The web design world, if you pay attention to many of the css and webdesign gallery sites, can seem a bit insular. Seemingly every few months, a new design accouterment pops up out of nowhere and is seemingly on every site. A past example of this is what I’ll call the ‘Crackerjack 2 for 1 Special Sticker’. Here are a couple examples I dug up:
Both of these sites are well designed sites and I’m not picking on them, I’m just using them as examples. For all I know, they were the first to use the element. But for a while, these ‘stickers’ were everywhere. As an element, the meaning of them is often lost on me, but that’s beside the point. And if you’ve been paying attention lately, the crackerjack sticker has been replaced by the peeling crackerjack sticker. It’s basically the same, but instead of a sort of star shape, it’s round and is actually peeling off the screen, implying that you better hurry up and take whatever offer is within its bounds or it just might fall off. Three sites I found that do this are:
Perhaps the next trend will be another sticker on top of the old sticker, which is also peeling and maybe a bit torn. Perhaps it offers something even free-er. I can’t wait.
So these are three sites I found, what are some others?
Isn’t this called a Violator in packaging design?
Here’s a really poor usage of the “crackerjack”: http://www.nomadexplorers.com/
LOL, I my site won’t be listed on unmatched style. Oh well I am just one guy, trying to do the best he can, with much more to go. I have more important things to focus on than a sticker image. Pretty nice of you guys to specifically bash somebody’s work though, classy!
After seeing these peeling stickers, I have trouble sleeping. I just don’t understand. Why peeling? Do they use cheap adhesives? Why not just go ahead and draw in a forefinger and a thumb to pull it along even faster and convey even more urgency?
I first want to point out that the top two examples are not a sticker, they are a badge. The Web 2.0 Badge has made its rounds, and is seen on thousands of websites.
The sticker concept is another way web designers have tried to bring visual design cues and metaphors from the physical world on the screen. There is nothing wrong with that!
Although I find the curling sticker to be silly (why hide some of the text you’re trying to promote?), I certainly don’t think it warrants a flamebait article about it!
Sure bring all the visual cues and metaphors you want form the physical world, just do them right… but in the “real world” wouldn’t the first examples still be applied as stickers?