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From the extreme complexity of MyPyramid, policy makers have opted for the extreme simplicity of MyPlate.   From my perspective, here are the positives and negatives.
 

Positives of MyPlate:

• The graphic is less complicated than the pyramids.
• It recommends all the basic food groups: protein, cereals, fruits and vegetables, and dairy.
• It tacitly encourages meals. Doesn’t it? You don’t eat off a plate when you graze.

Negatives of MyPlate:

• It is still prescriptive. Consumers are tired of being told what and how much to eat.¹
• It still emphasizes restriction and avoidance, so the overall feeling is negative. As such, it does nothing to heal consumers’ negative and conflicted eating attitudes and behaviors.¹   
• It still tries to get us to eat more than we need of fruits, vegetables and grains by stressing inflated “recommendations,” not requirements or minimums.
• It is confining. How do you get a chicken Caesar salad on MyPlate? Chili? Curry? Caldo de pollo con verduras (chicken and vegetable soup).
• It fails to emphasize family meals. This is despite considerable evidence of meals’ positive benefit^2,3 and the pivotal importance  of context management in The Satter Eating Competence Model (ecSatter).
• It fails to distinguish between what to put on the table and what to eat. Paying attention when you eat, you discover that appetite is happily fickle - what doesn’t taste good one day, does another.
• It ignores internal regulators. Is filling up the plate and eating it all, whether or not you are full, okay when it is mostly fruits and vegetables?
• Food enjoyment is still linked with “don’t eat so much.”  Rather than trusting that appetite can be satisfied, it is as if giddy self-indulgence will carry us away.
• Salt and fat, condiments that contribute to food enjoyment, are still vilified.
• It has been subjected to little or no consumer testing. To avoid doing harm, wide-ranging health and nutrition policy must be subjected to wide-ranging testing.
• Last, but not least, MyPlate isn't suitable for children. It is too low in calories and fat. Moreover, loading up a plate for a child puts pressure on him or her to eat, and the child eats less well under those circumstances.

Nobody asked me, but what if I were doing it?
The two basic principles of the 2010 Dietary Guidelines (DG) are: 1) Maintain calorie balance over time to achieve and sustain a healthy weight. 2) Focus on consuming nutrient-dense foods and beverages. Based on research with ecSatter, ^4-6 I would operationalize those principles in these ways:

• Address eating attitudes by stating unequivocally that eating is one of life’s great pleasures⁷ and that family meals are an essential part of eating well.⁸
• Be firm about discipline:
  • Structure: have meals and sit-down snacks.
  • Pay attention when you eat.⁹
• Give strong permission.
  • Put together meals with foods you enjoy.⁸
  • Eat what tastes good from what is at the meal.⁹
  • Eat as much as you are hungry for.¹⁰
• In a neutral fashion, give consumers food management tools,  absolutely avoiding shoulds, oughts, and exaggerated recommendations for low-calorie foods.⁸
  • Basic food groups, what they include, how much satisfies minimum requirements.
  • Menu planning - how to put together a satisfying and rewarding meal that is considerate of eaters’ various food preferences without limiting the menu to readily accepted foods.
  • How to use fat, salt, sugar, and other condiments to make food taste good. Such culinary guidance, by its very nature, supports moderation.

1.    Satter EM. Appendix C, What surveys say about our eating. Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family: How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook. Madison, WI: Kelcy Press; 2008.
2.    Hammons AJ, Fiese BH. Is Frequency of Shared Family Meals Related to the Nutritional Health of Children and Adolescents? Pediatrics. June 1, 2011 2011;127(6):e1565-e1574.
3.    Satter EM. Appendix B, What the research says about meals. Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family: How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook Madison, WI: Kelcy Press; 2008:227-230.
4.    Lohse B, Satter E, Horacek T, Gebreselassie T, Oakland MJ. Measuring Eating Competence: psychometric properties and validity of the ecSatter Inventory. J Nutr Educ Behav. 2007;39 (suppl):S154-S166.
5.    Psota T, Lohse B, West S. Associations between eating competence and cardiovascular disease biomarkers. J Nutr Educ Behav. 2007;39 (suppl):S171-S178.
6.    Stotts JL, Lohse B. Eating competence level of low-income adults advocates for attention to intervention development. .J Nutr Educ Behav. 2007;39:S39.
7.    Satter EM. Chapter 2, Adjust Your Attitude. Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family: How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook. Madison, WI: Kelcy Press; 2008:12-16.
8.    Satter EM. Chapter 5, Feed Yourself Faithfully. Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family: How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook. Madison, WI: Kelcy Press; 2008:45-50.
9.    Satter EM. Chapter 3, Honor Your Appetite. Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family: How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook. Madison, WI: Kelcy Press; 2008:17-25.
10.    Satter EM. Chapter 4, Eat as Much as You Want. Secrets of Feeding a Healthy Family: How to Eat, How to Raise Good Eaters, How to Cook. Madison, WI: Kelcy Press; 2008:27-43.