4 ms·

They're great because you can make them genderless, raceless, and their body shapes are completely ambiguous, being neither overweight nor fit. My mother worke

They're great because you can make them genderless, raceless, and their body shapes are completely ambiguous, being neither overweight nor fit. My mother worked as a photo-editor for a textbook publishing company many years ago and it was ridiculous how many meetings went into making sure they balanced the distribution of people that appeared in the books.

userbinator 5y ago
neither overweight nor fit Unfortunately, they all seem to have elephantiasis instead.
JohnWhigham 5y ago
When you make something for everyone, it's reduced and diluted to the barest parts. Completely soulless i.e. perfect for a faceless tech giant!
- threeseed 5y ago
  How is Apple faceless ? Everyone knows who the CEO and key executives are since they are visible at every product release.
  - seoulmetro 5y ago
    These companies are faceless because all your interactions with them do not go through humans and are usually devoid of any real, personal human interactions. It's not a literal take on the word faceless, there are faces, they're just not real. The real ones don't face you.
    - threeseed 5y ago
      For most people every interaction with Apple goes through a human. Buy a Mac, get it repaired, training etc. All in-store with an Apple employee.
      - seoulmetro 5y ago
        >For most people every interaction with Apple goes through a human. No they don't. For a lot, sure. Most? No. These people the interact with are part of the faceless attribute, they're usually pretty robotic interactions. But yes, they're a great part of Apple. To talk to a human. >All in-store with an Apple employee. They will usually say: "Okay let us take a look." and "Okay we took a look. You need a new X." It's not the most faceless, but it is one of them. It's nearly impossible not to be faceless in this market.
zucked 5y ago
Yup! In this whimsical style, the people shown can have skin, hair, etc. shades in every possible color of the rainbow.
dTal 5y ago
>They're great because you can make them genderless, raceless, and their body shapes are completely ambiguous, being neither overweight nor fit. Your description reminds me of another classic corporate clip-art style from the 90s, the infamous Microsoft "screen bean": http://clipart-library.com/image_gallery/176157.jpg http://clipart-library.com/image_gallery/176157.jpg
- DaiPlusPlus 5y ago
  Screen beans are cool now they're back underground, didn't you get the memo?
  - dTal 5y ago
    Well, I thought they had a certain obscure retro cachet. But if people on HN are telling me they're cool, I guess they're now too mainstream.
wilg 5y ago
Except the art in question is neither genderless nor raceless.
nerfhammer 5y ago
Obviously the solution should be to use muppets instead of people. Much more fun.
- philwelch 5y ago
  Except now they’re racializing muppets: https://www.npr.org/2021/11/15/1055733980/sesame-street-makes-history-with-the-debut-of-its-first-asian-american-muppet https://www.npr.org/2021/11/15/1055733980/sesame-street-make...
  - seoulmetro 5y ago
    Yeah, kinda weird to make human muppets. The human-like muppets were good. It's all about that fake outrage and fake pandering.
alexfringes 5y ago
I'm not a fan of the style, but I don't see how its defining visual characteristics are significantly more geared toward the political correctness safe route that you seem to be portraying it as. At least not when compared with illustration styles that employ a similar degree of abstraction. In the the 8 years that Adobe employed a similar style, starting in the mid 90s, it clearly managed to do so without even an inkling of diversity: http://splashscreens.sourceforge.net/acrobat.php http://splashscreens.sourceforge.net/acrobat.php Depending on the year you look at, the 90s version is less abstract than the current examples we're discussing here, but some years are actually more abstract. The lack of diversity is fairly clear to me regardless of that variation. Of course, whenever we analyze abstract visuals, biases come into play. So maybe this read above is rooted in my own bias (either in favor of being able to make a point here, or in regards to how I believe a 90s corporation would portray "the business user"), but I think that's a stretch in most of these examples.
leshenka 5y ago
> They're great because you can make them genderless, raceless, and their body shapes are completely ambiguous, being neither overweight nor fit. i.e. not looking like people at all

userbinator 5y ago

neither overweight nor fit Unfortunately, they all seem to have elephantiasis instead.

JohnWhigham 5y ago

When you make something for everyone, it's reduced and diluted to the barest parts. Completely soulless i.e. perfect for a faceless tech giant!

threeseed 5y ago
How is Apple faceless ? Everyone knows who the CEO and key executives are since they are visible at every product release.
- seoulmetro 5y ago
  These companies are faceless because all your interactions with them do not go through humans and are usually devoid of any real, personal human interactions. It's not a literal take on the word faceless, there are faces, they're just not real. The real ones don't face you.
  - threeseed 5y ago
    For most people every interaction with Apple goes through a human. Buy a Mac, get it repaired, training etc. All in-store with an Apple employee.
    - seoulmetro 5y ago
      >For most people every interaction with Apple goes through a human. No they don't. For a lot, sure. Most? No. These people the interact with are part of the faceless attribute, they're usually pretty robotic interactions. But yes, they're a great part of Apple. To talk to a human. >All in-store with an Apple employee. They will usually say: "Okay let us take a look." and "Okay we took a look. You need a new X." It's not the most faceless, but it is one of them. It's nearly impossible not to be faceless in this market.

zucked 5y ago

Yup! In this whimsical style, the people shown can have skin, hair, etc. shades in every possible color of the rainbow.

dTal 5y ago

>They're great because you can make them genderless, raceless, and their body shapes are completely ambiguous, being neither overweight nor fit. Your description reminds me of another classic corporate clip-art style from the 90s, the infamous Microsoft "screen bean": http://clipart-library.com/image_gallery/176157.jpg http://clipart-library.com/image_gallery/176157.jpg

DaiPlusPlus 5y ago
Screen beans are cool now they're back underground, didn't you get the memo?
- dTal 5y ago
  Well, I thought they had a certain obscure retro cachet. But if people on HN are telling me they're cool, I guess they're now too mainstream.

wilg 5y ago

Except the art in question is neither genderless nor raceless.

nerfhammer 5y ago

Obviously the solution should be to use muppets instead of people. Much more fun.

philwelch 5y ago
Except now they’re racializing muppets: https://www.npr.org/2021/11/15/1055733980/sesame-street-makes-history-with-the-debut-of-its-first-asian-american-muppet https://www.npr.org/2021/11/15/1055733980/sesame-street-make...
- seoulmetro 5y ago
  Yeah, kinda weird to make human muppets. The human-like muppets were good. It's all about that fake outrage and fake pandering.

alexfringes 5y ago

I'm not a fan of the style, but I don't see how its defining visual characteristics are significantly more geared toward the political correctness safe route that you seem to be portraying it as. At least not when compared with illustration styles that employ a similar degree of abstraction. In the the 8 years that Adobe employed a similar style, starting in the mid 90s, it clearly managed to do so without even an inkling of diversity: http://splashscreens.sourceforge.net/acrobat.php http://splashscreens.sourceforge.net/acrobat.php Depending on the year you look at, the 90s version is less abstract than the current examples we're discussing here, but some years are actually more abstract. The lack of diversity is fairly clear to me regardless of that variation. Of course, whenever we analyze abstract visuals, biases come into play. So maybe this read above is rooted in my own bias (either in favor of being able to make a point here, or in regards to how I believe a 90s corporation would portray "the business user"), but I think that's a stretch in most of these examples.

leshenka 5y ago

> They're great because you can make them genderless, raceless, and their body shapes are completely ambiguous, being neither overweight nor fit. i.e. not looking like people at all