Ask HN: How important is design?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5469283

by blubbi2 • 13 years ago

4 14 13 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

How important is design when you launch a website or an app? I'm not only speaking about UI-design, but also about the "aesthetic factor". It seems to me that design is important, but not a necessity. Of course, design will boost your startup, but is it really important to have a well-designed, beautiful interface or is it good enough to have a clean, usable interface - like HN?

What do you think about this issue?

josephpmay2• 13 years ago

It really depends on what your building. Are you building a B2B application targeting IT departments? Design doesn't matter as long as it's logical and functional. Building a consumer app? In that case, design is much more important.

blubbi2• 13 years ago

What about Craigslist? Is Craigslist a special case?

zachlatta• 13 years ago

Craigslist is the only exception I know of.

josephpmay2• 13 years ago

I think Craigslist is a special case because it's in a chicken-and-egg market. I personally hate using Craigslist because of their poor design, though I've heard rumblings that they're going to change that.

phelipao• 13 years ago

I like the Craigslist design. It is simple and easy to use.

dynabros• 13 years ago

Design = attraction

Development = personality

You need to be attracted to someone before you're willing to get to know their personality

atarian• 13 years ago

Like jospehpmay mentioned, it really depends on what you're building. Usually I find good design to be an absolute must when breaking into a crowded space (like social networks, email clients, etc). If you're innovating, I think most people will usually care more about the functionality and what problem you're trying to solve rather than how it looks.

ragatskynet• 13 years ago

I agree with the others but; design should be important in enterprise applications as well. I have seen many enterprise applications which were designed so badly people can't really use them very well. Of course I am not talking about fancy design things, but their usability sometimes... argh. Though they need to cut down money on something, so they focus on the functions instead.

But - if you want to get attraction (like said below) you need to focus on design. You won't look at a Mercedes if it was ugly.

Ask HN: How important is design?

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