Designing around people’s needs, interests, and capabilities has become one of the main goals of digital products and services in recent decades. Today we talk naturally about user experience, usability, or user-centered design as if they were inseparable from the internet or contemporary technology.

Yet this way of thinking is not new.

Starting from the idea, proposed by Robert Hoekman Jr., that an application is not an end in itself but a means and sometimes an obstacle between people and their goals, it is logical that much of design effort is aimed at removing friction and making those goals easier to achieve.

What is interesting is that this approach existed long before we had words for it.

Below are two historical examples that show how putting people first has been, for more than a century, an effective strategy for creating value.

1. Irving Thalberg and cinema designed for audiences

There is a particularly revealing example in the 1920s, when concepts such as user experience or user-centered design did not even exist.

Irving Thalberg, an American film producer, introduced an innovative practice for the time: screening films to specific audiences before their official release. The goal was not to validate a closed artistic vision, but to observe how real audiences reacted and adjust the product accordingly.

This way of working marked his time first at Universal Pictures and later at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the studio created when Thalberg was hired by Louis B. Mayer. His management was effective and, surprisingly, very efficient from an economic standpoint.

Thalberg was behind the success of films such as The Big Parade, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Mutiny on the Bounty, or The Broadway Melody, the first major musical in film history.

His figure was nevertheless controversial. His particular balance between authority and modesty led him to make decisions that were not always well received, and he was criticized for reinforcing the producer’s primacy over the director.

Even so, his impact was so significant that the Academy created a special award in his name to recognize his contribution to the industry. His understanding of production allowed these professionals to be valued for originality, inventiveness, and craft rather than for money spent.

Beyond the creative debate, his approach left a clear lesson. Listening to the audience before launching a product does not weaken the vision; it makes it stronger.

Listening to the audience before launching a product does not weaken the vision; it makes it stronger.

2. George Eastman and photography as an experience

An even earlier example is George Eastman, founder of Kodak and inventor of roll film.

In 1888, Eastman introduced the Kodak 100 camera with a message as simple as it was powerful: You press the button, we do the rest.

Historical ad for the Kodak camera

With that proposal, he did not just introduce a product, but a new way of understanding photography. Eastman removed technical complexity and transformed a specialized object into an experience accessible to anyone.

In doing so, he turned photography into an ongoing service rather than a one-off act, laying the foundations for a model that would last for decades. His innovation was not only technological; it was understanding that the real value lay in the user experience, not in the device itself.

As Daniel Gilbert would point out much later, and Kevin Kelly would also note, Eastman achieved something fundamental: investing in an experience that generated satisfaction rather than in a product alone.

Two stories, one idea

These two examples, separated by very different contexts and disciplines, share a common intuition. Success does not come from imposing solutions, but from understanding the people for whom they are designed.

Long before we talked about UX, user research, or user-centered design, there were already professionals who anticipated that putting people at the center not only improves products, but also builds more sustainable and relevant companies over time.

Technology has changed. The core idea has not.