Overly Critical Web Designers
I launched a couple of sites in the last day as part of the Fall CSS Reboot and have been perusing the designs that others have created. One thing I noticed has amazed me.
Its not any site in particular that I remember unfortunately, its the fact that people are so critical of others work. At this point, there must be about 900 sites listed. Amazingly, there’s only 1 site that has an average rating above 3 out of 5. Earlier in the day there were 2 sites rated over 3 (not the one that currently is) so I assume its only a matter of time before this one drops as well.
I find it extremely hard to believe that people can’t rate someone else’s work highly. Its unconceivable to me that 1/900th of the sites listed rate higher than a 3.
So what’s the deal? Are people really that hesitant to give credit to anyone other than themselves? I’ve noticed more and more lately that the comments on CSS gallery sites such as Stylegala and CSS Beauty other nothing more than nitpicking over minor details. People don’t appreciate the big picture, what it took to design and create the entire site. Instead, they dwell on the use of a <span> on a form instead of a <fieldset>.
I’ve started to browse sites such as CSS Import rather than the others because I can appreciate the work that people do and not have to see the inane nitpicking of people who seem to be satisfied by nothing.
In the end, I’m just hoping there’s a rounding error on the reboot site that’s causing this. This event was supposed to be a rallying point for the web standards community, not another forum to criticize other people’s hard work.
And no, I’m not bitter because of any ratings my sites have received. That’s not why I signed up. I can honestly look at a site and think, “man, I wish I could do that” but that’s apparently not something others are very willing to do.
Update: By the time I finished writing this, the one site rated above 3 dipped to a 2.91 rating so not a single site is rated over 3.
Comments
1. November 2005
Hey Rob—I used to enter online photography competitions quite a bit (DPChallenge) and I would see the same type of scoring. This website used a scale of 1 to 10 to rank photographs, and the most amazing photos would usually be scored no higher than a six or seven.
At the end of each competiton, you could see how many times a specific photo was given a score of 1 (the lowest possible score). Even the best photos would have multiple scores of 1. This must be an Internet thing, where you have so many people voting that the total scores are diluted. You will always have the jerk who tries to bump up their score by going through and giving everybody else a low score.
Alan
1. November 2005
That’s why I use the services, but I never read the comments (or in this case, disregard the ratings), too many people quick to offer unconstructive criticism. I still use these sites so I can check out others’ work, evaluate it from the user point of view, and see if there is anything I could learn from it.
2. November 2005
Perhaps I should go through and give more 5 stars, because I have no problem praising something when I think it’s done well. On that note, I think the “Best of Show” was http://www.ribic.org/
2. November 2005
I think that the core problem is that 99% of people voting on the site will be participants, so they obviously have a vested interest in not voting too many other sites above their own. Perhaps this combined with the fact that so many designers are bored of seeing the same old effects and layouts is causing the low average voting.
You’re right, it is a shame that not more were given higher votes – I’ve probably voted on around 100 sites, and given 10-15 of those a 4- or 5-star ranking, but I have to admit my voting is mostly visceral; I don’t think I’ve looked at anyone’s code, I simply think “oh, another two-column blog with drop-shadows and a picture of a flower at the top, but it’s got some nice icons – I’ll give it a 3.”
2. November 2005
Really… mine was rated 1.66 out of 5. :P I think some people run around giving everything a one.
2. November 2005
Matthew – I see what you’re saying but don’t see what benefit people get out of ranking other people’s sites low. This isn’t even a contest like Alan mentioned!
I’m now convinced that someone, something or some group of people are purposely skewing the results. The highest rated site is 2.1. The numbers have been steadily falling for the past 2 days. Me thinks something’s gone wrong in reboot land.
Nathan – Thats a neat one. I hadn’t seen it yet. I think Matthew has one of the nicer reboots along with e-velocity.
2. November 2005
Rob: Well I wrote the voting script, so unless Adam has screwed it up somehow between May and now (which I doubt) it is working as intended.
Perhaps if the rankings were a little larger (like Stylegala, with 1-10 votes) there would be more of a tendency to give higher scores. To me, a 5/5 score means the site really has to blow me away in terms of its design, and not many sites do that. Perhaps to a lot of people, 4/5 is still a “wow, that’s incredible” site (again in the minority), so inevitably the majority of sites will receive mostly 1s, 2s and 3s, leading to an average score a little over 2 (as we are seeing).
It was the same last year (although there was something weird going on with the voting, it was limited to two sites only).
2. November 2005
Sorry, I meant in May, not last year. Seems longer ago than it actually was… ;)
2. November 2005
This is quite worrying indeed.
I have a rather disturbing guess – In my opinion, the ratings are so low because there are many cheaters who boost their stats by manipulating cookies to allow multiple vote and giving 1 star to everyone who stands on their way (pergaps many times if needed).
This is just awful, but it’s just a guess after all, I can be mistaken…
2. November 2005
Matthew – Its not that I think the voting script doesn’t work right. I was just hoping that was the reason because at least that could be explained.
My point is still, what happened since the Spring Reboot? There were numerous sites rated higher than 3 and most higher than 2.
As of now, there are only a couple sites rated above a 2 for the Fall Reboot. And those sites were just added today which means they don’t have nearly the same amount of votes as sites added yesterday. For the sites that have been up since yesterday, rating have continue to go down over the past 24 hours.
Maybe as the web standards community grows and CSS gallery sites continue to pop up, people are unfairly expecting to see the next joshuaink or web.burza each time they look at a site.
3. November 2005
”...people are unfairly expecting to see the next joshuaink or web.burza each time they look at a site.”
I think that is probably the most accurate comment so far. Que sera sera.
4. November 2005
I find that I go less and less to showcase sites. The thing that really delights me is to find a site with high design standards, that has content that keeps me coming back.
It’s all too easy to get showcase burnout!
In an ideal world, good design would the norm and not the exception, and less needing of demonstration
5. November 2005
Well, everything else on the Internet always seems to follow this pattern where the pioneers are encouraging and excited to see others’ work, and then when it becomes more mainstream, it gets filled with trolls. I almost wonder if this is happening because CSS design is, in fact, that mainstream.
6. November 2005
@ Matthew
It’s funny how you should mention that because my partner the other day visited your site after noticing the voting script was done by you, whiling shaking his head at the cookie based voting that everyone is messing around with he asked me “what’s the deal with everyone and that bamboo image or w/e plant that is, and those rounded corners look icky”. Some people are enjoying this while some are jjust thinking its a big “cssreboot needs a big reboot”. I guess everyone has their own opinion but what a damn day it’s been!
Dev
Devon
8. November 2005
I quite agree, I’ve seen some nasty comments. A friend of mine got showcased on CSS Beauty, and had several bad comments. Like CSS Beauty standards have gone down… what’s the point of this site being here etc. The asthetics of design are going down it seems. Unless it flashes Bing Pop Snap it doesn’t get a good constructive comments.
But if anyone remembers at all when flash was making a huge bang. If the site wasn’t like 2Advanced it also got the same attitude.
That’s why I’ve been avoiding the comments and just viewing the sites. I’ve become a big fan of screenspire.. no comments just sites.
24. January 2007
I think the kind of mentality that web design draws is that of an insecure, pessimistic person. being that most of these people in the profession are not professionals. after all it is something that early teens can pick up and do extremely well. in fact, almost anyone can do it, it isnt really a professional endeavor.
so these rejected losers obviously, feeling so self-worthless, bag on others to make their worth appraise more…or so they think. they just continue being lonely, live in their mommy’s basement losers.
i make more a week, than they do the next 3 months. screw em.
DaMasta
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