History of Graphic Design

Screen: Essays on Graphic Design, New Media, and Visual Culture
By Jessica Helfland, John Maeda

The New Illiteracy

Riyong Wang March 3rd 10:59pm

- Design principles are not the real problem, but more resonant issue is the degree to which we have come to accept this sort of ill-defined, anything-goes expressionism.
- Design principles like good sentence structure, editing techniques, or the ability to articulate an original idea seem to have little if any tangible value.
- The issue is the degree to which we have come to accept this sort of ill-defined, anything-goes expressionism: messy and myopic, part stand-up comedy and part soapbox-proselytizing, a "medium" that is more likely to ricochet from personal issues than respond to public ones, in the end, verges on illiteracy.
- “Angry Websites make people feel good: but are they god or people? ”
- There are no rules.



The new illiteracy is an incubator for anger a breeding ground for self-importance. Designers these days tend to use childlike grammar, “kinda”, “gottta”, and horrifyingly precious misspelling of the word “cuz”. It’s nothing compared to the warped perception of inflated self-worth evidenced in this writer’s final posting: “I’m gonna write a book.”



On the website the opportunity to say anything is both seductive and eminently achievable. “Undecipherable type and vibrating colors as if to day: I’m angry, and my site says I’m angry too, so don’t mess with me.” Design tells designer's mood.


There are no rules, anybody can do, say, think, be anything, so is design principles. Every designer has experience, so everyone should be able to learn more about the problem of creating.