AADA - Raw, direct and live chats about design and creativity

The web is getting more and more complicated, but where does that leave people trying to learn the trade?

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Music and links from this episode

A Walk by Mystery Mammal

Lonely Satellite by Mystery Mammal

Conviction by Little Glass Men

Line-by-line notes

I don't like making this podcast a look back on the golden days

But today warrants a revisit

When I first started making websites

An embarrassingly long time ago now

Some 16 years ago

There were really only 2 things you needed to make one

HTML

And CSS

Some people were still using tables for layout, but that's a different story for a different day

And now, in 2017, you need way more than that

Git, terminal, grunt, gulp, npm, package managers, jquery, JavaScript, Vue.js, deployment commands

It isn't simple to make a website anymore

This episode is all about my belief that the web is getting too complicated

This is AADA, and I'm Craig Burgess

MUSIC

Yes, before you say it, you COULD still make a website out of just HTML and CSS these days

When I make a website for myself, I usually like sticking to just these two simple things

But if you rocked up to a web agency up and down the land tomorrow looking for a job

And they asked you what you knew

And you replied with HTML, CSS, and I know FTP to upload it

They wouldn't be very impressed, and you'd be unlikely to get a job

Let's get this straight,  for most agencies, they now expect more

From graduates, they expect a lot of complicated technical knowledge

Things like Git, task runners, setting up Terminal and using the Terminal are just the tip of the iceberg

And I'd argue that this knowledge is expected

And honestly, we've done this to ourselves

The web industries desire to continue to push the boundaries, and to continue to get better

To use faster and more efficient technologies

To use better methodologies

Has brought about a massive technological barrier to the web design game

The rise of the role of a "front end developer" has lead to the development of lots of obscure and difficult to learn technologies

I know all this, because I've tried to teach this stuff

I've kept it simple too

Things like basic Git commands, basic Grunt stuff, basic terminal commands

And all of this goes of the head of nearly everybody I've tried teaching this to

We're in this industry every day, and I don't think we've realised how complicated we've made things

I genuinely don't think we've realised it

Even responsive web design is difficult to teach people, and a difficult concept for a young designer and a young web developer to understand

Over the past five years, we've seen the front end side of building a website

Just the HTML and CSS stuff

Take lots of hints and tips from the "real" development community

And all that is really good

Don't misinterpret what I'm saying here

PRogress is good

And progress is necessary

And the web design industry has matured a lot

But in our obsessive effort to get better and introduce better technologies

We've forgotten how the hell we can teach this complicated stuff to the people who'll be replacing us in 10, 20 years time

We've forgotten that this stuff IS complex, no matter what we think

I usually like to end on an answer

A simple solution that could fix everything that I've just been talking about

One simple thing that could make everybody understand our job easier

But unfortunately, I don't have it

Our industry does need to keep getting more technologically advanced

And we need to move with the times and the technology that is available to us

And we do absolutely need young people coming up though the web industry

So the answer just isn't...easy

Or the answer isn't even there

I guess all I'm trying to say

Is just think of the kids man

When you're making your next website, and you're implementing lots of time-saving, life changing technologies

Think of all the young designers, developers, juniors,...

I've been thinking about this a lot lately: what's the future of the web?

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Music and links from this episode

где она мера? by Kosta T

Through The Storm by P C III

Open Door by Little Glass Men

Line-by-line notes

The web used to be like a weird piece of avant garde music

Nobody understood it, and nobody could work out how to apply it to anything

Until Tim Berners-Lee

In 1980 there was a man called Tim Berners-Lee

Tim still exists today too by the way, he hasn't vanished or anything

But in 1980, he was working on something very special at CERN.

He'd previously made a prototype of his information sharing network, that at the time he called ENQUIRE

He'd been working on the idea of hypertext: interlinking documents and pages and sharing information

When he became a fellow at CERN in 1984, he saw the opportunity to take this idea further

Tim created something called the World Wide Web, by pulling together lots of different technologies like the Internet, and hypertext

The first website went online on 6th August 1991.

It's still online today.

From there, the rest is history.

And today, I want to speculate on the future.

This is AADA, and I'm Craig Burgess

Music

27 years later, the world wide web is more powerful and all encompassing than ever

It's used for everything,

from just plain old boring websites,

to replacing government services,

to allowing you to book holidays online

To actually providing people jobs, like me

I think few people would argue with me when I say that the world wide Web and the Internet are the two most important inventions of the last 30 years,

And a strong argument could be made for the most important invention of all time too

Think for a second

You could probably just about imagine life without some of the other greatest inventions

If they were gone tomorrow, you could get by without a TV

Without a car

Without a microwave

Without maybe even a phone

But try and imagine a life without the internet

And that's nearly impossible

On a daily basis, I communicate with people

Pay bills

Book cinema tickets

Sometimes book holidays

Upload a podcast to let you listen to it

Check my bank balance

Update websites and get paid to do it

Make people websites and get paid to do it

Doing all that without the Internet

Is either really hard or impossible

So that's the Web now, but what is the future?

I think about this a lot

Especially when I think how far the Web has come in 27 years

What will it look like in another 27 years?

That’s a really tough question to answer

Especially when I consider that 12 years ago, I couldn’t have predicted responsive websites

The way that websites now expand and contract based on the size of the screen viewing it

Before that, everybody made two websites

A mobile website

And a desktop website

Even that simple thing

Was precipitated by the rise of the smart phone

And popularised by Apple’s iPhone, and then the ensuing Android phones

I think the future is in mobile

I think in 20 years time, they’ll be no such thing as a desktop computer

We’ll look back on 2017 and the 2020s and think about how weird we were

I think we’ll all use touchscreen devices permanently for every task, or some other kind of input I can’t even imagine right now

The laptop, the PC, that will all be gone, because we won’t need it

It’s more immediate to tap a screen right on the thing you want to change

Than it is to guide an arrow on a screen to that location with a mouse

There’s lots of maturing that needs to happen before then in the touch screen space

Apps need to get more fully featured

And somebody needs to break out of the gaming and entertainment bubble,

and start to explore the idea of making serious productivity apps for touchscreen devices that take advantage of the medium

Rather than being hindered by it

And when the web is entirely mobile

When 90-100% of all people consume websites on...

I've been thinking about this a lot lately: what's the future of the web?

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Music and links from this episode

где она мера? by Kosta T

Through The Storm by P C III

Open Door by Little Glass Men

Line-by-line notes

The web used to be like a weird piece of avant garde music

Nobody understood it, and nobody could work out how to apply it to anything

Until Tim Berners-Lee

In 1980 there was a man called Tim Berners-Lee

Tim still exists today too by the way, he hasn't vanished or anything

But in 1980, he was working on something very special at CERN.

He'd previously made a prototype of his information sharing network, that at the time he called ENQUIRE

He'd been working on the idea of hypertext: interlinking documents and pages and sharing information

When he became a fellow at CERN in 1984, he saw the opportunity to take this idea further

Tim created something called the World Wide Web, by pulling together lots of different technologies like the Internet, and hypertext

The first website went online on 6th August 1991.

It's still online today.

From there, the rest is history.

And today, I want to speculate on the future.

This is AADA, and I'm Craig Burgess

Music

27 years later, the world wide web is more powerful and all encompassing than ever

It's used for everything,

from just plain old boring websites,

to replacing government services,

to allowing you to book holidays online

To actually providing people jobs, like me

I think few people would argue with me when I say that the world wide Web and the Internet are the two most important inventions of the last 30 years,

And a strong argument could be made for the most important invention of all time too

Think for a second

You could probably just about imagine life without some of the other greatest inventions

If they were gone tomorrow, you could get by without a TV

Without a car

Without a microwave

Without maybe even a phone

But try and imagine a life without the internet

And that's nearly impossible

On a daily basis, I communicate with people

Pay bills

Book cinema tickets

Sometimes book holidays

Upload a podcast to let you listen to it

Check my bank balance

Update websites and get paid to do it

Make people websites and get paid to do it

Doing all that without the Internet

Is either really hard or impossible

So that's the Web now, but what is the future?

I think about this a lot

Especially when I think how far the Web has come in 27 years

What will it look like in another 27 years?

That’s a really tough question to answer

Especially when I consider that 12 years ago, I couldn’t have predicted responsive websites

The way that websites now expand and contract based on the size of the screen viewing it

Before that, everybody made two websites

A mobile website

And a desktop website

Even that simple thing

Was precipitated by the rise of the smart phone

And popularised by Apple’s iPhone, and then the ensuing Android phones

I think the future is in mobile

I think in 20 years time, they’ll be no such thing as a desktop computer

We’ll look back on 2017 and the 2020s and think about how weird we were

I think we’ll all use touchscreen devices permanently for every task, or some other kind of input I can’t even imagine right now

The laptop, the PC, that will all be gone, because we won’t need it

It’s more immediate to tap a screen right on the thing you want to change

Than it is to guide an arrow on a screen to that location with a mouse

There’s lots of maturing that needs to happen before then in the touch screen space

Apps need to get more fully featured

And somebody needs to break out of the gaming and entertainment bubble,

and start to explore the idea of making serious productivity apps for touchscreen devices that take advantage of the medium

Rather than being hindered by it

And when the web is entirely mobile

When 90-100% of all people consume websites on...

In 150 episodes, I'm about to do something I've never done. Go uncut and unscripted. Each episode I normally record of AADA is carefully planned and written. Then I go out and find some music to fit that episode. Then I cut out the bits where I mess up. It takes a long time. I've been plotting this episode for a long time. I've spent a long time thinking about my 11 best things I've learned in the first 11 years of my career as a designer. This episode didn't feel like it deserved to be carefully edited. I turned on my recorder, and started talking. What you're listening to is the result of that. For anybody that this episode might interest, I felt they deserved to hear me being honest, and talking from the heart.

You don't know everything when you're 18

You're not good at something when you first start it

Side projects are probably the most important thing in your career

Building a network of friends is really important too

Every agency does things differently

You've got to adapt

Everything isn't always fun, or perfect, or all roses

Find enjoyable work, even if your job isn't always fun

Don't rely on motivation, rely on discipline

Read everything

Never stop learning

Subscribe: ITUNES | ANDROID | STITCHER | RSS FEED

Support Ask a Designer Anything

Ask a Designer Anything Website

Twitter (@craigburgess)

Ask a Designer Anything on Facebook

Leave me a review on iTunes

In 150 episodes, I'm about to do something I've never done. Go uncut and unscripted. Each episode I normally record of AADA is carefully planned and written. Then I go out and find some music to fit that episode. Then I cut out the bits where I mess up. It takes a long time. I've been plotting this episode for a long time. I've spent a long time thinking about my 11 best things I've learned in the first 11 years of my career as a designer. This episode didn't feel like it deserved to be carefully edited. I turned on my recorder, and started talking. What you're listening to is the result of that. For anybody that this episode might interest, I felt they deserved to hear me being honest, and talking from the heart.

You don't know everything when you're 18

You're not good at something when you first start it

Side projects are probably the most important thing in your career

Building a network of friends is really important too

Every agency does things differently

You've got to adapt

Everything isn't always fun, or perfect, or all roses

Find enjoyable work, even if your job isn't always fun

Don't rely on motivation, rely on discipline

Read everything

Never stop learning

Subscribe: ITUNES | ANDROID | STITCHER | RSS FEED

Support Ask a Designer Anything

Ask a Designer Anything Website

Twitter (@craigburgess)

Ask a Designer Anything on Facebook

Leave me a review on iTunes

In 150 episodes, I'm about to do something I've never done. Go uncut and unscripted. Each episode I normally record of AADA is carefully planned and written. Then I go out and find some music to fit that episode. Then I cut out the bits where I mess up. It takes a long time.  I've been plotting this episode for a long time. I've spent a long time thinking about my 11 best things I've learned in the first 11 years of my career as a designer.  This episode didn't feel like it deserved to be carefully edited. I turned on my recorder, and started talking. What you're listening to is the result of that.  For anybody that this episode might interest, I felt they deserved to hear me being honest, and talking from the heart. 

You don't know everything when you're 18

You're not good at something when you first start it

Side projects are probably the most important thing in your career

Building a network of friends is really important too

Every agency does things differently 

Subscribe: ITUNES | ANDROID | STITCHER | RSS FEED

Support Ask a Designer Anything

Ask a Designer Anything Website

Twitter (@craigburgess)

Ask a Designer Anything on Facebook

Leave me a review on iTunes

In 150 episodes, I'm about to do something I've never done. Go uncut and unscripted. Each episode I normally record of AADA is carefully planned and written. Then I go out and find some music to fit that episode. Then I cut out the bits where I mess up. It takes a long time.  I've been plotting this episode for a long time. I've spent a long time thinking about my 11 best things I've learned in the first 11 years of my career as a designer.  This episode didn't feel like it deserved to be carefully edited. I turned on my recorder, and started talking. What you're listening to is the result of that.  For anybody that this episode might interest, I felt they deserved to hear me being honest, and talking from the heart. 

You don't know everything when you're 18

You're not good at something when you first start it

Side projects are probably the most important thing in your career

Building a network of friends is really important too

Every agency does things differently 

Subscribe: ITUNES | ANDROID | STITCHER | RSS FEED

Support Ask a Designer Anything

Ask a Designer Anything Website

Twitter (@craigburgess)

Ask a Designer Anything on Facebook

Leave me a review on iTunes

Once you start to appreciate that nothing is ever finished, you'll live a little easier.

 

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Music and links from this episode

Mayr Hayastan/Dilijan feat. Flower Gear (VDCJ Mix part 1) by Diezel Tea

I hate mashed potatoes by Pousse Mousse

Drift Away (instrumental) by Pachyderm

Line-by-line notes

As designers

We have a habit of being hyper critical

It’s natural to look back at a thing you’ve made

And think

Well, that could have been better

And maybe I could have tweaked that a bit

It’s normal to think like this

And once you accept one thing, it’s easier to deal with it too.

Everything is a work in progress.

Fast food

This is AADA, and I’m Craig Burgess

I’ve got something to admit to

I’m the worst finisher in the world

Now before you start giggling

I mean I’m rubbish at finishing anything

I’m an ideas person through and through

I think of an idea, and I can see it all the way through to completion

…

In my mind

I’m an amazing thinker

And I’m amazing at getting excited about new ideas too

And then I’m amazing at staying up until 3am to get started on it

Because of the way I think, I always start with the names

Then the branding

In fact, I was doing this only last night until about 12.30am

Way past my bed time on a school night

Being able to start a million projects and finish none of them used to really annoy me

I used to inwardly shout at myself

Why can’t you finish anything?

In fact, the only thing I’m good at finishing is 365 days challenges

And some of them I’ve failed at too

I used to think like this a lot, and it started to get me down

I decided the only way to get out of it, was to take a break from producing so much stuff

So a couple of years ago, I took a while off

As you can probably guess, it didn’t work

I was approaching this all wrong

And then it clicked what was so wrong

I never realised, everything is a work in progress

And you should be looking at doing lots of little things, often

I was looking at all the things I wanted to do

All the ideas I had

All the projects I wanted to complete

I want to learn guitar

I want to lift this much weight

Run this far

Do this thing or that

I was always looking at the end goal

And when you’re trying to do so much

And when that end goal is so far away

That kind of thinking just doesn’t work

You have to learn to love the process

If your desire is to learn the guitar

Your goal shouldn’t be to learn the guitar

It should be to turn up, 3 times a week, and play some guitar

The goal isn’t the end goal, the goal IS the process

Because by following the process, you automatically get the goal without even realising

This kind of thinking isn’t revolutionary

Learning to love the process is something that lots of people have known for years

But just appreciating it in your life a little more

And knowing everything is a work in progress

Lets you live a little easier every day

And you turn up, enjoying every single day

And who doesn’t want that?

MUSIC

This was AADA, and I’m Craig Burgess

Music featured in this episode was:

Mayr Hayastan/Dilijan feat. Flower Gear (VDCJ Mix part 1) by Diezel Tea

I hate mashed potatoes by Pousse Mousse

Drift Away (instrumental) by Pachyderm

For a line by line rundown of this episode go over to https://www.askadesigneranything.com/ep149

Find me on Twitter at @craigburgess

I’m back tomorrow

Support Ask a Designer Anything

Ask a Designer Anything Website

Twitter (@craigburgess)

Ask a Designer Anything on Facebook

Leave me a review on iTunes

Once you start to appreciate that nothing is ever finished, you'll live a little easier.

 

Subscribe: ITUNES | ANDROID | STITCHER | RSS FEED

 

Music and links from this episode

Mayr Hayastan/Dilijan feat. Flower Gear (VDCJ Mix part 1) by Diezel Tea

I hate mashed potatoes by Pousse Mousse

Drift Away (instrumental) by Pachyderm

Line-by-line notes

As designers

We have a habit of being hyper critical

It’s natural to look back at a thing you’ve made

And think

Well, that could have been better

And maybe I could have tweaked that a bit

It’s normal to think like this

And once you accept one thing, it’s easier to deal with it too.

Everything is a work in progress.

Fast food

This is AADA, and I’m Craig Burgess

I’ve got something to admit to

I’m the worst finisher in the world

Now before you start giggling

I mean I’m rubbish at finishing anything

I’m an ideas person through and through

I think of an idea, and I can see it all the way through to completion

…

In my mind

I’m an amazing thinker

And I’m amazing at getting excited about new ideas too

And then I’m amazing at staying up until 3am to get started on it

Because of the way I think, I always start with the names

Then the branding

In fact, I was doing this only last night until about 12.30am

Way past my bed time on a school night

Being able to start a million projects and finish none of them used to really annoy me

I used to inwardly shout at myself

Why can’t you finish anything?

In fact, the only thing I’m good at finishing is 365 days challenges

And some of them I’ve failed at too

I used to think like this a lot, and it started to get me down

I decided the only way to get out of it, was to take a break from producing so much stuff

So a couple of years ago, I took a while off

As you can probably guess, it didn’t work

I was approaching this all wrong

And then it clicked what was so wrong

I never realised, everything is a work in progress

And you should be looking at doing lots of little things, often

I was looking at all the things I wanted to do

All the ideas I had

All the projects I wanted to complete

I want to learn guitar

I want to lift this much weight

Run this far

Do this thing or that

I was always looking at the end goal

And when you’re trying to do so much

And when that end goal is so far away

That kind of thinking just doesn’t work

You have to learn to love the process

If your desire is to learn the guitar

Your goal shouldn’t be to learn the guitar

It should be to turn up, 3 times a week, and play some guitar

The goal isn’t the end goal, the goal IS the process

Because by following the process, you automatically get the goal without even realising

This kind of thinking isn’t revolutionary

Learning to love the process is something that lots of people have known for years

But just appreciating it in your life a little more

And knowing everything is a work in progress

Lets you live a little easier every day

And you turn up, enjoying every single day

And who doesn’t want that?

MUSIC

This was AADA, and I’m Craig Burgess

Music featured in this episode was:

Mayr Hayastan/Dilijan feat. Flower Gear (VDCJ Mix part 1) by Diezel Tea

I hate mashed potatoes by Pousse Mousse

Drift Away (instrumental) by Pachyderm

For a line by line rundown of this episode go over to https://www.askadesigneranything.com/ep149

Find me on Twitter at @craigburgess

I’m back tomorrow

Support Ask a Designer Anything

Ask a Designer Anything Website

Twitter (@craigburgess)

Ask a Designer Anything on Facebook

Leave me a review on iTunes

The colours in fast food restaurants isn't all as it seems.

 

Subscribe: ITUNES | ANDROID | STITCHER | RSS FEED

Music and links from this episode

7-La hache et le canoë by Pousse Mousse

4-Roulé-boulé-boulé by Pousse Mousse

Dans la batterie solo by Frederic Lardon feat Laura Palmée

Line-by-line notes

As I’m in the marketing game

I see lots of things in a different way

When you’re in marketing

Or when you’re a designer

You don’t take anything at face value

My episode yesterday about Photoshop discussed that a little bit

But today, I want to focus on something else that has hidden meanings

Fast food

This is AADA, and I’m Craig Burgess

Let’s start with something really basic

And something that you won’t even think about consciously

That’s colour

Obviously, everything has a particular colour

When I spoke about political parties in episodes 145 and 144,

I talked about colour a lot

And the meaning of colour

In politics, red means a socialist/left leaning party, almost exclusively around the world

And blue means the opposite

I think Those two things, just taken by themselves,

Are pretty fascinating

Before you even see anything else, a logo, words, anything

The colour of something is already influencing you

And beyond politics, the psychology behind colour goes even deeper than that

Believe or not

When you see a colour

Just the simple act of a colour bouncing off of your retina

The it being processed by your brain

This still starts to influence you, and do all kinds of things to your mood, your hunger levels, your priorities

It’s really quite crazy when you think about it

And maybe just a little bit creepy

Fast food companies are the absolute masters at using colour to great influencing effect

Let’s take the colour red again

It’s been proven that the colour red stimulates appetite

That’s why so many fast food logos

Burger King, McDonalds, KFC

Are all predominantly red

And you have not a single say on how the colour red influences you

Because it’s programmed into your brain already

And it’s programmed to instinctually think things when presented with stimuli

Red and yellow used together, as they so often are in fast food restaurants, represents speed

And also, yellow is one of the most visible colours you can choose at any time of day, but especially in daylight, which is why McDonalds chose it for their giant M arches all around the globe

And because red and yellow has become so well known in fast food

Any other fast food places that open also pick these colours

Perpetuating the standard that fast food restaurants should be red and yellow

And as more and more fast food restaurants pop up using these colours

The more you associate red and yellow with fast food

It’s genius really

One other point that’s interesting though

Is how a lot of McDonalds have started implementing the colour green in their restaurants now

I’m not sure if it’s a worldwide thing, but this is a thing in the UK

They haven’t picked a garish green, they’ve picked a dark olive green

An earthy green

And this gives McDonalds immediately a much different impression

They’ve also upgraded to wooden tables and benches in a lot of their restaurants too

It gives off lots of new impressions of McDonalds

Mainly around quality

It makes you think about natural foods, and the environment

Lots of natural foods and vegetarian products use dark greens in their packaging

And it’s no accident McDonalds have chosen this as they’ve also been banging the "100% chicken and beef” marketing drum

The green also makes McDonalds feel more adult

And maybe a little bit more like a place to relax like a coffee shop

And not just a crappy fast food restaurant for crappy fast food

When you think about colour theory and the psychology of colour

There isn’t many greater examples than looking at fast food joints.

Next time you see a colour in a restaurant

Have a think what it’s trying to say to you

Because I guarantee...