Through the looking glass. A design vision for publications in an era of massive fragmentation

Abstract

In the publishing industry where 0s and 1s have replaced an archaic material called paper as the primary form of distribution, the struggle to bring content from analog to digital has been frought with questions about how to create digital- native publications. Of existing solutions, most can be put into two camps; those that look like websites, and those that replicate print layouts on screen. Unfortunately, these approaches lessen the integrity of content by forcing it to live in the shell of a website sans consideration for editorial context, or are committing usability faux pas by simply mimicing print-like forms on a screen. Through the Looking Glass is a prototype concept for a true 21st century publication, from information architecture to design and development. This project was conducted at a time in between the app revolution - where publishers rushed en masse to deliver content via applications made for specific devices - and a return to the browser and open web as the preferred content delivery platform of choice for publishers. A key catalyst for a shift in interest back towards web sites or web apps for content delivery was the advent of responsive web design, or an approach to designing and developing sites that automatically adapted to the screens on which they were viewed. This method of creating a content delivery platform appears to be, after discussion with a number of professionals who have experience designing and building both native applications and web sites and web apps, less time consuming and certainly less frustrating when considering the necessity to distribute content across various screen resolutions, platforms, and devices while trying to reach design parity. Of course, the trade offs of moving to the web from apps aren’t 1:1, additional pros and cons to each approach exist and this project simply sheds light on some of those areas. The year 2012 is still just the beginning of the migration back to the browser for the publishing industry, and knowledge gained from this degree project will hopefully help to provoke thought on this subject and be carried forward in my own future endeavours.