Spotted this thread on Twitter today, these are the thoughts of a designer, retweeted by another designer I follow:
Given the pithy responses to the original tweet, I will give the designer the benefit of the doubt that he was just yanking everyone’s chain with this thread, but I have seen designers who post stuff like this without irony.
To those that do this - Just. Stop. Please.
I applaud that you perceive that there may be a problem with something you see in the universe, and that you think it could be better. But before putting your critique’s hat on, please take the time to become more familiar with the domain of the thing/concept that you are critiquing.
To cover the above scenario: I used to be a pilot, and had to learn morse code as part of my studies to obtain my license. I initially thought the same as above - what a confusing jumble this seems. But guess what? When I actually started to USE morse code, I realised what an incredibly efficient method of communication it is. The series of dots and dashes are not seemingly random, as pointed out by one of the replies above, rather they reflect the frequency of usage (‘E’ is the most commonly used letter in the English language, and is denoted by a single dot), and are also designed to prevent ambiguity of similar sounding letters.
To suggest that the series of dots and dashes are dependent on the ‘numerical position within the set’ is flawed thinking. Quick - who can tell me the 16th letter of the alphabet? The 11th? As you can see - this is a pointless strategy.
(On the other hand, morse depiction of NUMBERS uses a flowing pattern system that is logical and consistent).
I was blocked on Twitter last year by a certain ‘high profile’ designer who is considered a darling of the Twitter Design community. She raised questions about something that is commonly used in the aviation industry, and when I (politely) pointed out the flaws in her thinking, based on my actual real world knowledge of the topic, she immediately Tweet shamed me and blocked me to prevent any further discussion on the subject.
This was quite an arrogant and myopic stance to take, and I hope that she is still not considered a role model for new up and coming designers in the field. (Note that she raised questions, but like the above example, didn’t actually use her designer expertise to come up with any sort of solution for the problem).
I know plenty of great designers. Some of them have even worked on my own creations and made them better than I could have ever envisaged.
Questioning something is perfectly valid. But before you voice your opinions on a particular facet of the existing design, please take the time to study the history and immerse yourself in the context of that design, and ask yourself WHY it is as it is currently? There are always forces that hold things in place, and sometimes those forces exist for a good reason, and shouldn’t be bent or altered unless your way forward is significantly better.