Here’s a contest where 28 photographers post-processed a mediocre image in different ways,¹ showing that nudging and interpretation are most of what makes up quality in art. I think that this same principle translates to software aesthetics, in that quality is a matter of tweaking the visual properties, to find a better balance of purpose.

1. Be sure to read through each interpreted photo link, each one talks a bit about what/why ↩