Designers often talk about the look and feel of a product, an app, an object, etc. These are good concepts to be talking about, but how the thing feels isn’t really the important feel. The important feel is how it makes you feel. That feeling isn’t usually covered by look and feel discussions.
This has recently come into focus for me. The trigger? Instagram.
I’ve been on Twitter (@jasonfried) for years. Since I don’t have a Facebook account, Twitter has been my only social networking outlet. I mostly use it for sharing novel or interesting things I’ve seen or read, the occasional quote, or a point of view, perspective, or epiphany about something business related.
I follow just under 200 people. Some of them I know personally, others I’ve never met, some are brands, some are individuals, some are because of hobbies or special interests, some are dead serious, others funny or silly. It’s a healthy mix, and I try to pay attention to everything that shows up in my feed.
Twitter’s an amazing thing, no question. I think it’s one of the most important products ever, and it’s absolutely changed the way ideas, news, insights, complaints, and casual communications happen.
A few months ago I signed up for Instagram (@jason.fried). I started following a few people – some of the same people I follow on Twitter. Almost immediately I felt something – I felt good! Instagram makes me feel good. I enjoy thumbing through Instagram.
Since then, every time I’ve gone back to Twitter, I’ve noticed I’ve felt anxious, unhappy, uncomfortable. I didn’t notice this before I started using Instagram, because I didn’t have anything to contrast it with. It was just the way it was, and I didn’t think much about how it made me feel.
Every scroll through Twitter puts at least one person’s bad day, shitty experience, or moment of snark in front of me. These are good happy people – I know many of them in real life – but for whatever reason, Twitter is the place they let their shit loose. And while it’s easy to do, it’s not comfortable to be around. I don’t enjoy it.
Every scroll through Instagram puts someone’s good day in front of me. A vacation picture, something new they got that they love, pictures of nature, pictures of people they love, places they’ve been, and stuff they want to cheer about. It’s just flat out harder to be negative when sharing a picture. This isn’t a small thing – it’s a very big deal. I feel good when I browse Instagram. That’s the feel that matters.
So now I have a choice… When I have a few minutes to kill, and my phone is in front of me, I almost always reach for Instagram. I never regret it. I come away feeling the same or better. When I occasionally reach for Twitter, I discover someone’s pissed about something. I often come away feeling worse, feeling anxious, or just generally not feeling great about the world. Twitter actually gives me a negative impression of my friends. I know it’s not Twitter doing it, but it’s happening on Twitter. that’s how Twitter feels to me.
None of this has anything to do with how the apps look or feel. It’s not the buttons, it’s not the animations, it’s not the interface or visual design. It’s not the colors, it’s not the font, it’s not the transitions. It’s how using the apps make me feel before, during, and after. The sense of anticipation (am I about to see something wonderful vs. am I about to get a dose of someone’s bad day?), the things I experience as I scroll through (a butterfly vs. an injustice), and how I feel once I’m done (that was nice vs. fuck that – ugh).
The Twitter vs. Instagram experience is really reinforcing what matters when designing a product. What kind of behavior can we encourage? What kind of moments can we create for people? What do people anticipate before they use something? How does it leave them feeling when they’re done? These are now some of the most important questions for me when working on a design.
BTW: You can follow me on Twitter at @jasonfried or on Instagram at @jason.fried. I promise to keep both positive.
Jermaine
on 08 Apr 15I wish I could double-tap this post. Such a good observation. Personally learned a lot on Instagram as well. So many interesting things to discover.
Bryan
on 08 Apr 15Jason, I couldn’t agree more. I have a teenage daughter who decided to put together “100 Happy Days” on Instagram. For 100 straight days she posted a picture of her doing something fun with either friends, our pets, her siblings (and even her parents). I’ve haven’t enjoyed anything online as much as following her journey of happiness on Instagram.
Wil Schroter
on 08 Apr 15@jason – Twitter is more akin to the experience of reading a newspaper. Instagram is akin to listening to music on the radio. They are both information channels, but people tend to broadcast/receive a bit differently and I think that influences the source content a bit, and by virtue, your experience.
Amrita
on 09 Apr 15I wonder if this is partly because people have a harder time expressing a negative feeling visually? (total conjecture on my part). For example, Pinterest also leaves its users with similar feelings.
Regardless, it’s interesting to see the cultures and subcultures that products/companies foster. I wonder how much of this the “creator” of a product can control…
ZAM
on 09 Apr 15I do agree with that observation – while wondering how digital products have taken the turn to affect our daily life and emotions. If Facebook was also in the list that would have been interesting, because – as mentioned in this post is one of the reason why I stopped using Facebook – though I used it a lot couple of years back.
Definitely it shows others affect our lives even in the tiniest ways. And I love instagram for the feel good factor – definitely ;)
Zorrie
on 09 Apr 15So true… Only as a designer you cannot thoroughly control all the experiences users have with your product. Every product, every app etc. “lives its own life” once let free in the big WWW-world.
Faizal
on 09 Apr 15Try 9gag :D
Joel
on 09 Apr 15The vail of text on the web makes us feel comfortable sharing our ‘true opinions’ (aka shit on Twitter), whereas with a photo, its a much more intimate preview into our lives. And I believe we all share some level of desire for others to ‘like’ us, which in the case of a photo, is a realistic representation of some part of us or experience, and not some black text on a white box.
Frank
on 10 Apr 15I feel very depressed looking at Instagram. Seriously. Every time I scroll through the feed (being in a cab, at the workshop, on the toilet… ) and I see all this happy nice people have amazing lives and experiences, I feel bad. These people are happy right now, I am not. In the end how you feel a certain service will always be quite subjective and I am not sure if designers can do too much about it. Your Twitter and Instagram experience is very personalized depending on who you follow and in which mood you are when you yourself use that service. Don’t blame the service too much, as long as it is not fostering bad behaviour.
Lee
on 10 Apr 15I’m not sure you can design for individual experiences as ‘good design’ for many is so subjective. One person may love that shiny new button while another hates…on and on.
Comparing Twitter to Instagram is like pinhole view of the world. One provides the reality of life—warts and all, while the other shows life through rose-colored lenses.
Brad Fults
on 10 Apr 15I think you’re selling yourself short if you determine most or all of the value of a product or service based on how happy it makes you. As Lee points out, Instagram presents the world [sometimes literally] through a carefully curated filter. Taken to the extreme, we could all be happy eating nothing but sugar, salt and fat, and never arguing or having our worldview challenged by anyone.
I would say that’s a short-sighted an unfulfilled life. Much of the content on Twitter that isn’t pure ranting or emotional dumping is information, which often makes you feel bad because you learned about police shooting unarmed people, or a dictator slaughtering citizens. Knowing upsetting things is part of living a well-rounded life, so while I can see an argument for filtering out people who uselessly complain, there is a whole lot of signal on Twitter (and news sites) that is not happy, but is important.
Peter Spear
on 10 Apr 15Thank you for this post. I think what you are articulating is vital to product and brand development, yet can get the short end of the stick with talk of users, usability, and design, etc.
I’ve come to call this kind of sensitivity “brand listening” because it is a way of researching the experience that is attuned to the subjective, emotional (read: human) experience where most value is actually created.
Jason Fried
on 13 Apr 15I think you’re selling yourself short if you determine most or all of the value of a product or service based on how happy it makes you.
I’m not determining all or most of the value based on how happy it makes you, but how something (or someone) makes you feel is a very big deal. I think it’s important to consider how your product makes impressions, and what kind of impressions you promote, when designing your product.
P
on 14 Apr 15The feel of Twitter vs Instagram .. nowhere this seems more evident to me that when comparing DHH’s feeds: critical opinions on Twitter about things that really seem to annoy him (companies sucking, tech IPOs, NSA, etc) whereas his Instagram feed is filled with lovely people and things he surrounds himself with (family, awesome looking cars). There is a certain aspect of distance to how people behave on Twitter (could this be because of Twitter being more of a “text” medium, and text being a symbolic & introspective representation of our impressions of the world), whereas Instagram feels more immediate, intimate and local (that “a picture is worth 1000s words” cliche springs to mind). Thank you Jason for your insights.
Nick Foley
on 14 Apr 15The idea of using a social network or product based on its ability to filter away the negative or challenging aspects of real life is depressing. It is like self-selecting for your own positive-only filter bubble… like Instagram-as-Soma despite the fact that all of the negativity still exists (and needs to be addressed) elsewhere.
I’m not really defending twitter here, since there are certainly plenty of stupid, angry people on it… but the metrics you’re suggesting could make an equally strong case for the ‘goodness’ of an app that helps you find a tranquil place to go put your head in the sand…
Jason Fried
on 15 Apr 15but the metrics you’re suggesting could make an equally strong case for the ‘goodness’ of an app that helps you find a tranquil place to go put your head in the sand
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with intentionally putting your head in the sand from time to time. Isn’t that what vacation is about? Isn’t that what watching a great show is about? Isn’t that what a great novel is about? Isn’t that what going on a walk in the park is about? Sometimes you just want to enjoy yourself and not be bombarded with negativity and snark.
This discussion is closed.