Google’s UIs always look slightly odd and unpolished at first glance but their apps are all nice and elegant. When actually using it you quickly notice that everything is thought through and works as expected. It’s not flashy, the overall theme is a little childish, but all the elements are at the right spot.
I don’t want to start that old stupid thing about programmers and how they are unable to create useful UIs (Sorry programmers, you don’t get off the hook so easily.), that’s just stupid. The above linked site was made by someone who is clueless about UI design. You maybe a programmer, but that’s no excuse. And just some polishing won’t do.
(I would just like to add: I think the idea is great an practically screaming for a sleek UI.)
Good points. Thank you. We definitely want the very best UI and we are not thinking that it is of secondary importance or that we can just spray it on. We will get it right.
I would strongly disagree, just because it's slim doesn't mean it doesn't look designed. I've run across a lot of apps trying to be slim and basically just Google that have failed miserably because they were "designed by programmers". Google has many subtleties to it that makes it a great design.
I think google can be a bad example when making design considerations, because they provide the simplest product on the internet: type in some words, get back a page of links. They don't need any design, they just need to pick the right links.
