Web Requires Immediacy
Designing for the twenty-first century presents a challenge to those trained to design exclusively for print. The Web demands a new kind of designer. This medium has reinvented how design is conceptualized, as well as re-created the designers' role in the production and creation of a Web site.
The days of symmetry have been replaced by fluidity. Screens need to download quickly, show an enormous amount of information and hold the attention of an audience that can exit with one click. As a result, the Web requires an immediacy not found in traditional media.
The new school of designers do not have the innate inhibitions of their predecessors. Some of the control a designer traditionally possesses is relinquished to the medium. Designing for print and designing for the Web require distinct approaches and strategies for how the information is presented and accessed. The designer must be willing to both subvert the limitations of this technology and exploit its capabilities.
No Web site is created just to be created; it costs too much. All design needs to fit within a business model. Gone are the days of the boutique as business savvy design studios challenge ad agencies.
Designers can maximize their creativity and innovation by thinking of the information and how it should, or better could, interact with the viewer. The 'new designer' brings a new perspective of controlling and mastering this mini-network.