Wednesday, December 28, 2005

Mixed feelings about news site design Why Haven't Online Newspapers Gotten it Right? A friend sent over a link to this item, in which computer industry writer Kirk McElhearn lays out his problems with news website design, speaking both as a reader and as someone who has given online site "usability" some thought. His observations might be a good place to start a class discussion... or inspire a grad student research project. So here they are. McElhearn likes the scan and skim accessibility of a printed newspaper, and serendipitously finding something new that he wasn't looking for. When newspaper websites try for the same effect, they wind up crowded and overwhelming, he says: "... today's newspaper web sites have too many links, too many stories, too much information (and way too many ads, including animated ads that make it all but impossible to read the text which is the essence of a newspaper) all on one page, with the idea that more is better. They can't understand that there could be other ways of attracting readers to the diverse content they offer." He blames newspaper designers for carrying a "get everything in" habit to the websites they build, sacrificing more meaningful story summaries for truncated headlines, something I've muttered about here before. As for the advertising, he says he'd pay for a subscription to a good, ad-free online paper. (I wonder how many people would pay for "Class A" news sites without ads, when they can get a dozen "Class B" sites with the ad annoyances.) McElhearn doesn't see any great sites based at newspapers, but picks The New York Times home page over The Washington Post. Both have scores of stories and only give summaries for the top few, but he points out that the Times uses longer headlines for its section story links farther down the page. (I had to go look to see what he meant. He's right. I'll paste examples from both websites in a footnote at the bottom of this page.) Salon.com and news.Google.com, get McElhearn's best reviews, but still with reservations. At Salon, the home page isn't to his liking, which I guess means he prefers the single-column headline and summary approach on the inside pages, like News and Tech/Business. He likes the two-column layout of the untouched- by- human- editors Google News, but not the fact that only the day's most-covered stories are presented. He doesn't provide examples of the news sites with too many ads and terribly short headlines. I guess he figures everyone has one nearby. -------------------- FOOTNOTE. Samples of those "section" headlines mentioned above... Times: NATIONAL Police Forces, Their Ranks Thin, Offer Bonuses, Bounties and More A Family Feud Sheds Light on Differences in Probate Practices From State to State Democrat Joins Schwarzenegger, and the Grumbling Is Bipartisan Post: NATION -Cops Backed in NOLA Shooting -Heart Device's Export Blocked -The Elephant in the Room 3:41:18 PM    comment []

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