Good design is clear thinking made visible, bad design is stupidity made visible
Edward TufteRead
Confusion and clutter are failures of design, not attributes of information. And so the point is to find design strategies that reveal detail and complexity - rather than to fault the data for an excess of complication. Or, worse, to fault viewers for a lack of understanding.
Interpretation
Effective design clarifies information rather than complicates it.
In this quote, Edward Tufte emphasizes that confusion and clutter arise from poor design choices rather than the inherent nature of information itself. He advocates for design strategies that enhance understanding by making complexity and detail more accessible, rather than blaming the data or the viewers for misunderstanding it.
In practice
In a presentation about data visualization, this quote can underscore the importance of clear design.
Good design is clear thinking made visible, bad design is stupidity made visible
I have stared long enough at the glowing flat rectangles of computer screens. Let us give more time for doing things in the real world...plant a plant, walk the dogs, read a real book, go to the opera.
There is no such thing as information overload, just bad design. If something is cluttered and/or confusing, fix your design.
The minimum we should hope for with any display technology is that it should do no harm.
PowerPoint is like being trapped in the style of early Egyptian flatland cartoons rather than using the more effective tools of Renaissance visual representation.
If you’re told what to look for, you can’t see anything else.
The role of designers and product makers is to really become much better editors. What kind of functionality is actually needed - and truly delightful - to consumers? Remove all the extraneous stuff.
My goal is to omit everything superfluous so that the essential is shown to best possible advantage.
I am passionate about what design can do - how far it can support the new ideas and the new ways of living of this 21st Century. Good design accelerates this exciting future where manufacturing is local, materials and processes are cradle to cradle, business models are both socially and financially driven.
Good design emphasises the usefulness of a product whilst disregarding anything that could possibly detract from it.
Form must never trump function. Some objects are made to look so smooth, you don't know where to pick them up or how to turn them on. If I'm designing a garlic press or cheese grater, I need my hand to fit comfortably on it. I like to know, instinctively, how to use it.
Goal we've always had for design at Apple is to create solutions that are inevitable.
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