many others.

Addendum

I’ve recently noticed Google has modified the search yet again, and for once, I’m actually impressed… not by the design but by their progress.  On my laptop (and only my laptop, for some reason), I now see a new sidebar, with a jQuery dropdown menu allowing the user to filter their results.  And what’s more… these links actually feature colorful, though rather generic looking ICONS!  I’m wondering if my laptop is somehow connecting to the few servers running with Google Caffiene. Now mind you, this is a big step for Google… they’re actually embracing design to highlight a really smart and useful tool. Now I can filter results by shopping, news, blogs, maps, images, video, and a handful of other options (but no Music filter? Strange). It’s an incredibly useful feature that exists to a degree on the Google I’m finding on my other machines, but it’s much easier and intuitive now. 

All that being said, the icons are pretty terrible, and too simplified to be poignant or even particularly relevent. A comic strip word bubble has seemingly been appropriated for 4 of the icons, with very minor changes to each. The Maps filter icon is a Google Maps Marker, but without the white circle and letter, it looks like a red lightbulb.  I’m sure many users won’t even make the connection. 

Baby Steps…