Simplicity in Web Design at SXSW 2002

Jason Fried, Stewart Butterfield, and I will be leading a peer meeting at SXSW on Simplicity in Web Design (3:30-5:00 on Mon, March 11). If you’re attending SXSW, you should swing by and join the conversation. Here’s the panel description:

“As the Web continues to increase in complexity, many designers are looking to simplicity as a tool in designing Web sites that are at once powerful and easy for people to use. Join your peers and colleagues in a discussion facilitated by three working designers who are committed to producing work which is simple: obvious, elegant, economical, efficient, powerful and attractive. We’ll be discussing what simplicity in Web design really means, the difference between Minimalism as an aesthetic and simplicity as a design goal, who is and who isn’t simple, how you can use simplicity to your advantage, and plenty more.”

The peer meeting is something new at SXSW this year…it was described to me as “a real life chat room”. It emphasizes the interactivity and level of participation one finds in online spaces, and tries to move it into a physical discussion forum. To make that online/offline connection a little more concrete, we’re looking for examples of Web sites and applications that are designed with simplicity in mind. Bonus points for ecommerce sites, Web tools, or sites that are not obviously simple (a site might be visually complex, but still easy to use). Share your examples of simplicity.

(Oh, and if you’re planning on attending the peer meeting (please do!), let us know if you have particular aspects of simplicity in Web design that you’d like to see discussed.)