Maybe there is hope for you yet, Mr. Newspaper. Although the internet may be faster, more convenient, and infinitely better in so many ways, perhaps newspapers have some life left in them after all. The key, according to Jacek Utko, is design.
We are accustomed to newspapers coming in a certain shape, size, colour, texture, and basically any other description you can think of. Newspapers have been essentially the same for hundreds of years, give or take the invention of colour ink and recyclable paper. You expect a few big, square images on the front cover, which is folded over once, then to open up into a 2 page spread which varies little from the basic grid, and continues for approximately 20 pages, and repeats over 5 or 6 sections. Colours are always muted, images are similar in format, size and content, and typeface is the same size, colour and font throughout (besides headlines).
According to Utko, many of the solutions suggested o save newspapers, such as making it free, smaller, more niche focused or opinion driven are viable options, but in the long run they can only buy time. His answer is to recreate our image of the newspaper. We need to take something that is very text heavy, and content driven, and bring the appeal from the outside in. Utko believes that a newspaper has untapped potential for creativity, and that will ultimately be its saving grace.
He says, “the secret is that we were treating the whole newspaper as one piece, as one composition. Like music. And music has a rhythm, has ups and downs…flipping through pages is the readers experience, and I am responsible for this experience.”
I agree with his ideas about info-graphics, which you can hear at 3:40 in the clip. I know that I am a very visual learner, and colours and large images draw me in and entice me to read dense content. His ideas about improving the entire product through function and form make sense in theory, but to be put into effect would take a change-minded individual like himself at the front end of the movement.
I’m a little bit inspired from this motivational speech. But its easy when you’re sitting on top to say “to be good is not enough.” You may not agree with everything he has to say, Mr. Newspaper, but you’re hardly in a position to be picky now are you?
There could well be potential in "thinking outside the square" in terms of newspaper production- in reinventing them and changing our common (and longstanding) expectations.
ReplyDeleteMy mum gets the paper delivered every day, and she's been getting the Herald Sun for the past 2 years, purely because she loves the cryptic crossword in there. My 16 year old brother began to read The Herald Sun, and my dad was horrified, claiming that he should be reading The Australian or The Age instead- instead of filling his mind with crap.
However, after two days of The Australian, mum and I decided to change back to the Herald. Don't get me wrong, I like the Australian, it's probably the most informative and accurate of all the papers. The reasons we changed papers were:
a. mum couldn't do the cryptic crossword in The Australian
b. there are few pictures in The Australian, which I love to pour over when I eat my bowl of museli
c. it's too big, and we only read the paper when we eat breakfast
d. we all wanted an easy read to skim over, just the main headlines (however inaccurate or badly written they might be)
e. my brother stopped reading the paper.
So, I'm the same in that I strongly relate to visuals, and I also love the smaller size of the Herald. I know it is far inferior in terms of quality reporting, but the fact is that it's a great paper to skim over when eating your brekky in the morning. Which is something all of my family do. I'm not ashamed about that, and at least my brother reads this paper!
hm im not sure. i think the only reason the newspaper is still in existence TODAY is that people like the sense of tradition, they like the big format that gets messed up on the kitchen table at breakfast, they like the huge amount of news it provides (even if they only read a little here and there), they like the black and white, the inky pages.. because that what a newspaper is. to change it would to be to ignore the majority of newspaper buyers/subscribers.
ReplyDeletesure this readership may die out, but im not sure that the generations to follow would be interested in a newspaper just because its small, in colour and niche - isnt that what magazines are for?
Good point about the magazines being exactly that: small, niche and in colour. However I think the examples in the video from Jacek Utko give you an idea of how newspapers could change drastically, or even slightly without blending into the magazine genre. I am not a newspaper reader, so maybe i don't understand the little intricacies that make a newspaper appealing. I suppose time will tell!
ReplyDelete