> Perhaps it’s our obsession with quantification and optimisation.
I think this is onto something. We're no longer designing for someone, an imaginary persona who wants something specific. We've learned to gather and analyse data in a way that makes it possible to design for everyone, and we're predictable in what we desire as a species. Individual variation gets averaged out on scales that large.
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The bland paintings at the start were requested by nobody, or at least nearly nobody. They were not "People's Choice" in the sense that most people wanted specifically those paintings. It might even be the case that nobody requested the (blue × animals) combination. Maybe among four responses we get
- Blue × humans
- Blue × trains
- Green × animals
- Red × animals
and then we end up with a (blue × animals) painting. The same thing is going on elsewhere. When trying to offend as few people as possible on each property independently, it's hard to get anything other than what we get.
however, i dont think it is a matter of offending people, but of boiling down our differences to the least common denominator. if you ask people around the world what the color of the sky should be, you cannot be surprised when they all answer "blue"
I think this is onto something. We're no longer designing for someone, an imaginary persona who wants something specific. We've learned to gather and analyse data in a way that makes it possible to design for everyone, and we're predictable in what we desire as a species. Individual variation gets averaged out on scales that large.
----
The bland paintings at the start were requested by nobody, or at least nearly nobody. They were not "People's Choice" in the sense that most people wanted specifically those paintings. It might even be the case that nobody requested the (blue × animals) combination. Maybe among four responses we get
- Blue × humans
- Blue × trains
- Green × animals
- Red × animals
and then we end up with a (blue × animals) painting. The same thing is going on elsewhere. When trying to offend as few people as possible on each property independently, it's hard to get anything other than what we get.