Metafluence

Web 2.0 style web design is not a fad

While the battle on Wikipedia continues to ensue over what Web 2.0 means, there is no doubt that a common visual language has emerged. Gradients, 45° angled lines, glossy buttons, wet floor reflections, and bright colors are all traits common to the Web 2.0 aesthetic. In the beginning, they were charmingly fresh. Now that they have defined an era that is seemingly slipping away, won’t businesses sensitive to being labeled “2.0″ demand a new direction?

Drop shadows were all the rage in the early 90s print world when DTP software made knocking out an image simple. It seemed like everywhere you turned someone had a white background with knocked out images and a drop shadow. I know I went through a drop shadow embargo much the same way I do now for the type face Papyrus. If a convention is over used, I don’t want to be known for pumping out “me too” designs. However, the drop shadow technique settled into a more staple position in the print world. It has even extended into the web space to become a staple in the Web 2.0 style. And, why? Because it’s a logical design convention that adds depth to an otherwise flat medium. New software made it easy to wield, which lead to drop shadow mania.

Newspaper design went through a similar craze. When computers first came along, tasteful layouts fell to tacky fascination, particularly in regards to typography. In the early 90s, you might see a section headline for a Halloween special draped in an ornamental font where each letter looks like a carved pumpkin. When the new computer design platform brought this new choice to the scene, we all thought it was cool. Now, it looks like something a scrapbooker would do.

In the case of the drop shadows, they went through a heavy use phase when they first hit the scene, but eventually worked into the fold as another technique in a designer’s arsenal. Newspapers just flat lost their sense of taste, but regained it once they understood that just because you could, doesn’t mean you should. I think Web 2.0 design patterns share more in common with the fate of drop shadows. I say this because many of the conventions that comprise the Web 2.0 style are natural explotations of the medium. Here’s a breakdown on a few:

Gradients

Gradients look so nice on screen because they add some dimension to a design. But, that’s not their only appeal. They also easily tile as a background image while keeping the file size small. I don’t think gradients are going anywhere anytime soon.

45° angled lines

Whether you have an old school CRT or a modern LCD monitor, it’s still a matrix of pixels distributed in an orthogonal grid. And, while anti-aliasing can fool our eyes to see smother curves and angled lines, nothing looks sharper than perfectly horizontal, vertical, and right-angled lines. Thick or thin, 45° angled lines look clean on screen. I think we’ll see more of these guys moving past the 2.0 hype cycle.

Bright colors

Flickr’s magenta and cyan, Google’s primary colors, and Technorati’s green are all typical color palettes for a Web 2.0 company. It’s not surprising because those colors look so good on screen. We don’t see them in print. What? We don’t see magenta and cyan in print? Are you an idiot? Well, there might be colors that share the same name on paper, but print is a subtractive color medium and the screen is a saturation model. That means bright colors have more inertia behind them on screen. Electrically powered colors tend to look cleaner and fresher on screen when compared with their pastel and earth-tone rivals. While I do think we’ll see shifts in the popular color combinations, I don’t think dull colors have a bright future online.

Glossy buttons

Apple started this craze with the introduction of their Aqua interface on the original release of Mac OS X around the turn of the millennium. Since that time, everyone has picked up on the glossy look. It’s obvious why. The additional textures and hues used to create a glossy element add a welcome visual complexity to otherwise boring elements. I do think we’ll see less of Aqua influence as we move forward, but I don’t think it will leave completely. Textures such as semi-translucent, high gloss finishes, and brushed metal emulate detail we see in RL. We’ll see the use of these textures and more to enhance visual interest for years to come.

These soon-to-be classics, however, are currently suffering from a reputation management problem. We’re nearing the end of the Web 2.0 peak on the hype cycle. Kleiner-Perkins has halted all investments for ventures labeled Web 2.0. Some influential bloggers are calling the Web 2.0 time of death as you read this. And, that’s just fine. I’ve gone back and forth about whether or not we’ll call this next wave Web 3.0, but I think it’s time we move away from monikers that have versioning in them. Now we need to talk about developments with descriptive nomenclature such as cloud services, platforms, and widgets.

It is this designer’s opinion that as we move into the next era the Web 2.0 design conventions will not die, but evolve into the long term classics of the medium. I think we’ll see these conventions worked in amongst newer fads as web designers continue to explore the medium.