Siddharth Rao, co-founder of prolific Indian design firm Web Chutney, hands out a biting (and well-deserved) review of Indian publishers and their user interfaces, in a blog entry titled “Indian Publishers have the shittiest interfaces for sure“. Gotta love an Indian blog that dishes it out cleanly:

For all the silly money thats going into the online business in india, most people dont get some basics right in spite (of) truck loads of cash - Designing User friendly interfaces and navigation is one such thing.

Although he is talking specifically about Indian publishers, he also hits on an issue that is more pertinent to outsourcing: the dearth of good designers. Why is it so hard to find a talented, experienced, Indian web designer? Siddharth thinks it has to do with how easy it is to claim that you are one.

Any guy with 3500 Rs takes up a course in Galgotia Computer learning and claims to be a web designer. And anyone with a English Hons from Uthkal University becomes a content editor or even worse information architect.

Yup. This is why it’s hard to find good people. It is why the world doesn’t trust Indian design. And, it’s why Rediff looks like Yahoo leaning over the toilet after one too many Kingfishers.

Tangent: Although Siddharth’s writing is often wordy, he concisely shares my sentiments when it comes to ‘Information Architecture’:

User Interface design mission statements should be simple - give users the shit they need and give it fast.

Exactly. Skip the year you need to get a Masters in Information Architecture and just internalize the above sentence. While you’re at it, stop calling yourself an Information Architectect. People who design buildings deserve to own the word Architect. No matter how late you stayed up tweaking that website, your job is just easier. Besides, you make more money than your architect friends do - at least let them have their word.