3 ms·

Skeuomorphism >> Fisher Price

kstrauser 6y ago
I didn't like the skeuomorphic appearance, but to each their own. I despised the skeuomorphic behavior though. Limiting an app's functionality to that of its real-world counterpart was a God-awful trend of horribleness. For instance, here's an article about how much Lion's Address Book app sucked: https://www.betalogue.com/2012/01/15/abook6-dumb/ https://www.betalogue.com/2012/01/15/abook6-dumb/ If a future version of macOS made the icons and app background textures photorealistic again, fine, so be it. I might think it was ugly, but I'd keep using it. If that same version brought back a Calendar app that only let you go to the next or previous month's view because that's how a real calendar works, I'd heave my laptop out the window and switch back to Linux.
- flenserboy 6y ago
  Lion was an all-around dog, pretty much the worst OS X release with the possible exception of Catalina. Amazing how it followed on the heels of something as great as SL.
  - Wowfunhappy 6y ago
    I think Lion is the a large part of the reason Snow Leopard is remembered so fondly. It's a great release, but not quite as good as people remember. And, Apple was able to course correct very quickly with Mountain Lion and Mavericks, which I really do love. In fact, I think something similar is happening today with Catalina and Mojave. Mojave was never a particularly good release, but Catalina is just so bad...
- jjoonathan 6y ago
  The thing I most appreciated about skeuomorphism was that it had a high skill ceiling. A mediocre graphic artist's designs could be ugly, and often were, but a good graphic artist's designs could be positively delightful. The Mac OS X green glowing battery and metallic hard disk come to mind. Aqua had a good run before it overstayed its welcome. I'll gladly put up with a few bad designs if it means that I actually have something to look forward to now and again. I live for the pleasant surprise. Minimalism was a godsend for bad artists, but the flip side of that coin is that none of it is ever particularly good, either. It's one big sea of shrug, and to my taste that's worse than diamonds-and-dirt. But to each their own. I'll grant you that skeuomorphism as a constraint on functionality was a consistently bad idea, but I'd argue that minimalism as a constraint on functionality is consistently even worse. Apps either Just Work or Just Don't. I've been on the "lol screw you, user" side of this many times, but I used to write it off as just the new incarnation of poor error reporting until the day I was working on a wireless product and my assigned UX guy hid my "Connection Failed" message behind an indefinite spinner. Not one that only popped up when the connection failed, mind you. The only way to tell if configuration was happening or if it was stalled from a failed connection was to know how long it was supposed to take and kill it if it took too long. What if you didn't have this knowledge, but would otherwise be capable of diagnosing a connection issue if you had a hint that the connection was the problem ? Too bad, so sad. Just Doesn't Work. Ugh.

I didn't like the skeuomorphic appearance, but to each their own. I despised the skeuomorphic behavior though. Limiting an app's functionality to that of its real-world counterpart was a God-awful trend of horribleness. For instance, here's an article about how much Lion's Address Book app sucked: https://www.betalogue.com/2012/01/15/abook6-dumb/ https://www.betalogue.com/2012/01/15/abook6-dumb/ If a future version of macOS made the icons and app background textures photorealistic again, fine, so be it. I might think it was ugly, but I'd keep using it. If that same version brought back a Calendar app that only let you go to the next or previous month's view because that's how a real calendar works, I'd heave my laptop out the window and switch back to Linux.

flenserboy 6y ago
Lion was an all-around dog, pretty much the worst OS X release with the possible exception of Catalina. Amazing how it followed on the heels of something as great as SL.
- Wowfunhappy 6y ago
  I think Lion is the a large part of the reason Snow Leopard is remembered so fondly. It's a great release, but not quite as good as people remember. And, Apple was able to course correct very quickly with Mountain Lion and Mavericks, which I really do love. In fact, I think something similar is happening today with Catalina and Mojave. Mojave was never a particularly good release, but Catalina is just so bad...
jjoonathan 6y ago
The thing I most appreciated about skeuomorphism was that it had a high skill ceiling. A mediocre graphic artist's designs could be ugly, and often were, but a good graphic artist's designs could be positively delightful. The Mac OS X green glowing battery and metallic hard disk come to mind. Aqua had a good run before it overstayed its welcome. I'll gladly put up with a few bad designs if it means that I actually have something to look forward to now and again. I live for the pleasant surprise. Minimalism was a godsend for bad artists, but the flip side of that coin is that none of it is ever particularly good, either. It's one big sea of shrug, and to my taste that's worse than diamonds-and-dirt. But to each their own. I'll grant you that skeuomorphism as a constraint on functionality was a consistently bad idea, but I'd argue that minimalism as a constraint on functionality is consistently even worse. Apps either Just Work or Just Don't. I've been on the "lol screw you, user" side of this many times, but I used to write it off as just the new incarnation of poor error reporting until the day I was working on a wireless product and my assigned UX guy hid my "Connection Failed" message behind an indefinite spinner. Not one that only popped up when the connection failed, mind you. The only way to tell if configuration was happening or if it was stalled from a failed connection was to know how long it was supposed to take and kill it if it took too long. What if you didn't have this knowledge, but would otherwise be capable of diagnosing a connection issue if you had a hint that the connection was the problem ? Too bad, so sad. Just Doesn't Work. Ugh.