bird - 4:57 pm on Feb 18, 2002 (gmt 0)

One thing that Nielsen makes perfectly clear in almost any of his writings is that you have to design your site so that it appeals to your target audience, and that it reaches the goals you had in mind when designing it.

If your goal is to attract as many people as possible, and to offer them something that triggers them to give you money for it, then any high tech gizmos and graphic extravaganza will stand in the way of that goal.
If your goal is to "express yourself artistically", then you can use any gadget and violate any useability guideline you like, and you may have reached your goal anyway, even before the first visitor has ever seen your site. And by doing so, you still adhere to Nielsen's principles!

I'd actually turn the accusation around: Nielsen knows very well that the spectrum has two ends (at least) and that each has its place. Davis appears to deny the justification of any other aspect than creativity, and thus stifles useability. Of course this is a very speculative assumption from my side, as I can't make heads nor tails of his site... ;)