Re: flat web design.
Buttons that don’t look like buttons.
I blew someone’s mind today. She’s about my age, competent at her job, but not much into technology.
She complained that she always needs to scroll past the weeks in her web-based calendar.
I pressed the current date shown in the top-left corner above her appointments, which pulled up a big date overview by month.
She was so excited, asked me how I did that.
Mind you, the date was shown as simple black letters on a white background, with only a black, downwards-pointing chevron a bit to the right. It hardly suggested interactivity, especially to those not knowledgeable about web design.
I often think that flat design was a mistake, and today’s situation was a good example of bad user experience (UX) stemming from non-intuitive controls.