Does anyone remember the time when Mosaic introduced inline images to the community of WWW users? Well, I didn't even know that the internet existed back then, so I can't say that I do. What I do know, however, is that people don't seem to realize just how big of a deal that was. What's the big friggin' deal about a web browser displaying a string of byte sequence that encodes RGB values, you may ask. Well the significance of that incident wasn't that it was a technical advancement in image viewing technology (perhaps it was a big deal precisely because it wasn't a technological breakthrough). It was a big deal because it opened up a door for a paradigm shift.

Most of you will remember that the introduction of inline images for Mosaic eventually gave birth to all the crazy web sites with animated gifs, ugly horizontal rules, and tiled backgrounds. Many of us, including yours truly, are guilty of those websites. I bet you've been hoping that everyone would just forget about that phase in your life and move on. But, nope! Today's your unlucky day, cuz I'm going to bring all that memory back! =P

But why? Why the hell would I want to bring back the painful memories, you protest. It's because I believe that was the defining period in the history of graphical user interfaces that made it absolutely clear, once and for all, in terms of what users thought of their desktop user experience thus far. No, really. I'm dead serious. Unfortunately, I'm not talking specifically about the ugly images you used on those web pages (you should definitely keep your day job). What I am talking about is the implications of the visual interfaces that were used on these web sites by people like you: they did not resemble anything found on our own desktop applications.

You see, when both the creative and the not-so creative minds that comprised of the WWW community were given the choice of defining their own interfaces, neither of them looked at their desktop applications and go "Gee, I'd really love it if my web site had these lovely beveled grey buttons and menus that I've admired for so long" No siree, bob! Many of them went running out into the wild looking for that spinning e-mail icon, and the glossy "back home" button instead, while others carefully crafted their own with tools like Photoshop. It didn't matter whether you were artistically inclined or not, we were all just users: users who knew what we wanted to see and experience. And boy did we make sure we didn't re-experience the desktop on the Web.

But something weird happened as the Web matured. Browsers got more sophisticated with scripting technologies, and a whole new profession called "web developer" was born. That much isn't weird, but then DHTML became the talk of the town and professional programmers suddenly showed up in the scene and proceeded on a grand quest to...... turn the web into a desktop application. o_O; For some reason, these genuinely smart individuals were going out of their way to simulate the very paradigm users intentionally went away from. I mean... Sure, creating GUI toolkits out of the DOM was technically slick. Yeah, that draggable window inside my browser is kinda cool. Come over hear and I'll even give you a pat on the back for that technical Rambo maneuver. But weren't you paying any attention to what people did with the Web??? Wouldnt anyone who had been watching say "Man, it looks like the users really don't think very highly of the desktop application UI. Maybe we should stop and think about what they will find compelling."???

It takes a moment before you realize that the Web has actually raised the bar in terms of what users could expect from graphical user interfaces, both visually and interaction-wise. Not necessarily because the Web is an easier platform for building interfaces (although I can personally argue that there's much truth to that) or because the interfaces found on the Web is leaps and bounds better than the ones found on our desktop, but because it showed the masses what's possible beyond the desktop paradigm. Yet the expert DHTML gurus are spending days and nights trying to take us back 20 years into the world of cascading menus and hierarchical trees!! Now that's an ass-backwards movement even Kriss Kross may not be able to top. I mean... WHY??? So that the Web can suck just as much as your desktop? Is that the goal?? Or was it so that you can hear the I-am-not-worthy crowd go "Wow! I did not think you can do that on the Web!" Well, guess what? Maybe we shouldn't be doing that on the Web.

If we're really passionate about our desire to provide users with the power to harness the information-rich environment of the Web, we must first throw away our preconceived ideologies about the UI paradigms found in our application-centric environment of the desktop. I know it's comforting to have a reference guide, a benchmark, or even that sense of familiarity. But, man... we have to let it go... we just have to let it go. This is not about bashing DHTML or even the specific use of cascading menus or hierarchical trees. As a matter of fact, I believe DHTML has incredible potential. It's just that we have to break out of the mold and think of creative uses of the technology, instead of blindly copying the wisdom of the old engineers.

C'mon people... I may not be smart enough to tell you exactly what the new interface should be like, but you guys are! Help make the Web a better place! PLEASE!!!