Recently, why doing a project track for our internal team, I managed to get four of our existing rethink projects together side by side, since these are the titles that will launch a new look before July 1.  I normally do these project tracks to alert everyone on the Garcia Media team about our progress, so that all are informed and on the same page.

The moment I looked at the four front pages of these newspapers in four different countries and continents, one thing was obvious: color use.

Not that color has not appeared in most of our projects since day one, but what got y attention was the variety of hues in the color palettes of these projects, as well as the choices, especially for logos, an area in which little, if any, color experimentation every took place, but that seems to be a very organic and fertile ground in which to take color to the next level now.

And because my observation about color was spontaneous and fun, I sent the image of the four projects side by side to my good friend, colleague and design and color expert, Dr. Pegie Stark Adam, with whom I have collaborated on a variety of projects, including the Poynter EyeTrack series for print and online, the past 25 years.

Pegie brings a unique perspective to color and design because she is also a fine artists with a rich collection of paintings to her credit, at least one of which I am proud to be the owner of and to display in my home.

I sent the pdf of the images to Pegie, but did not mention my reaction to the color.

A few hours later I got her mail and her informed response, which I share with you:

“What I am noticing in the world around me is that color palettes are becoming more vivid and now I see why - the introduction of the tablet. I see how beautiful and rich colors can be on my iPad. It’s almost like painting rather than printing on newsprint which always creates color intensity problems. “

The digital influence

Pegie is right. Indeed, we consciously or subconsciously design for print with a sort of digital sense behind what we put on the pages.  Not just for color, mind you, but also and especially for navigation, the use of icons and symbology, the display of graphics.

Only this past week, while showing first set of designs to a group of clients in the United States, a member of the group commented:

“That front page looks very much like something you would see in a tablet.”

Until he said it, I had not observed that, in fact, this newspaper front page could easily appear in a tablet edition and call your finger to action on the screen of that iPad.

There is nothing wrong with that, as long as we are well aware that a printed newspaper edition is NOT a tablet, or online edition.  But there is benefit, and I become more aware of that each day, if we take certain functional design strategies and apply them as much as possible across the various platforms in which a title presents its information.  Not just in extending brand recognition, but functionality.

This is an interesting area to continue to observe and to experiment with.  Perhaps those cognitive psychologists who study how users engage with various platforms in today’s media environment will tackle the subject and offer us some insights.

Meanwhile, however, I am fascinated by Pegie’s comments that when we design for the tablet, for example, we are sort of painting on a canvas, as opposed to placing—or hanging—elements on a page, which is the case when we design for print.

Even more fascinating is how art (in its most pure sense), design, marketing, psychology and technology mix in this process.

Of related interest:

The work of David Hockney on the iPad

Pegie tells me that she is studying the David Hockney iPad paintings. Hockney, considered one of the most influential contemporary British artists, has taken to the iPad as his new canvas.  See him in action here:

And here is story about David Hockney art on iPad:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-11666162

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1020

TAKEAWAY: The Gulf News, published in Dubai, will convert to the Berliner format on June 1.  We help with the preparations for what will make the Gulf News the first newspaper in the Berliner format in the Gulf region.

Front pages from the various UAE daily newsappers: Gulf News, The National, Kaleej Times, Sport 360, Al Bayan, Al Ittihad

I am reporting this week from Dubai, and what excitement is there in the Gulf News newsroom as the date approaches for its conversion to the Berliner format.  This week I join Miguel Gomez, Gulf News design director, as we put finishing touches on the many details involved when converting from broadsheet to Berliner.

When the Gulf News makes that move, on June 1, it will become the first newspaper printed in a Berliner format in the Middle East.

Geographically speaking, I cannot imagine a spot in the world with the same degree of media effervescence and energy as what is happening in the Gulf region.  I first visited the area almost 10 years ago, for a first major redesign of the Gulf News.  I have remained on retainer here ever since, visiting every three months and watching closely the evolution not just of the Gulf News, but of other titles in the region.

In the United Arab Emirates, printed newspapers thrive, and because the competition is aggressive, the positive result—-and a win win situation for readers and advertisers—is that titles are constantly changing and evolving.

When I look at the sampling of newspapers at my breakfast table here, I see award winning design coming from The National, The Kaleej Times, the Gulf News, and from the Arab-language titles, Al Ittihad, Al Bayan, as well as from the new sports daily, 360.  It wasn’t always this way here.  Visual journalism here has taken off at the same speed as the highrise buildings that make Dubai and Abu Dhabi cities of the future.

The Gulf News is #1

Recent page from the Gulf News showing the many awards the newspaper has received this year

For the Gulf News, the title with which I consult here, the constant quest for quality has paid off handsomely, as demonstrated by recent figures from the Arab Media Outlook which show that the Gulf News is the most read newspaper in the UAE, with the highest number of paid subscribers. 

This is no small accomplishment in an age in which media face tremendous competition, not just from other media, but by such factors as lack of time, which figure prominently in the audience’s decision when asked about their media consumption.

“We are very proud of our standing among UAE readers,” says Abdul Hamid Ahmad, editor in chief of the Gulf News. “In a highly competitive market, we remain number one not just among English language dailies, but among all newspapers. That requires hard work and dedication.”

Visual journalism advanced

Less than 10 years ago, when I first visited the Gulf News newsroom, there was no design department, no art director, and no concept of visual storytelling.  Today, under the leadership of Miguel Gomez, all that is design, infographics and visual presentation are paramount, fully integrated into the daily editorial planning across platforms, and relevant to everything that is done here.

This recent page (shown above) published in the Gulf News showed the many accolades received from worldwide organizations.

With the change to the Berliner format will come many opportunities for better use of photographs, graphics and illustrations.

The Gulf News continues to evolve.  We will keep you updated here on the day of the launch.  Stay tuned.

And if you happen to visit Dubai in the next few months, give yourself a treat and sample all the wonderful dailies published here. 

The iPad in the schools

I am happy to read that Carrollwood Day School, of Tampa, where three of my grandchildren attend, will launch an 8th Grade iPad Pilot Program. Next year, CDS will introduce a one-to-one iPad program for the eighth grade. The iPads will be purchased and owned by the school. Every 8th grade student and teacher will be issued a personal iPad for the school year.

This is becoming a trend in many American schools, to introduce students as early as possible to the iPad.  Our future readers are becoming experts at reading on the new devices.

Of special interest today:

Sleep on them! (Covers of your favorite magazines turn into pillow cases)
http://www.spd.org/2012/05/snuggle-up-with-your-work.php#&panel1-1

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1019

In case you have not read it yet, I recommend this piece published in The Verge.

In a nutshell: Writer Ellis Hamburger relates his experience visiting Vadim Lavrusik,  a “Journalist Program Manager” attempting to make Facebook as important a destination as Twitter for news.

Those are the first few lines in the piece, and the rest is just as interesting.

We already know that news nowadays breaks on Twitter. It is an accepted fact and there are plenty of recent news events to verify it.

So Facebook wants to be part of the process—-and, in some cases, it is already.  I refer to Twitter and Facebookas the central squares, where the masses gather for all types of information. Breaking news being a part of it.

The Facebook News Feed

About 500 million people per day see the Facebook News Feed. Amazing number, but not surprising, knowing what we know about the impact of Facebook and how it has become a part of our daily ritual, one stop we make on the way to or from whatever else we are doing. And not once a day, but perhaps several times a day.

Perhaps one of the highlights of the piece on The Verge is when the writer asks Mr. Lavrusik about the difference between News Feed and a news website like The New York Times .

“It’s as if he doesn’t really think of the two media as different forms at all, but instead two brothers: one medium contains current stories written by friends, while the other contains current stories written by journalists.”

One could say that the differences are greater than that, of course.  A traditional news website presents material curated by editors who follow a prescribed agenda based either on their publications’ philosophy of what constitutes good and necessary content (this may be different for The New York Times and a regional newspaper, for example).
The Facebook News Feed, as we know well, reflects a more spontaneous, highly personal and less cohesive mix of items.

We need both, in my view, and I, for one, cannot imagine one of these two choices of getting information replacing the other.  But I can’t help but think that for years we only had the news as selected and processed by editors, who followed their own agenda.

We were missing out on a lot of great and entertaining rich information, which Facebook’s News Feed provides.

The thought that this piece from The Verge brings to mind is whether Facebook’s News Feed, or others like it that may come along in the future, will continue to make inroads in the areas traditionally covered by “official” news websites such as The Times.  Is the aim of Facebook to make their News Feed a one stop shopping trip for media consumers?

Will I open my Facebook page to find the top 10 news items that I must know, combined with news about what my friends in Germany or Sweden did last night, and the photos of my grandchildren at a little league game or a school talent show?

A sign in Vadim Lavrusik’s page“ title=“Facebookpage”>Facebookpage reads:

“Journalism isn’t dying. It’s being reborn.”

He could add “…reshaped by the people’s own concept of what is news, what is important and what they relate to.”

It is about what has consequence, which was always on every journalism textbook about the determinants for what makes news.

What those old journalism textbooks did not mention was the level of engagement that the audience demands.

Facebook apparently sees consequence and engagement as the two forces that will shape its future.

We in the media should concentrate on those two forces as well.

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1018

One month after the launch of its new tabloid Weekend section, De Telegraaf readers appear to be enjoying the new content offerings and the design that packages them.

To hear design director Hans Haasnoot describe it: “Our readers are very much loving the Weekend supplement and all that is new,“ Hans writes me. “Each week we in the newsroom get more organized and have more fun producing the weekend, and this translates into satisfaction for our readers.“

As readers of the blog may recall, De Telegraaf launched its new Weekend package April 7. It introduced a newly rethought Weekend section—full of useful articles to make the reader’s life better, healthier and more fun.  Weekend became a tabloid section while Reportage, which was also redesigned and rethought, remained in the broadsheet format as the rest of De Telegraaf.

I now look at these pages and admire the visual energy that each of them carries.  Recently, a designer colleague I met at a conference, who is familiar with the design style of De Telegraaf, asked me if it was difficult for me to create a systematic look for a newspaper whose design is not at all associated with rules, templates or system.

It was difficult at first: what designer would not be taken by surprise when faced with the front page of Holland’s De Telegraaf?  But once I got over that initial shock and asking myself the question as to where to begin, then it was a matter of focusing on this newspaper’s rich DNA, and making sure that it was preserved, as we created a more systematic approach.

Indeed, if you take a close look at these pages, you will see how the system works:

—Story structures have been created for the different type of stories.

—A color palette ties the Weekend package together and creates differentiators for the various sections, most of which are only two pages, as in Health, Money, etc.

—Created a Center of Visual Impact (CVI) on each page, to generate hierarchy and avoid the former style of too many items equally sized.

So, I told my designer colleague, there is a system for the madness here.

And, what is most important, the DNA and visual branding of De Telegraaf comes through.

Our previous blog posts about De Telegraaf:

http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/de_telegraafs_weekend_edition_launch_2_a_new_weekend_edition_launched

http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/de_telegraaf_of_the_netherlands_preparing_for_a_newly_designed_weekend_edit

http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/de_telegraafs_weekend_edition_launch_2_a_new_weekend_edition_launched

Illustrations for the digital book

Here are two sample illustrations by Luis Vazquez, of the Gulf News of Dubai.  We commissioned Luis to create the images that will accompany each chapter of my digital book, The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet.  These illustrations are for the Pop Up and Advertising chapters respectively.  Luis has captured the spirit of the book in each of his illustrations, which will be used as chapter openers.

Of special interest today

Bitly data shows the best times to post links to Facebook, Twitter and Tumblr
http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/mediawire/173308/bitly-data-shows-the-best-times-to-post-links-to-facebook-twitter-and-tumblr/

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1016

Update #4: Saturday, May 12, Dubai, 12:40

TAKEAWAY: The word “redesign” was already overused by the end of the 1990s; however, in 2012, it should be substituted for the more appropriate term “rethink”.

Once upon a time in what seems ages ago,”redesign”was the paramount word to describe change within a newspaper.  And redesign we did, first trading Bodoni-style fonts for Helvetica-svelte fonts; introducing color to gray old ladies; putting promo boxes above or below the newspapers’ flags, some of which were, in turn, changed (gasp!), creating order from chaos, and, even switching from broadsheet to compact formats. Then came the waiting for the reaction of the readers, not to mention the contest judges who would decide if the redesign was worthy of gold, silver, bronze, or a “non event” medal to the forgotten from the most trendy contests.

But that was then and this is now: in 2012 the word redesign is not adequate for what we do, although, indeed, we do redesign.  However, today the redesign is one of many tasks that are involved in the process of “rethinking” an entire news operation.

It takes a while to get the teams in the newsroom to forget that it is all about the redesign, and get them to engage in a rethink.

It is easier to redesign than to rethink, of course, and less stressful, threatening and difficult to execute.

For me, the word redesign no longer describe what my team and I do when we come into a newsroom.

Starting with the briefing

I must admit that many of my projects have started with a call from an editor, publisher or art director saying something like:

“Hey, Mario, we would like you to come and redesign our……”

Usually that is the last time that “redesign” creeps into the conversation.  After an initial briefing, in a majority of the cases, we all agree that a rethink is more appropriate.

In my first workshop I usually pose the question: if your newspaper did not exist as of today, if it never existed, what would we be gathering to discuss here today?

Ah, storytelling and how to present information to an audience that moves across the platforms.

So, is it practical to begin discussing the typical “redesign” topics: can we change the logo? Are we changing the format? Are we going for different fonts? More use of color?
Less text on the cover?

Not that these questions are not important, but they are so a half hour ago, if you follow me here.

I prefer to engage the group with questions that are more likely to sound like this:


—Which platforms is your current audience using to get information?  Which platforms are they likely to use by 2015—-I am not one for projecting the products beyond three years, which in today’s terms could be an eternity.

—What is the DNA of your publication and what is the strongest area of content? Usually, it is local. If so, how can you give your local coverage better display across the platforms?

—What is the philosophy of your newsroom about breaking news? Indeed, we know news breaks on Twitter. What do you do with the story following that first burst on Twitter?

—Do you have a newsroom plan in action to trace the path of a breaking story across platforms right when it is happening?

—Finally, what is the role of the tablet edition in your newsroom?

Where should one begin?

So, here we are, originally brought in to redesign the newspaper, but the conversation has shifted and the redesign is now item 3 or 4 on a list of 6 or 7 items.

And that is the way it should be.  Soon the members of the newsroom who were counting on a quick cosmetic fix redesign a la dynamic 1980s or glorious 1990s, begin to realize that this is NOT what will propel them forward.

Instead, the story takes center stage, then the platforms.

After this exercise is completed, the question is, for purposes of look and feel, which of the platforms do we pick to get started with sketching?

There may be different views here, but I prefer to start with the digital platforms and then move on to print.  And of the digital platforms, it is my preference to begin with the online edition, which sits between the mobile phone and the tablet, but with many common features.

After story structures have been defined and applied digitally, then application to print becomes easier, more functional, and just as much fun as it ever was.

But, remember, there is no redesign without a proper, thorough and sometimes painful rethinking of what you do and how you do it.  Along the way, the big elephant in the room, and one that must be dealt with: do we have the people to execute our rethink?

Often yes, sometimes not.  This is where part of the pain of rethinking comes in. I am happy to say that in my experience,  most newsrooms manage to realign human resources, to create new positions, to assign new tasks to those in old positions, and, presto, change in on the way.

If the word redesign has any proper use today is in the need to redesign some editors out there who simply do not get it.

There is no true and sustainable rethinking of a product without the editors joining the process with gusto.

So, if your organization is calling me about a redesign, we will, of course, provide that, but not without a thorough discussion leading to a rethink.

Meet the “What Did I Miss?” Generation

First, we had the generation of the always connected , but that was in those long ago early days of the Internet when online was the safest way to be sure one was constantly informed.

Then, we talked about digital natives with addiction to anything with a screen and news updates.

Now, it is the “what did I miss?“ generation, those truly warriors of connectivity who are even jealous of the few hours they spend sleeping and thus anesthesized from incoming news.

A piece in The New York Times profiles one such person, but I am sure he represents many more.

Since every addiction signals the arrival of a therapeutic treatment to eradicate it, I can only imagine the power of disconnect that authors like William Powers(author of Hamlet’s BlackBerry) promote.

Pages we like

The South China Morning Post devotes its Back Page to the magnificent illustrations by staff artist Adolfo Arranz.

Follow up

O Globo’s iPad app

This week we blogged about O Globo’s new iPad app: O Globo +.  Here is an article of interest that relates to that subject.

- Revenge of the afternoon newspaper: Brazil’s O Globo sees engagement skyrocket with a magazine-like iPad app
http://www.niemanlab.org/2012/05/revenge-of-the-afternoon-newspaper-brazils-o-globo-sees-engagement-skyrocket-with-a-magazine-like-ipad-app

First Paragraph:

A surprising thing happened when Brazilian newspaper O Globo launched O Globo a Mais, a new weekday evening edition designed for its iPad app in February. The amount of time that people spent using the app per day shot up from an average of 26 minutes to an incredible 77 minutes. The jump seemed unbelievable, even for the team behind the new publication.

The Hindu publishing new Luxury weekly supplement

Cover of the new luxury supplement, which devotes most of its content to watches

Earlier this week we mentioned that the Indian daily, The Hindu, has started publishing a tabloid supplement each Saturday devoted to Luxury items.  Art director Brian Gaughan send us some sample pages from the first edition.

Weekend reads

 
- USA: Colin Myler’s ‘Daily News’ is working on a new national site, ‘Daily News America’
http://www.capitalnewyork.com/article/media/2012/05/5868016/colin-mylers-daily-news-working-new-national-site-daily-news-america
 
- USA: Programming Politico’s Future With Video
http://www.adweek.com/news/press/programming-politicos-future-video-140071
 
- USA: Papers Offering More And Better Video News
http://www.tvnewscheck.com/article/59254/papers-offering-more-and-better-video-news

- Content, function and purpose: Three lessons on mobile and tablet publishing for magazines from #PPAConf
http://www.themediabriefing.com/article/2012-05-09/Three-lessons-on-mobile-tablet-publishing-for-magazines

-The Art of Apps
http://artofapps.splashthat.com/

Register Citizen’s ‘open’ newsroom
Register Citizen Editor Rick Thomason leads a tour of its experimental newsroom, open to the public every day of the week.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E55WIoh-hxA

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1015

The Brazilian newspaper O Globo has launched an iPad app.  Called O Globo a Mais (or O Globo Plus), this app is curated, appears in the afternoon and includes highlights of the newspaper’s printed version, plus exclusive digital material.

I have now downloaded the O Globo + app, after reading the statements from O Globo’s online editor, Pedro Doria, in an interview with the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas.

It caught my attention that the O Globo + app is published in the afternoon—a desired time slot based on what we know about the behavior of tablet users. Doria stated that the tablet uses a similar edition of the printed version, but with online tools, such as audio, and video. The difference between the three formats is in the time of day in which they are used and how the reader interacts with each of these formats.

It is worth mentioning that O Globo is one of Latin America’s most respected newspapers, a leader of Brazilian journalism and one the most prominent print publications in the Marinho family’s Brazilian media conglomerate.

About the app

In those first ten seconds when we look at the landing page of the O Globo + app, we get a feeling of a classy, elegant and authoritative publication.  The app is read in vertical mode exclusively, with most of the gesturing involving horizontal swipes, with scrolls for texts within a story only.

The navigation is both vertical and horizontal, quite visual and easy to follow.

Typographically, this is an elegant and clean app.  There are some videos in the edition I have downloaded, but not a large number of pop ups or animated graphics.  Perhaps this will come later.

In terms of advertising, there appears to be one company sponsoring the edition I downloaded.  The advertising presented is rather flat, and not much different of how the ad would have appeared in print.

Overall, a pleasant, easy to navigate app. There is nothing here that can be described as breaking new ground, but the app does reflect the DNA of the print edition, and it has all the potential to grow and to become more interactive.

I am tempted to say that my disappointment with the O Globo+ app is that, in spite of its elegance and visual attractiveness, it has not advanced newspaper apps to the next level.  However, as a person involved with the creation of news apps right this moment, I know the challenges that O Globo’s team may have faced, principal among which , if my experience is correct, are:

1. The difficulty of making print editors join the app effort with passion.
2. The difficulty of hiring extra people to develop the app to its full potential—-as in more pop up moments.
3. The continued confusion about how quickly a newspaper app can become a revenue producing part of the operation.

O Globo + has gotten out of the gate with all the potential to be a winner. It will be fascinating to follow it in the months ahead.

Of interest today

- USA: $3M in Subscription Revenues For BostonGlobe.com, But Site Still Struggling to Convert
http://paywall-times.com/index.php/3m-in-subscription-revenues-for-bostonglobe-com-but-site-still-struggling-to-convert/

 
- USA: $5.8M for Dallas Morning News in Digital Subscriptions
http://paywall-times.com/index.php/5-8m-for-dallas-morning-news-in-online-subscriptions/

- Why Publishers Don’t Like Apps – The future of media on mobile devices isn’t with applications but with the Web.
http://www.technologyreview.com/business/40319/

 
- The changing role of the homepage and why your website is not a newspaper
http://www.themediabriefing.com/article/2012-05-03/The-changing-role-of-homepage-and-why-your-website-is-not%20an

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post # 1014

Illustration by Ana Lense Larrauri/The Miami Herald

For reasons that escape me, but which I am sure I have promoted myself inadvertendly, people associate me with a glass of champagne in my hand.  It could be worse, I always remind myself.

Why the love affair with champagne?

I discovered champagne in my 40s, more than 20 years ago.  Until then, my contact with alcoholic beverages was an occasional and refreshing gin and tonic, which probably had something to do with coming of age in hot and humid Miami. Gin and tonics always guaranteed a “refreshment”, better than Sprite or 7-Up and more sophisticated.  I think I had my first gin and tonic at a birthday party for a college friend when I was 20 years old. While most of the crowd at that party was drinking beer, and the occasional rum and Coke (Cuba Libre), I did not take to those drinks at all.  Beer, rum and hard liquor have never been my thing.

But, alas, along came that first glass of champagne, and it was not at a wedding. That would have been anti climactic.  My first glass of champagne, and I do remember the moment distinctively was aboard a Pan Am flight en route from Miami to Los Angeles.

Indeed, the glamour days of flying.  The stewardess in the light blue cap and uniform offered me a glass of bubblies right after take off for the five-hour flight and I gladly accepted.  It made me feel good, relaxed. I remember that I was listening to that great jazz singer, Diane Schuur, singing “Sunday Kind of Love”.

Little did I know at the time that I would be engaging in that ritual of “the three” for a long time to come: sipping bubblies, flying and listening to jazz.

Today, at 65, millions of miles, thousands of glasses of bubblies later, and God knows how many more Diane Schuur and other jazz artists’ songs later, I am not just still here, but the glass of bubblies is a nightly ritual.

A nightly ritual

At the end of each day I drink my glass of champagne, no matter where I am, and regardless of what the day was like.

I’ve grown accustomed to my bubblies, one glass a night, sometimes to celebrate a mega day, or to relax me after one that was not so good.  Bubblies can help you with both.

In a perfect world, I would have a bottle of Veuve Clicquot by my side; if it is super special, Veuve Clicquot Grand Dame.  But some Spanish cavas and Italian proseccos will do.

You look at the bubbles going up and down on that champagne flute.  You take a mini vacation from the day that was.  You do your own meditation and contemplation, and the rest comes easy.
In fact, as Leslie Caron sang in the film Gigi (1958), I, too, am convinced that “the night they invented champagne, t’s plain as it can be They thought of ….me.“

The night they invented champagne
They absolutely knew
that all we’d want to do
Is fly to the sky on champagne

Like mini vacations, rituals that develop and nurture you over a period of time are good for you.  You don’t need much help to carry them out once you have decided to pursue them.  In the case of bubblies, if I have company, the mini vacation turns into a grander mini vacation. But just me alone will do, too.

When 6 pm comes, I am usually ready for my time with the bubblies.  Of course, you must plan it. Bottles of champagne do not appear serendipitously.  My refrigerator at home holds more bottles of champagne than anything else.  I have reminded my four adult children that, if they are giving me a gift for any occasion, champagne is the answer. I do not need another tie, sweater, shirt or bottle of cologne.

A man my age is not in the process of collecting anything, except perhaps good memories.

The bubblies contribute to that.

Lesson #20: Develop your own rituals that allow you to relax and to find the right balance in your life and work.

1.Mirrors.
http://www.garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_1—a_look_in_the_mirror

2.Refugee.
http://www.garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_2—refugee

3.Teacher.
http://www.garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_3—teacher/

4.Mentors.
http://www.garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_4—mentors/

5.Consultant.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_5—consultant/

6.Eagle.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_6eagke

7.Abroad.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_7._abroad

8. Books
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_8_books

9. Luck
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40years_40_lessons_9_luck

10. Positive.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_10positive

11. Culture
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_11_culture

12.Adapting.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_12_adapting1

13.Dreams.
http://www.garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_13_dreams

14. The Pitch.
http://www.garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_14_the_pitch

15.. Ethics.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_15_ethics/

16. Time.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_16_time

17.Pause.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_17_pause/

18.Stories.
http://www.garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_18_stories

19.Boss.
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/40_years_40_lessons_19_boss

Today’s pop up

It is the Big Cup Final for German soccer this Saturday. So Bild celebrates by showing us the starting line up and when you touch the name of a players, the women in their lives—-wives and/or girlfriends—pop up.

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post # 1013

Sometimes you can hear the bells ringing, as when Warren Buffet , that rich man with a love for newspapers , announces that, indeed, he is ready to buy more of those beautiful things made of ink and paper.

To hear Buffett say it, he thinks newspapers will  have “ in an area where there is a sense of community,“ Buffett mentioned this at the annual gathering of Berkshire shareholders in Omaha on Saturday.

This means regional more so than metropolitan areas, so it will be interesting to see what properties Buffett goes after, although I assume there will be several newspapers in midsize to small cities that he will be attracted to

And in India, a new “luxury” tabloid has appeared.  when was the las time that you heard the words luxury and tabloid spoken in the same sentence?  A product of The Hindu, a media company based in Chennai, and on our list of clients at Garcia Media, the new tab appears to take advantage of India’s fast growing middle class and its insatiable appetite for well known brands.

The tabloid ‘Watches, Luxury & Beyond‘ will be published on Saturdays and will be distributed across seven markets along with The Hindu and Business Line..

And, in spite of continued declining circulation and advertising revenue, The Washington Past, another former Garcia Media client, has managed to post a profit.  The Post Co.’s first-quarter earnings doubled from a year earlier, but profits excluding one-time items fell. Overall, the company on Friday announced net income of $31 million, or $4.07 a share, compared with $15.2 million, or $1.87 a share, in the first quarter of 2011. Revenue was $972.5 million in the first quarter, down 7 percent from $1.04 billion.

The Post continues to do a great job of integrating units within its newsroom, enhancing its print operation and constantly updating its digital offerings.  And, although there was no “good” news to celebrate in the newspaper division per se, we believe that a profit such as the one reported will allow The Post to continue to grow, and for more people to keep their jobs there.

Today’s pop up moment from Bild: remembering Star Wars, and, specifically actress Carrie Fisher, who, says Bild, mesmerized in her role of Princess Leia in the original Star Wars trilogy.

Today she mesmerizes as a “retired jedi”.  See the transformation of Carrie Fisher, that was then, this is now.

This is what those Bild pop up do best.

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1012

Everybody is a journalist on Twitter. No, wait a minute now a report reminds us that, indeed, everyone is a publisher!

That was a quick promotion.  Some journalists work a lifetime and never become publishers, either because they did not make the cut, or did not care to even try (I don’t blame them).

Apparently, interest is high in how Twitter affects what we in the media do, especially with breaking news, so a study is underway at Indiana University to examine the extent to which Twitter users behave like journalists, even if they aren’t journalists in the traditional professional sense.

This could be equaled to a study at a karaoke bar, to test the extent to which those courageous enough to grab the mike behave like professional singers.  Judging by what one can observe at some of these karaoke sessions, with Beyoncé or Justin Bieber wannabes caressing the microphone as they mouth the words of the song staring at them from a screen, the desire is there to be like that adoring mega star.

Those who go on Twitter to “report” news? Not so sure they wish to be journalists, but it probably makes them feel good to be participating.

To me that is what this is all about: perhaps those who become “journalists, photographers, videographers” just because they happen to be in the right place at the right time in possession of a tool that allows them to record the event, simply wish to engage.

When we talk about the media quartet: phone, online, print and tablet, we must remember that the key word is “engagement”.  Users wish to participate, to interact, and what better way than by becoming a part of the process.

It will be interesting to see what the Indiana University reveals.  For sure, we will see greater numbers of people engaging via Twitter. Twitter is the grand central station of news: it all passes through there.

It will be up to professional journalists to guide all those “passengers” on board and on to their destinations and to further engagement, analysis, and interpretation.

I celebrate Twitter, and not just because it is here to stay.  Twitter is a great way to develop an appetite for more information (the kind only professional journalists can provide). It is like a delicious tapa or appetizer that alerts you to what else is in store in the kitchen.

Pop up of the day

Frank Deville sends us this fun pop up from today’s Bild: all about acrobatic ants. Follow it here!

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1011

TAKEAWAY: The Poynter EyeTrack: Tablet research testing has started, and preliminary reports of early tests show that a majority of tablet users prefer to swipe horizontally.

Dave Stanton, Sara Quinn and I discussing final prototype for Poynter EyeTrack: Tablet in my home this week

The excitement builds up as the Poynter Eye Track: Tablet project gets into the most interesting phase of testing with subjects.  This time, the now popular Poynter Eye Track series moves in the area of the tablets: how do users who read news on their tablet behave?  Which type of landing pages are more appealing and functional? How do users react to photo galleries, videos and graphics?

It is all part of what is going to be tested, and the tests have begun.

Unlike previous Poynter EyeTrack studies where the results waited to be compiled in one grand finale, this time, knowing that we live in the culture of Twitter,  where so many things quickly become “so 15 minutes ago”, we will be providing results of the tests on a regular basis.

I am sure the industry appreciates this.

This week Sara Quinn, Poynter faculty and project leader, David Stanton of Smart Media Creative, and I had an EyeTrack: Tablet workshop in my house in Tampa to finalize details, review strategies and, most importantly, discuss exit interview questions.

As we have found out with previous EyeTrack research projects, it is not possible to test all just with the special glasses.  Some reactions we need to gather in the old fashioned way: ask the question and get a reaction.  The industry is also keen on finding out answers to many questions of which we can now “suppose” what the answer would be.

We hope that the Poynter EyeTrack: Tablet project will guide us in a number of these questions.

What have we found out so far?

Here are the takeaways:

iPad users have an overwhelming instinct to swipe horizontally through a full screen photo gallery, regardless of portrait or landscape orientation.
I am not surprised here at all, and neither is our Poynter research team.  In focus groups I have personally observed a more intuitive move to gesture in the direction of swiping than scrolling. 
Early indicators, observed with about a hundred people in an initial, small slice of the study at multiple sites around the U.S, tell us it is so.

Participants who were given an iPad in landscape orientation swiped horizontally 93% of the time. In portrait, they swiped horizontally 82% of the time. This is statistically significant evidence for a horizontal inclination and that the swipe direction isn’t just a random behavior.

“Breaking the research into smaller questions “allows more faculty, researchers and students to get involved,” said Jeremy Gilbert, assistant professor of media product design at Medill School of Journalism. Medill students are conducting part of this early testing. Other subjects are being observed at the University of Florida, at Poynter and, soon, in Denmark.

“Breaking the research into smaller questions “allows more faculty, researchers and students to get involved,” said Jeremy Gilbert, assistant professor of media product
design at Medill School of Journalism.  Medill students are conducting part of this early testing. Other subjects are being observed at the University of Florida,
at Poynter and, soon, in Denmark.

I am not surprised here at all, and neither is our Poynter research team. In fact, our Poynter team decided to test user instincts here because already most tablet mags navigate horizontally between stories and vertically through them. But most photo galleries move horizontally through a single story or topic.
In focus groups I have personally observed a more intuitive move to gesture in the direction of swiping than scrolling.  Early indicators, observed with about a hundred people in an initial, small slice of the study at multiple sites around the U.S, tell us it is so.

The prototypes tested

The major prototypes in Poynter’s EyeTrack: Tablet  project include three styles of entry pages. Development is underway.

Here is the model for a classic and traditional news app, a style of presentation which is made popular by such apps as The New York Times. 
Are readers more likely to enter and to stay within a news app that has this look and feel?

The carrousel navigator: made popular by such apps as NPR and CNN, the carrousel invites swiping, based on a series of images.
It is a visual invitation to navigate the app.  The Daily uses it as a choice for navigation, showing an image of full screen pages

The Flipboard-style navigator: as the name implies, here is another visual invitation. Made popular by Flipboard, here the user clicks on an image and gets to the story. 
Such apps as that of Switzerland’s Tages Anzeiger capitalizes on this style. Very inviting and direct and often used as a secondary navigational option.

Here are the screens to text such variables as text and photo, text and video, text and graphic

Various advertising styles to be tested

How you can help!

And here’s a way you can help. We’re currently looking for 20-30 great stories with strong “shelf life” to be included in the prototype testing. The stories should exemplify storytelling in a variety of forms for tablet—written, video, photo and both static and interactive graphics. If you’d like to suggest a story or project now, please let me know. We’re in need of stories about sports, business, global news, science, popular culture, and more.

You can read more about the project and how to get involved here:
https://www.facebook.com/PoynterEyeTrack

Previous blog posts about Poynter EyeTrack:Tablet:

Poynter eye-tracking research to determine best strategy for news on tablets
http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/media-lab/mobile-media/151844/poynter-tablet-research-tap-touch-pinch-swipe-eyetrack-stories-staffing-revenue-and-more/

http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/the_poynter_eyetrack_for_ipad_a_progress_report_and_some_prototype_screens

http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/the_tablet_magazines_and_the_cash_register_some_good_news

New EyeTrack study: learning how news apps tablet users’ eyes and fingers move
http://garciamedia.com/blog/articles/new_eyetrack_study_learning_how_news_apps_tablet_users_eyes_and_fingers_mov

Poynter to Launch EyeTrack Research for Tablet
http://news.yahoo.com/poynter-launch-eyetrack-research-tablet-204105980.html

Poynter EyeTrack: a history
http://www.starkadamdesign.com/training/Eyetrack.html

About Poynter’s earlier EyeTrack studies:

2007: The Myth of Short Attention Spans
http://www.poynter.org/uncategorized/81456/eyetrack07-the-myth-of-short-attention-spans/

EyeTrack 2007 video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FKQPCn_ais&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Where in the world is Mario?

I am at home in Tampa all of this week: enjoying all that nature I have right outside my back door, with the Hillsborough River as a backdrop; some of the trees in my backyard at 400 years old, and sit on an environmentally protected area of Florida, a swamp, where sometimes the most beautiful birds appear, plus huge turtles, the occasional snake, and, on occasion, sleepy alligators.  But I have a deck that is 10” high so no danger of alligators approaching us!  It is a peaceful and serene setting that I am always happy to come home to.

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1010

TAKEAWAY: Today is World Press Freedom Day, as designated by the United Nations General Assembly.  What better way to celebrate it than with this collection of posters by Adonis Durado and his talented team at the Times of Oman and Al Shabiba.

Designer: Winie Ariany

Designer: Ralph Bagares

Designer: Isidore Vic Carloman

Designer: Adonis Durado

Designer: Quasiem Gamiet
  

Designer: Mohammed Qardan

Designer: Waleed Rabin
  

Designer: Srinivasa Rao
  

Designer: Sahir K.M.

Designer: Lucille Umali
  

I join the many who give thanks today, World Press Freedom Day,  for living in countries where press freedom is a right, never to be taken for granted.

I was recently in Chile, attending the WAN IFRA Latin America conference, and one of the most popular sessions involved a discussion of freedom of the press, in a continent where such freedom is not always respected.  In my own native country, Cuba, freedom of the press does not exist.

To celebrate this day of World Press Freedom, I am delighted to showcase the work of Adonis Durado and his award winning design team at the Times of Oman and Al Shabiba

I am sure you will feel, as I do, that the work of these designers is very moving, quite strong and communicates the importance of the message, and of this day, at a glance. Congratulations to the Times of Oman team!

This is how Adonis explained their project for World Press Freedom:

We call it “Any Given Sunday”, a weekly and informal gathering with my staff where we spend an hour discussing art and design, or reviewing works from international designers, or watching documentary films relating to visual arts and communication, or doing fun exercises using obstructions (like asking them to redesign the toilet signage while ruling out cliché symbolism).
 
The idea of this meeting is to motivate and inspire them, to churn out creativity other than making pages, to increase their visual vocabulary and teach them how to articulate their work, and of course to add fun in the office.
 
But this week, we’ve gotten a little serious in our creative exercise. When I learned from WAN-IFRA website about the World Press Freedom Day (May 3), I asked my team to come up with a poster commemorating the freedom of speech and a call to end impunity against media killing. I told my staff that in my country, corrupt politicians don’t sue reporters for their articles, they simply put bullets in their heads. Just imagine that in 2009 alone, 32 Filipino journalists and media workers were slain, as accounted by media organization Reporters Without Borders.
 
Working on the theme “Silence kills democracy, but a free press talks”, my staff (including myself) created these posters.
  

University of Oregon talk

Yesterday I had a chat via Skype with journalism students at the University of Oregon in Eugene.  Here is a transcript of that conversation:

Tablet Talk with Dr. Mario Garcia, founder of Garcia Media
http://ormagazine.tumblr.com/tagged/uotablettalk

Of special interest today

- USA: Christian Science Monitor sees traffic, revenues rising after 3 years of Web-first strategy
http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/business-news/the-biz-blog/171833/christian-science-monitor-sees-traffic-revenues-rising-after-3-years-of-web-first-strategy/

- USA: A Twin Cities turnaround? The Star Tribune carves a path back through growing audience
http://www.niemanlab.org/2012/05/a-twin-cities-turnaround-the-star-tribune-carves-a-path-back-through-growing-audience/
- USA: Washington Post’s Sunday circulation drop not as steep as it appears
http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/mediawire/172440/washington-posts-circulation-numbers-not-as-bad-as-they-look/

Where in the world is Mario?

I am at home in Tampa all of this week: enjoying all that nature I have right outside my back door, with the Hillsborough River as a backdrop; some of the trees in my backyard at 400 years old, and sit on an environmentally protected area of Florida, a swamp, where sometimes the most beautiful birds appear, plus huge turtles, the occasional snake, and, on occasion, sleepy alligators.  But I have a deck that is 10” high so no danger of alligators approaching us!  It is a peaceful and serene setting that I am always happy to come home to.

At home in Tampa, Florida until May 7.

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1009

They were 18 seniors at the University of Oregon’s School of Journalism and Communication, in a class about magazine editing/design taught by Ed Madison.  I was sitting at home in Florida in my family room.  Skype did the rest.  It would have taken me about five hours by air to travel the more than 3000 miles from Tampa, Florida to Eugene, Oregon, but here we were, exchanging thoughts about the state of the media and what’s important.

The students had smart questions, starting with one that went something like this:

What is the most difficult part of creating a design for a digital platform?

I did not have to think too long about that one: the most difficult task is usually changing the mentality of the editors, even today.  Indeed, I told the students, you will be surprised about the number of working editors who can’t think beyond the “printed” newspaper.

Some still wonder if news should break on digital (I admit that the number of editors who feel that way is getting smaller, but they are still out there).

I am enthusiastic to think that this generation of future journalists engaged in our class via Skype feels positive about the story being carried through various platforms. But, I reminded them: YOU will have to work for a boss who may not share your enthusiasm.

In fact, the questions after that first one centered on the specifics of each platform and how to adapt stories to fit into the media quartet: mobile, online, print and tablet.

Their very own iPad magazine

These students have already produced their first online magazine. It contains some good storytelling , pop up moments, and good content.

Here is the link for the students’ OR Magazine:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ormagazine/id497535480?mt=8

Here’s a video that chronicles the work the students did:

Obviously, there is no substitute for the personal contact between professor and students, and among students themselves.  That is unequal in its benefits. However, as my experience today showed, it is also possible to bring views beyond those of the professor into the classroom via Skype and other conferencing possibilities.

“Dr. Garcia  provided our students with invaluable insights about the distinctions to consider when creating content for tablets. He dispelled the myth that tablets will kill print—and challenged students to design with all of the senses in mind,’ said Ed Madison, who teaches the class in which I appeared at the University of Oregon.

It is a win win situation for all involved.  I know that I enjoyed my time with the students and learned much from their insights and questions. It is already a fact that we often have at least one person NOT in the room, but appearing via conferencing, when we hold briefings and meetings at various locations globally.

The same has become true for colleges and universities.

As our “class chat” concluded, I felt very positive about taking a peek into how the next generation of journalists thinks: this group considers it totally normal to create stories for various platforms, and the good news is that they did not seem to have a specific alliance to any particular platform.

Their alliance, as I reminded the students, should be to the story.

Follow the team on Twitter
 @ORmagazine

Monocle Radio interview

Check out my appearance in Monocle Radio’s The Culture program with editor Robert Bound. I taped the show a few days ago and it aired int he 30/4 segment:

http://www.monocle.com/monocle24/?openepisode=11100029

Where in the world is Mario?

I am at home in Tampa all of this week: enjoying all that nature I have right outside my back door, with the Hillsborough River as a backdrop; some of the trees in my backyard at 400 years old, and sit on an environmentally protected area of Florida, a swamp, where sometimes the most beautiful birds appear, plus huge turtles, the occasional snake, and, on occasion, sleepy alligators.  But I have a deck that is 10” high so no danger of alligators approaching us!  It is a peaceful and serene setting that I am always happy to come home to.

At home in Tampa, Florida until May 7.

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1008

Katharine McPhee, Raza Jaffrey,and the iPad in a scene from Smash,

It’s beginning to happen: the iPad goes Hollywood, or at least it is starting out on TV shows like Smash, the NBC hit musical drama about the creating of a musical.  I admit I am a devoted fan of the show and its talented cast, which includes Angelica Huston, Uma Thurman and Debra Messing.

Since I cannot watch past episodes of Smash while traveling abroad, the minute I come home I catch up on missed Smash moments.  It was during one of those Smash marathons that I have realized how much the iPad plays a role in the show.

Of course, it is all Apple products on Smash, but what caught my attention about the iPad is that it replaced the printed newspaper in a scene where two actors discussed celebrity coverage, a typical scene where the usual prop would have been a New York City newspaper, since this show takes place there.  Instead, the iPad is part of the scene (see photo).

Of semi-related interest:

How Star Trek imagined the iPad 23 years ago

http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2010/08/how-star-trek-artists-imagined-the-ipad-23-years-ago.ars

Pages we like

These two pages about legendary fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld come from Germany’s Bild: Lagerfeld says that he has two houses, one in which to sleep and another one in which to sketch and to create.

Also Frank Deville, our Europe correspondent, sends this double page spread headlined The Buzz of the Day

Of interest today:

As news shifts toward mobile, will text alerts get left behind?

http://www.niemanlab.org/2012/04/as-news-shift-toward-mobile-will-text-alerts-get-left-behind/

First paragraph:

In a blast text message to subscribers on Tuesday afternoon, The Washington Post announced that it’s…ending blast text messages to subscribers, on April 30. So don’t expect to get SMS headlines like “Mitt Romney sweeps GOP primaries in five states” for much longer.

Where in the world is Mario?

I am at home in Tampa all of this week: enjoying all that nature I have right outside my back door, with the Hillsborough River as a backdrop; some of the trees in my backyard at 400 years old, and sit on an environmentally protected area of Florida, a swamp, where sometimes the most beautiful birds appear, plus huge turtles, the occasional snake, and, on occasion, sleepy alligators.  But I have a deck that is 10” high so no danger of alligators approaching us!  It is a peaceful and serene setting that I am always happy to come home to.

At home in Tampa, Florida until May 7.

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1007

It was at a specific moment during the Reading Digital Symposium at RIT (Rochester Institute of Technology) where I gave a presentation during the weekend, that I turned to my iPad and Tweeted the following:

RIT talk: I sense a flirting between the disciplines: technology meets humanities meets design meets storytelling. Nice.

Dozens of retweets and emails later, I am still fascinated by what happened at the Symposium, the smart and interesting people I met, the speakers with whom I had the honor to share the stage, and, most importantly, the level of preparation and excitement that all of the RIT students I met displayed.

Here is how Prof. Charles Bigelow, Melbert B. Cary, Jr. Professor of Graphic Arts at RIT’s School of Print Media described the evolution of he Symposium:

Two years ago, in June 2010, I co-organized an RIT symposium on the Future of Reading. It covered a broad span of topics, from literature 
to history to philosophy to design. 

For this 2012 symposium, just two years later, I concentrated mainly on the science and art of reading, and the tag line I used was: 
“The future of reading is already here, and it’s time to take a closer look at it.“

And that is exactly what this Symposium was about: a look at how we now read on digital platforms. The speakers represented the full range of expertise, among them: Kris Holmes, who designed the pioneering Lucida font family for digital screen displays and operating systems; Gordon Legge , a psychologist and newuroscientist and the author of Psychophysics of Reading in Normal and Low Vision; Steve Matteson, Creative Type Director for Monotype Imaging and David Brailsford ,co-founder of the School of Computer Science at the University of Nottingham (UK), whose research has centered on Document Engineering.  (I will provide some highlights of Brailsford’s and Holmes’ presentation s later in this post).

For Prof. Bigelow, the new digital display technologies and devices are radically different from traditional analog printing, but, he emphasizes that “it is all about the image that gets to the retina of the
eye that is important.”  It is this thought, he says, that shaped the program he assembled and the speakers.”

“ …. I invited vision scientists to talk about scientific studies of reading in relation to digital screen displays.

“The typefaces used on smart phone and tablets are, in many cases, not the same as those used in print media, so I invited type designers to talk about creating fonts for the new media. And, of course, fonts are only one building block of a page of information - news, stories, images, etc. - so your talk gave us better understanding of how and why those elements can be put
together across different platforms, while Kris Holmes showed us new approaches to lively display typography, A computer scientist talked about technical issues in getting the e-text to work conveniently across platform (it often doesn’t), and a philosopher discussed the uses of technology by literate humanity - do the new devices make us cyborgs? 

A different audience

My presentation at the RIT Symposium was the last of a series of presentations I have given during a three-week trip that covered three continents.

What was unusual and different about this one, and which prompted my Tweet about the “flirtation” of the disciplines, was precisely the mix of speakers and audience, and the expertise and interests they share.

My usual audience is primarily “journalists”: publishers, editors, designers, digital media directors, with advertising and marketing types thrown in.

Here, the word “scientists” is more applicable to describe the 100 people in attendance.  And while many or most are interested in typography and design, especially symposium organizer Prof. Charles Bigelow, who teaches in the School of Print Media at RIT, their research is highly scientific, including some fascinating studies of typography through the ages that were presented here.

But, back to the “flirtation”: as I spoke to professors, and, especially graduate students, it is obvious that they are interested in dipping their toes in the neighbor’s pool: find out more about how smartphones will be used for reading, for example, or the best way to design a navigational system for an app.

While my audiences of “journalists” appear to be greatly interested in the concept of survival—-as in the survival of printed newspapers, these “scientists” seem to be less concerned with that, and more fascinated by the prospects of platforms they may create to facilitate reading—including in printed newspapers and magazines.

When Prof. Bigelow first invited me to the Symposium, I confess that I did not understand fully what my role would be in such a gathering.  As I prepared my presentation, I became more excited about the prospects of those for whom I would give the talk, and how much I could learn from them.

I was right: I probably learned more than I taught, although I am sure that the audience got a glimpse of how we who design content for the platforms they create think, what worries us, and what we consider to be top areas for further research.

This presentation gave me an opportunity to discuss our current Poynter Institute 2012 EyeTrack for the Tablet, a study that is currently taking place at various centers throughout the United States. 

The ideal major

As I exchanged ideas with RIT students, it was obvious that we need to consider the type of major where the “flirting” of the disciplines gets to the next, more formal stage.

I reminded a good friend who is considering returning to school for Masters that yesterday’s proceedings at RIT had made me more aware of what I advised him earlier: create your own program, and if I were you I would involve the various disciplines of digital technology, design, storytelling and even psychology.

Unfortunately, and this may be the same even at RIT,  academia takes time to respond to changes in the industry.  University departments are like islands, and creating bridges may tax the patient of the most devoted faculty member or student.

Nevertheless, as Prof. Bigelow and I said goodbye on the edge of the RIT campus, we both agreed that it would be a good thing to allow students to customize their programs.

This symposium was a good reminder that the disciplines are linked, that the desires of faculty and students are synchronized to the idea.

I only wish I were younger to start creating my own program, and I would definitely welcome the opportunity to be a part of any academic team that wishes to advance this fascinating conversation.

Conference highights

David F. Brailsford

David F Brailsford, The University of Nottingham: gave one of the most fascinating presentations, and these statements stayed with me:

The tablet changes everything, even for a computer scientist

“Key players are now Amazon and Apple
with Adobe in a more minor role.  I believe that Amazon and Apple are like the Linotype and Monotype of today.”

Charles Bigelow

Charles Bigelow, the Melbert B. Cary, Jr. Professor of Graphic ArtsRIT: His current research is on the relationship of vision science to typography, the evolution of typographic forms, and typographic “culturomics” - analysis of trends in typographic tastes and sizes in relation to literate culture.

Bigelow discussed typography, with emphasis on historic factors that have had an effect on the “shrinking” of type size.  He showed how in the 15th Century type tended to be large.  Type size becomes smaller and smaller as vision correction (eyeglasses) become a reality.
“The Protestant ethic valued frugality,” Bigelow said, “ so book print became smaller, and, of course, books were then easier to conceal if authorities came to arrest you.”

In contemporary terms, he said, hardcover books continue to have the larger type, while newspaper and paperback books emphasize smaller.

Kris Holmes

Kris Holmes has designed and co-designed over 100 typefaces, including pioneering system interface screen fonts for Apple Macintosh Systems 7, 8, 9. and OS X. Her Lucida Grande designs are the standard user-interface fonts for OS X.

As I did not sit through this presentation, I asked Prof. Bigelow for highlights, which he gracefully agreed to do. Here is his report:

Holmes’ talk “Moving Right Along” was about the impression of movement and animated movement in typography. She showed historical and modern examples of cursive italic and script typefaces that convey a feeling of the movement of the scribe’s hand. Then she showed  examples from “writing masters” in later eras, who created lively pages of sinuous script that were impossible to achieve in typography.

She suggested that the extravagant flourishes of the writing masters were a way for them to show that their art went beyond the rigid limits of metal typography, so they could still attract clients in the era when typography had made the traditional manuscript writing of the scribe nearly obsolete. 

Lucida

She then showed pages of her own script designs, such as Isadora, Lucida Handwriting,and Kolibri (there are examples in her “Dossier”), which have a lively look. 

Type, motion and the iPad

Then she talked about and showed examples of moving letters that can be displayed on the iPad and other tablet computers that have a “refreshable surface” (fast enough for movie-like illusion of motion). 

She explained and demonstrated different kinds of moving type. The mechanical kind of motion can made with software like Aftereffects or Flash, by simple transformations of letters - scaling of size, shifting of position, obliquing, rotating, etc. That is the basis 
of much of the “kinetic type” that is popular on YouTube. One of her examples was of letters drifting and falling like autumn leaves. 

She also demonstrated the RSVP kind of display (Rapid Serial Visual Presentation) in which words of a text are flashed on the screen one at a time for short periods of time, so that readers don’t have to move their eyes and can let the letters come to them. 
She asked the audience if they found it relaxing or irritating. Some found it relaxing, some found it irritating 

She also showed “self-writing” movement of scripts, like the “That’s All Folks!“ of the old Looney Tunes cartons, and showed examples of her own design. Then she showed full animation of letters in which they run and move like characters in classical animated movies. Thus, she said that (fast) refreshable displays add a lively dimension to display typography and also enable other approaches to displaying text typography.  

More Symposium details

http://www.rit.edu/cias/readingdigital/speakers.php#engstrom

Surprise of the day

Advertising messages try to catch us everywhere, indeed.
Yesterday, while on a USAirways flight home to Tampa, what a surprise to open the table in font of me only to be greeted by this Verizon advertising.  This while the flight attendant calls attention to the special of the day: get th USAirways credit card today, sign up and as soon as you make your first purchase, no matter how small, you get 40000 that “could get you quick on your way to Hawaii”.

As a captive audience at 35000 feet, I imagine that we are all the best of subjects for advertisers, starting right on that table in front of you.

And, no, there was no wi-fi on this particular flight.

Where in the world is Mario?

I am at home in Tampa all of this week: enjoying all that nature I have right outside my back door, with the Hillsborough River as a backdrop; some of the trees in my backyard at 400 years old, and sit on an environmentally protected area of Florida, a swamp, where sometimes the most beautiful birds appear, plus huge turtles, the occasional snake, and, on occasion, sleepy alligators.  But I have a deck that is 10” high so no danger of alligators approaching us!  It is a peaceful and serene setting that I am always happy to come home to.

At home in Tampa, Florida until May 7.

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1006

Update #4: Saturday, Rochester, NY: 18:14

TAKEAWAY: So a Google exec thinks we should do away with narratives and go for “computational journalism”? ALSO: It is a new look for Australia’s regional daily, Illawarra Mercury

Google should stick to searching!

Here is a piece that caught my eye, starting with the headline.  Perhaps it is the fact that I have spent part of my week participating in a a WAN IFRA Latin America conference, where the notion of re-invention of everything from the way the newsroom architecture is set up, to the way the economics of charging for content are evaluated, to the way we train journalists to think multimedia, was all part of the two-day discussions.

However, here is another type of reinvention: how we write, and, more importantly, how we teach journalism to a new generation of journalists.

According to this piece,  Google’s head of news products and Google+ programming Richard Gingras told media executives the following:

“We need to rethink how we teach journalism, There will be a day – and it should not be far from now – where we can create persistent forms of stories not written in narrative form but in (Google) Fusion Tables and query strings, status updates and tweets.”

Then, he added:

“This is a renaissance of media and journalism,” explaining that “computational journalism” can amount to “the reinvention of the reporter’s notebook”

I am doing a mini meditation on this.

Two publishers from very large Latin American newspapers approached me Thursday to ask me how I saw the state of journalism education generally, with one of them saying:

“Based on what we have learned here in Santiago the past two days, including from your lecture, our journalism schools are not sending us graduates who are prepared to tackled the challenges.”

That is one big general statement, and I am sure that there are very good journalism schools that are doing it right, including several I have visited in the past 12 months in the United States, and, some from around the world where my contact with their students leads me to believe that there is a smart dialog about the state of the industry, the requirements of the new breed of journalists, and, indeed, the new forms of writing that are going to be important in a multi platform world.

However, I am not so sure I understand what “computational journalism” is all about, and maybe I do not wish to know.  Will every story be told through numbers? (Boring and impersonal). Will info graphics be the only storytelling tool? (Works in some cases, but not for all).

I have no question in my mind that a good, solid, old fashioned narrative is as good today, in almost any platform, as it was when Ernest Hemingway was writing for the Kansas City Star
. Google’s Gingras may not favor the narrative, but in my 40+ years in this business, I have sat through enough gatherings of readers to tell them that, indeed, those readers value a good narrative that engages them.


I prefer to keep using Google as the search engine to find those good narratives, but perhaps Google should let someone else write them.

A couple of articles on “computational journalism”

A new framework for innovation in journalism: How a computer scientist would do it
http://www.niemanlab.org/2012/04/a-new-framework-for-innovation-in-journalism-how-a-computer-scientist-would-do-it/

Can an algorithm write a better news story than a human reporter?
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/04/can-an-algorithm-write-a-better-news-story-than-a-human-reporter/all/1

New look for Australian regional daily

It was last August 2011, during a trip I made to beautiful Australia, to speak at the PANPA conference in Sydney when I met Steve Cassell, production editor of the regional daily, Illawarra Mercury. The Mercury is published in Illawarra,,a coastal city situated immediately south of Sydney, in a region in the Australian state of New South Wales.

Steve and his team asked me for a little “special time” to show me the work they were doing on an in-house redesign of The Mercury.  This was one of those meetings of which I have dozens during the course of a year: you are speaking at a conference, and a group of editors, usually from a small regional daily or weekly, asks ahead of time to show you their handy work.  Such was the case here.

I remember that I looked at what Steve and his team had and made some suggestions.  I forgot about this until this week, when Steve wrote me with an attachment of the new Mercury, of which he and his team are very proud.

Here is what Steve wrote:

“You may remember giving an hour of your time to myself and Illawarra Mercury editor, Stuart Howie, while visiting the PANPA conference in Sydney, Australia, in August last year. Your advice was extremely helpful and was applied in many areas of the redesigned Mercury, which was launched on March 25 this year. “ 

 
 I think the new Mercury uses photos well and the content has been organized to make it easier to navigate.  Steve has sent the “before” pages for a comparison.

Although I do not recall the specifics of this redesign, I do see that this what one would call a mild redesign, with nothing to shock the reader.  However, in my view, the new Mercury seems a bit more upscale, with a more focused approach to story presentation, photo use and, particularly, the front page design, which was the most dramatic change .

My only recommendation: I wish the team had done more with story structures. All stories carry the basic headline then jump into text, there is a lack of texture here, but this is something that can be implemented even after the redesign has been launched. Go for it, and thanks for sharing these.

Pages of the Mercury BEFORE the redesign

Weekend reads

Weekend reads:

-President Obama: ‘I read all of the New York Times columnists’ | Poynter.
http://www.poynter.org/latest-news/mediawire/171648/president-obama-i-read-all-of-the-new-york-times-columnists/
 
- UK: Rupert Murdoch predicts newspapers could die out in 10 years
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/apr/26/rupert-murdoch-predicts-newspapers-may-die

First paragraph:

Rupert Murdoch has predicted there may be no newspapers in 10 years’ time because of the competition from the internet, and urged the government not to “over-regulate” them out of existence.

- Flipboard is ‘head-on competitor’ on Economist’s road to all-digital
http://paidcontent.org/2012/04/26/economistflipboard/

First paragraph:

The Economist’s CEO thinks news publishing will go all-digital at some point in the near- to mid-term.
  

- Researchers: There will be twice as many tablet owners in 2014
http://tabtimes.com/news/ittech-stats-research/2012/04/25/researchers-there-will-be-twice-many-tablet-owners-2014

First paragraph:

Carrying on from a raft of new figures on how tablet ownership is about to explode, Futuresource Consulting has now said that there will be twice as many tablet owners in USA and western Europe by 2014.

- Vadim Lavrusik: 10 ways journalists can use Facebook
http://www.journalism.co.uk/news-features/how-journalists-can-use-facebook-vadim-lavrusik/s5/a548936/

Highlight:

Facebook’s journalist programme manager has been in the UK telling journalists how he thinks they should best use Facebook

 
- #Tip of the day from Journalism.co.uk – build your news brand on Foursquare
http://blogs.journalism.co.uk/2012/04/24/tip-of-the-day-from-journalism-co-uk-build-your-news-brand-on-foursquare/

Today’s pop up comes from Bild: celebrating the first year since the Royal Wedding of William and Kate, and asking: you sure they want babies?
  

Where in the world is Mario?

April 27, Rochester, NY—speaking at Digital Reading Symposium at RIT (Rochester Institute of Technology).  I am honored to be in this gathering which explores the art and science of reading on screens .
http://www.rit.edu/cias/readingdigital/

April 29-May 7: at home in Tampa, Florida

The iPad Design Lab: Storytelling in the Age of the Tablet

Video walkthrough of the iPad prototype of iPad Design Lab

TheMarioBlog post #1005