This is the most "get off my lawn" thing I've read around here in a while. I'm baffled that the author thinks there's any mystery that many users and many desig

This is the most "get off my lawn" thing I've read around here in a while. I'm baffled that the author thinks there's any mystery that many users and many designers like injecting some playfulness into their work. It's so over the top to describe the choice of playful logos as "manipulating [users], engendering stupidity as the desirable state they should be in". Realizing I don't want to be as much of a stick in the mud as the author is making me actively wonder how I can make my own work more playful. Additionally I think the article makes a bit of a mistake to group up old distracting playfulness attempts (Microsoft Clippy and related assistants; I'd put other old fashions like animated cursor trails in this category too), playful logos (Google, Twitter, etc, like the Elf logo here), and flat design. Microsoft Clippy was egregious for surprising the user, animating about, and talking when the user is trying to focus. I think it's overreaching to look at Clippy, decide the playfulness was the bad part, and then associate its badness with logos and flat design. I think the article overlooks the intended benefits of flat design in how it simplifies the UI by removing unnecessary skeuomorphisms and details. (There are valid criticisms that flat design sometimes removes too many details and makes UIs harder to understand, but the article only talks about flat design as an arbitrary fashion of playfulness.)