--- title: "Design by enthusiasm\n | Ubuntu" description: As many of you are most probably aware I work for Canonical and some of my blog posts from here are syndicated to design.canonical.com. I was asked a rather interesting question on that blog and partly due to the impatience of the asker decided to respond by way of a post. My other motivation for […] url: https://ubuntu.com/blog/design-by-enthusiasm?format=md keywords: index, follow --- 1. [Blog](https://ubuntu.com/blog) 2. Article --- [Canonical](https://ubuntu.com/blog/author/canonical "More about Canonical") 30 July 2010 # Design by enthusiasm [Design](https://ubuntu.com/blog/tag/design) --- Share the article As many of you are most probably aware I work for [Canonical](http://www.canonical.com/) and some of my blog posts from here are syndicated to [design.canonical.com](http://design.canonical.com/). I was asked a rather interesting question on that blog and partly due to the impatience of the asker decided to respond by way of a post. My other motivation for responding in this way because I didn’t want an interesting question to be lost in the comments. The question: “I wonder if the ‘open for all’ in FOSS makes the design part suffer from ‘design by comitee’? What are your thoughts on this?” – Tor Løvskogen Bollingmo It can be hard to avoid any design anywhere being subject to influence by committee. It is very hard to avoid being influenced by people who are louder, stronger, more powerful, more persuasive and to avoid giving discussions too much weight. Get too many stakeholders involved and things can quickly get messy. This is the very reason I am an advocate of user-centred design. Good data is the ultimate opinion neutraliser. In open-source, it seems to me, we suffer from a proliferation of design by enthusiasm. A passing comment turns into a mock-up, which turns into some code and before you know it – KAPPOW! – ladies and gentlemen, we have a feature! We definitely don’t want to curb our enthusiasm, but I do think we need to learn to direct it. Ideas are cheap. Let’s learn to be discerning. Let’s get enthusiastic about building great things for a set of target users to fulfil a particular need. [Get in touch Interested in running Ubuntu in your organization?](https://ubuntu.com/about/contact-us/form) ## Newsletter signup Get the latest Ubuntu news and updates in your inbox. Work email: \*I agree to receive information about Canonical's products and services. By submitting this form, I confirm that I have read and agree to [Canonical's Privacy Policy](https://canonical.com/legal/data-privacy). Sign up ## Share on --- ## Related posts [### Challenges designers face in open source (and how to fix them)](https://ubuntu.com/blog/challenges-designers-face-in-open-source-and-how-to-fix-them) Open source powers up to 90% of modern software, yet many projects lack usability. Canonical’s Design team surveyed 115 cross-functional professionals to uncover the 4 core... [Kola Ojoodide](https://ubuntu.com/blog/author/kola-ojoodide) 26 June 2026 [### Template: Streamlining open source design contributions](https://ubuntu.com/blog/template-streamlining-open-source-design-contributions) As designers working at Canonical, we’re always thinking about open source. We believe that encouraging more designers to contribute to open source benefits everyone, from the... [Nina Rojc](https://ubuntu.com/blog/author/ninarojc) 16 June 2026 [### Decoding design: How design and engineering thrive together in open source](https://ubuntu.com/blog/decoding-design-how-design-and-engineering-thrive-together-in-open-source) Open source thrives on engineering-driven processes. Fast feedback loops, terminal tools, Git workflows: they’re the lifeblood of how we build software in the open. But for... [Miguel Divo](https://ubuntu.com/blog/author/mdivo) 22 May 2026 [### Why web engineering is great](https://ubuntu.com/blog/why-web-engineering-is-great) Hi, I’m Johann! I’m an engineering manager in Canonical’s web team. For the larger part of my 15 years of work experience as engineer, I’ve been working in web development.... [Johann Wolf](https://ubuntu.com/blog/author/johannwolf) 27 April 2026