The Question Stack

When I was just starting out as a designer I’d ask things like, how do I make drop shadows in Fireworks? How do I hack Javascript to make this hover thing work? What the hell is semantic markup? How do I use grids and color in a way that doesn’t make me look like a fraud?

Then after a while the questions got harder: What do journalists need to do their jobs more effectively? Why isn’t there an easy way to share what I’m reading with my friends? Should randos in Turkey be able to follow my mom on Facebook? What would it mean to never forget anything — to have a complete set of memories with the people I care about? What the hell is collaboration?

Then they get even harder: Why help newspapers when a lot of their writing is depressing? Will we regret spending so much time in front of our screens, how will that actually feel? By only projecting the ideal side of ourselves are we manipulating reality in a harmful way? Richard Dawkins says we’re just machines for genes, wut? Does anything matter?

Then questioning the questions ensues. Will this ever have an answer? If so will it actually change anything?

Design is the creation of a plan or convention for the construction of an object or a system — Wikipedia

You can’t have a plan before a question. Design is often more a search for the right questions than it is answers. It’s too easy and satisfying to jump to solutions, whether you’re a designer of some sort or not. When you do you’re cheating yourself and the people around you.