Why government is still obsessed with flashy design?
I was going through the DigitalMSME website, which is recently launched allowing MSME companies to use the digital platform in joining the MSME movement and take advantages of different schemes from Government, including different IT services provided to boost operational efficiency. The intiative is certainly welcoming and with right approach can help lots of Indian MSMEs to grow.
But at the same time — it’s equally painful to see a traditional and outdated design for a website which itself has a word “Digital”. The Digital world is far ahead of what it is represented in the DigitalMSME website. Just to share an example, please have a look at the below picture showing the Notifcations section ( or you can go to this link http://www.digitalmsme.gov.in/ICT/ICT_Welcome.aspx to experience by yourself as well).

Can you remember when you saw such kind of flashing gifs last? Probably in 2007–2008, where this was a trending design. If you want to enjoy these gifs or want to create a presentation with these flashing gifs — just search “new.gif” in Google and you will get a great deal of such images with different combinations and designs.
Now, the point is — we are a decade ahead and the design trends have changed a lot in these 10 years, with the tablets and mobiles widely used and internet browsers evolved to a different class accommodating new designs like Apple’s Human Interface design, Microsoft’s Flat Design or Google’s Material Design. When we develop a new website, we need to ensure some of the basic trending design standards are met, if not all.
This is not the era where people enjoy installing flash player to view animations in the browser and certainly not the era where people enjoy too many colors for no reason. The information matters undoubtedly and certainly matters more in a website like DigitalMSME. But on top of that — User Experience (UX) matters most where people are much tech-savvy comparing to a decade earlier and accessing a website from different devices.
Pointing out few more glitches below —
The Swacch Bharat logo is looking like a paint-job, with uneven edges.
The MSME logo on top-left is not visible properly, and it disappears when you try to view the website on mobile.
The DigitalMSME logo seems to be built on Powerpoint. A mature logo is expected for such an information website.
The Home, Twitter and Facebook icons on menu-bar are not matching in color. Some flat color icons are certainly useful here.
Too many colors for no reason
If DigitalMSME website developers are reading this post — this is a gentle request to upgrade the design standards to improve the human experience on the website with improvements on UX, Visualization and usage of good imagery.
