Naive design is better than AI design

There is a scourge of AI-designed signs taking over America, especially small businesses and organizations.

I will not mince words: these signs are disgusting. They are maybe the most aesthetically ugly and repulsive things I have ever seen. It is fascinating that AI is capable of producing something far uglier than any human can. And it is highly unfortunate that AI design has largely replaced naive design.

Naive design, in the way I'll use the term, consists of any design made by a nondesigner. Think: posters put together using design software or hand-drawn signs by nonartists. Think vintage youth group T-shirts.

People used to make fun of tropes of "naive designers" like overuse of Comic Sans, poor color choices, and loud, clashing use of design elements. Now, these sorts of "errors" are charming and pleasant in comparison to AI design.

Many people attribute the use of AI design tools to cost-cutting and laziness. But I think the problem is different: you can make a cheap, lazy design without AI. The problem is that people don't trust their own abilities. They want something that looks "designed." ChatGPT, sprinkle a little more design on this. Instead of a bland, a little awkward, but still human design, AI gives you something loud, bombastic, full of flourishes, and horrifically ugly.

I am going to make an absolutist claim, and it may be motivated by taste: never, ever use AI to make a poster, advertisement, logo, sign for your business or organization. If you see someone using AI in their designs, you should tell them to stop and that it looks bad—not to shame them, but to encourage them to trust themselves as a naive, human designer. Spin up your favorite design program, or get out the scissors and markers, and make something human, and I promise it will look better than anything AI can produce.