Nieman Foundation at Harvard
HOME
          
LATEST STORY
What will a conservative National Labor Relations Board mean for news unions?
ABOUT                    SUBSCRIBE
Dec. 12, 2008, 9:59 a.m.

Gawker mixes up the visuals

The Gawker Media blogs redesigned yesterday, prompting explanatory posts all around the family of sites. From a cynical point of view, the redesign of each site’s front page to include shorter excerpts of each post seems clearly aimed at generating more pageviews (and thus, more ad impressions). In most cases, the key link the post is about is only accessible by clicking “More »” to another page.

But I want to point out something admirable about the Gawker sites: They’ve been willing to do more formal experimentation with how blog posts are displayed than just about anyone else.

A quick scroll down the Lifehacker front page, for instance, will show some posts that are just a small headline; some with a small headline and a one-sentence tease; some with a large headline and a tease; and some with either a small or large headline and a full-width image. Sports blog Deadspin is also experimenting with using different background colors to highlight certain content.

None of those options is groundbreaking. But one of the bigger design problems most blogs face is their visual sameness — the unbroken line of headline, post, headline, post all the way through the content. So bravo to Gawker for breaking it up.

Joshua Benton is the senior writer and former director of Nieman Lab. You can reach him via email (joshua_benton@harvard.edu) or Twitter DM (@jbenton).
POSTED     Dec. 12, 2008, 9:59 a.m.
Show tags
 
Join the 60,000 who get the freshest future-of-journalism news in our daily email.
What will a conservative National Labor Relations Board mean for news unions?
“If you want something out of your crappy news company, you’re going to have to go fight for it yourself out on the picket line.”
News for young people by young people: How this new Spanish outlet aims to reach an elusive audience
“People are tired of the political news cycle in Spain. It’s non-stop. It’s four big things a day. It’s crazy. And that’s something that doesn’t benefit news consumption. People are overwhelmed.”
How young Kenyans turned to news influencers when protesters stormed the country’s parliament
A recent study shows the country’s news ecosystem is shifting towards alternative sources. This trend might shape journalism in the years to come.