I’ve been waiting for this since the 8th grade after finishing D2 Expansion…

More and more I encounter people that seriously do what I do, people that SERIOUSLY understand and value and comprehend the profession of what means to be a DESIGNER, people that can tell you that many amateurs are stupidly taking up this profession, or at least they are trying hard and failing harder and on top of that with a wrong impression, the impression that “being a designer” is easy money for crappy services.

With them OUR reputation and the respect for this craft is going down the drain to, pushing clients to be more and more confused and out of balance, not having anymore the instinct and the eye to spot GOOD QUALITY CRAFTED DESIGN, thous choosing the cheap and low quality so called “professional designers” – If i would be asked I would say that stealing templates from the web and reselling them is not that creative or professional from any point of view.

Never the less, those that truly are in their essence DESIGNERS at the very core and get jobs in big companies who do not understand that DESIGN is not simply an adjective to place in front of a product’s name to somehow artificially enhance, are forced to embrace the same futile mentality toughs stripping them of their original imagination.

With these two problems on the surface how can a client ask for professionalism when he dose not know what that really means, and how can huge companies be professional when the leading man/woman dose not even know how to download Photoshop and yet they make the “design” decisions…..get the fuck out of the way and let us do our work PROPERLY, professionally!

Everything is designed. Few things are designed well.

I do not want to say bad things about anyone as a person, or about their craft, or their experience and imagination but…from where I’m standing, even if the tools are brilliant and the resources are flawless, without even thinking at the grate ones, I can say that the web is becoming more and more alike from website to website, everybody is copying from everybody, a continuos loop.

I’m a Visual Designer so I constantly need to be up to date with allmost everything that is new, thus continuosly browsing the web and spoting what I am about to say.

From what I am seing the web is starting to repeat its designs…more am more websites are alike, positioning, color schemes, used elements, fonts, and even the media in some of them are identical (I am so sorry but I do not want to give any examples cause I do not want people getting angree at me, this is my opinion deal with it) it is simply stupid. I know you need to do it fast and for the money, most of the times, I do it as well, but with 10 minutes extra you can create something simple and original.

Have you seen those sites that have the search on the right, the big sliding/fading/freakingout media slider in the header, that have that boring menu on a well streched line beneath the slider and the links are just plain old text? If you are doing that you need to be extremly good or you have to be a master at what you do, to make that look very good…I can continue with the details but the web shows it best.

These kind of things and the lack of free imagination in the designing process, also the overuse of some design rules out there are creating this repetition, this look-alike process which is rasing the bordom line thus making the user to head on to the next website and so on untill: 1.He gives up (shuts down his laptop) or. 2.He has the luck to find something professional and further more ORIGINAL and stick to that.

Yeah I know what you will say, that the user is used to that layout and so on and so forth BUT the users keep up from evolving, in order for our skills to evolve we need to teach the user our new technologies, our new skills, our beautiful layouts because we lead the way, we say what happends and when…the just point-click and scroll.

We all know that something pure original and amazing will stop you in your track and capture your undivided attention.

But amongst these repetitions there are only a handfull of daring web/print designers that have the guts and the imagination to bend the rules and create something which is not tied to that baseline or to those standards that are imposing these layouts, and something which will not sustain this monotness state of the web. They should be your teachers and the work they do should be your starting inspiration.

I one to them I’ll bow, keep on fighting the fight guys & girls!!

1. They are very weird people.
2. There are billions of them in the world, like colors on the screen of your computer.
3. They will analyse conversations in layers.
4. You will spend the day assembling furniture from IKEA.
5. They drink and eat all kinds of weird shit just because they like the packaging.
6. They hate each other.
7. You’ll come out the last out of the movies because you have to see the full list of credits.
8. They cant change a light bulb or without making a sketch.
9. They fuck up all the tables with their cutters.
10. They rather study the paisley pattern on your outfit than listen to what you have to say.
11. They will fill your house with magazines and whatever is out there that has drawings.
12. You never know if it is really an original or a copy.
13. They make collages with your photos.
14. They do not know how to add and subtract, they just understand letters.
15. They idolize people who nobody knows and speak of them as if they were his colleagues.
16. They take pictures almost daily and all are cut in weird shapes.
17. They ask your opinion about everything but  they do whatever they want.
18. Everything is left justified, right or center unless they arrive late.
19. They hate Comic Sans with the same passion they love Helvetica.
20. They use iPhone for everything, because everyone has one.
21. You can not decorate the house without consulting them.
22. They steal street signs.
23. Always carry their hands painted with something.
24. They buy dolls unfinished for them to paint.
25. Everything becomes something other than what it really is: cards as tickets, cards as …
26. When arguing, you will be nicknamed like the OSX spinning wheel (not affectionately)
27. Do not know how to dress without consulting the Pantone book.
28. They hate Excel.
29. They read comics.
30. They want to save the world only with a poster.
31. You will spend the day brainstorming.
32. On vacation they will take you to countries that you do not know exist and have no beach.
33. Museums are their second home.
34. They know more positions than the Kamasutra.
35. They can’t go to a restaurant without secretly critiquing the menu design.
36. They listen to music you have never heard of.
37. They can´t cook a normal dish, they always have to experiment with new ingredients.
38. They read rare books: stories of children, Semiotics …
39. When you are going to tell you something, everyone has read it in their facebook and twitter.
40. They have own iPods before you knew they existed.
41. The orgasm they remember is when they heard that Adobe was acquiring Macromedia.
42. They have their own shops just for them and there are the most expensive in the city.
43. They want to spend all the money in the Apple Store.
44. You will never understand their gifts.
45. They see ordinary objects and laugh.
46. You wake up in the middle of the night hearim them screaming “When is the deadline?”
47. They see CMYK and RGB like Neo sees the Matrix.
48. They dream of the day nobody will make a single change to their designs.
49. They rather pay for a font than for a special birthday gift.
50. They are always sleepy because they work 24/7.

Original source @ABurbonForSilvia