Consulting a website on my phone recently, I was struck by how painful it has become to use the internet. All I wanted was to read some local news and check the spread of a power cut in my area. Instead, as I scrolled, I was assailed by interruptions from integrated adverts which – in the best case – wanted eagerly to tell me about the charm and usefulness of a new BMW. In the worst case, I was urged to consult some lawyers immediately because I had been mis-sold an insurance or financial product in the past and was due an enormous payout, if only I would contact the least credible-looking advocates in the country.
When I use YouTube, I’m swarmed by ads featuring young people who claim to have mastered day trading (and I can get rich, too, by paying for their course, or joining their chatroom, or spreading the word to my delighted friends and family). Or I see phony advertising powered by AI, ads which claim Elon Musk is giving away bitcoins to a fortunate few, or Vitalik Buterin (the creator of Ethereum, another cryptocurrency) is having a special anniversary event for all adherents to his vision – accompanied by a lucky dip you can enter by clicking this link. No need to worry about where the link goes. Don’t you want to be rich?
It’s the same whether I browse on my phone or on a laptop or desktop. It’s everywhere. Is it possible, you may ask, that I simply dislike advertising? Guilty. But when did you last see an advert, especially online, which you actually enjoyed? A shouting builder insists that you, yes you, can profit from a government scheme regarding solar panels, if only you go through him. Or a tedious youthful entrepreneur type insists that they have ‘invested’ in lightweight luggage – and that you must, you simply must, join in.
But I fear the degenerating aesthetic quality of the internet goes beyond advertising. Even between the ads, the videos one might watch on YouTube or TikTok or Instagram Reels are getting uglier and cruder. They have garish, oversaturated colours. Their makers OVERenunciate every OTHER WORD so you DON’T go AWAY. Video thumbnails now have massive red circles and arrows to draw your attention to something inconsequential, or large text with strange comments like ‘Wait, this is actually FIRE?’ or ‘What does he know?’ to hook people like fish on a line.
Some of this is merely a trend in design. In the recent past, parts of the internet were made by people who were pleased with themselves. Their designs had a sleek minimalism, a deliberate elegance. We could sell extra ads, designers implied, or we could pack every square inch of screen with links to other things on our site. But we prefer not to do it. We’re better than that – and so, dear reader, are you.
Parts of the internet used to prioritise elegance. Now almost everything is loud, oversaturated and cramped
But money’s tight and standards have fallen. The minimalism of the past decade has given way to a style made up of needless additions. Many websites swell with fake sponsored content. They suffer from horrible design more broadly. Autoplaying videos are loud and annoying. Screaming headlines are so big they’re difficult to read. Some newspaper websites have taskbars and menus so packed with keywords it’s hard to find something as simple as the obituaries section or the weather. (First, you click on the ‘burger’ to open up a series of nested menus, then you navigate to ‘Misc’…)
AI art does not help. In theory, it has put new tools in the hands of ordinary people. It might, advocates claim, give some users’ graphic design skills a much-needed polish. But sadly, at least in web design, the users of AI have found their reach exceeds their grasp. AI has made many online visuals uglier and more generic even as its underlying technology improves. (Think hyper-real fake people who seem uncanny, even frightening; or images that look like animation but have none of the grace and perspective real art would naturally incorporate.)
Some parts of the internet used to prioritise elegance. It went beyond snob appeal. If users could navigate around easily, and see what they wanted, form followed function. Now almost everything is loud, oversaturated and cramped. And users are under constant advertising siege. It’s no wonder, I thought, mid-power cut, that people who are online all day are losing their minds. I know I am.
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