[LazyJim]

...fake.

OK not all designers are fake, but there's an incredible number of self proclaimed designers that don't design, or even know the first thing about it.

There are two meanings to the word, and most people don't know this, or don't know which one they are using. Also while you may know, the people reading that you are a designer, probably don't.

Design is:
1) to plan and invent the route from problem to solution.
2) a decorative or artistic work.

Notice that (1) is a verb, and (2) is a noun.
Creating (2) makes you an artist not a designer.
If you carry out the processes involved in (1) then you are a Designer.
If you apply (1) to create (2) you are a Graphic Designer.

It's not necessarily your own fault.
Every time I tell someone I am a "Web Designer" they assume I just make web sites look pretty.
I think it started when graphics tools on the computer gave anyone the power to create visual designs and graphics, and publishing to the web became easy as pie.
People who created graphic designs for web pages and published them as web pages put 2 and 2 together and made 22; they called them selves Web Designers. They are actually Graphic Designers in a Web context.

While I do not want to devalue Graphic Design, and understand the importance of visual appeal. I wan't people to know what they are, and what they do, I want real designers to get the recognition they deserve, and above all, I want the public to understand, or at least appreciate the difference.

If "Web Designers" and "Graphic Designers for the Web" cannot tell the difference, then how are the public going to find out?