Ruined by Design: How Designers Destroyed the World, and What We Can Do to Fix It Kindle Edition

With the arrogance and lack of wordly perspective only a designer could muster (and one whose expertise is making computer interfaces at that) the author makes a polemic argument that somehow designers are responsible for the impact of all that they design in the world. He has some valid points when it comes to the closed worlds of Facebook and Twitter, but loses all grasp with reality when extending the argument farther afield from what he knows. As if the designer of the internal combustion engine in your car is somehow responsible for the policy failures of our government to curb global warming, or even has the levers to rationally address global warming. I'm sympathetic to the idea we need more ethics in corporate work, but this book is the simplistic ideology of a person who hasn't thought very deeply about the problem but simply sees his chosen profession as the hammer to fix all too many problems in the world. At least we can be thankful he didn't go into law.Should we blame the designers of cars because making cars effective at their job also makes them easy to abuse without governments providing for proper urban planning and public transportation? Should we really blame Twitter for the abuses on its platform any more than we should blame the designers of other open forms of communications? Should we blame the original designer of the book for the hateful books that are written? Should we blame Alexander Bell for not doing more to preclude abusive phone calls?What the author fails to understand is that design cannot fix culture, and he's got the tail and the dog reversed. Designers cannot save us, and only a designer would have the arrogance to see such responsibility.The premise of taking responsibility for moral choices in corporate work is appealing--for anybody in any role--but the execution here is deeply disappointing. If you have any illusions as to the maturity of thought you'll encounter inside these pages, I encourage you to use Amazon's "read this" feature to read the introduction to the book. You'll see that you're in for a provincial and naively view of the world from somebody who flatters themselves and their chosen profession with nearly infinitely more impact than they actually have.

Simply terrible. I seriously want my money back. This is an editorial by a hateful person preaching against hate, not a useful or insightful passage here. Stay away and save your money.

I've enjoyed Mike Monteiro's previous work and have been looking forward to this since I learned he was writing it, I was not disappointed. In Ruined By Design, Monteiro accurately describes an uncomfortable reality and provides clear actionable steps that we can incorporate into our lives in hopes of turning things around. This is an important book for right now, and one everyone involved with any kind of service or product production should consider, tomorrow may be too late.

I'm not a "designer" by trade. I've been a software engineer for 20+ years and worked on systems that have informed, entertained and helped millions of users. This book opened my eyes to the great power with which I am entrusted, and exposed me to the many deliberately and implicitly harmful decisions many in my industry have been making. As software "eats the world" as some eggheads claim is inevitable, understanding the ethics of our work and our ability as individuals to drive the future in a positive direction will just get more important. Thankfully, this book exists to give us all a necessary kick in the pants.

There were times I wanted to rate this book 4 stars, other times 2. I split the difference. Some very valid points. Sometimes just a rant.

This was a difficult book to get through. I 100% agree with the overall points made here - that systems behave the way they are designed, that design cannot be neutral and that lack of diversity and ethics contribute to the ill-effects of said systems. It's a very important message and it is not served well by this book.To be honest, I know the author's style and I was looking forward to his trademark ranty and boisterous tone, but it ended up being a bit of a slog to get through. The book isn't very well organized and is an endless series of anecdotes and retellings of the ills of big tech companies. Yes, seeing them in a big compendium is somewhat illuminating, but there's actually almost no information or calls to action in here. Those that are are buried in overlong waxing poetic about the various ills of society.If you have friends or co-workers that are not bought in on the importance of diversity, the impact of design, and the great problem of unintended consequences, this book will do little to change their mind. And if they ARE bought into it, this won't give them anything new or insightful.I think if this were more focused and better edited it could be really powerful. As it stands, it reads like a first draft.

My friend glances over and says, “Woah - you said this was a design book, but it’s talking about business, lawyers, and politics? I didn’t know Designers [had this much influence].” I smirked wide and remembered they key to the book is that we are gatekeepers, not mere pixel pushers. We do have such influence through our choices.I let him know, “I’ve been realistically paid more to tell people to stop building dangerous things and to educate other designers on this, than I have by making screens, and that’s why Mike is similar to me. I want this outlook to be the new design norm.”I also believe the design licensing and unionizing ideas are essential, to protect our interests and value as Designers, (and to protect the general public, adhering to local & global safety)!P.S. Pretty please let me into the private Slack channel! [email protected] / @bitpixi on Twitter

In this book, Mike takes the task the generations of designers who have let terrible things happen on their watch. From the Facebook designers who allow the company to harvest all of our data, to the designers of cages to put immigrant children in. At every level, Designers have both helped and hindered humanity, and the latter often feels like it’s winning.Read this book if you’re interested in how you, as a designer, can make the world a better place for humanity. And definitely read this book if you work at the companies we often see as worst offenders: Facebook, Twitter, Google.

Possibly one of the best design books I've ever read and it's so easy to read. It's not meant to provide magical solutions, just analysing how we've dug ourselves a hole and how we could've not. Definitely worth reading, no matter which industry you cover- it makes you think from the first page. As a design graduate just starting out, its a necessary read, but highly suited to any level. Great source of inspiration, no matter whether you agree with its content or not.Well done.

You don't have to agree with everything that Mike Monteiro says or thinks to enjoy this book. However I guarantee you'll finish the book (or even the first few chapters) with a very good idea of what your position is on bad design, especially design that manipulates and exploits people.

It's an unashamed rant about designers and their lack of responsibility. This book's highly entertaining and contains a lot of good points, although I'm not sure the author's proposed solutions are quite as simple as he suggests. E.g. I'm not convinced the body of knowledge used by designers is mature or well-enough defined to serve as the basis for a certification scheme for professionals. In fact I'm not even sure the definition of "designer" is clear enough to know who should or shouldn't be registered. And while some designs are definitely evil, sometimes it's more because of unforeseen consequences than malice. However, anything that reminds us that we need to think about ethics and responsibility before we implement things is good. So even if you don't agree with all the points it's a fun read, and a compact book so won't take long to absorb. And if some of the points make you feel uncomfortable, that's good.

Loved this book. It wasn’t what I was expecting as the title is negative. It is a positive great read for all.