You would think that a news site on a laptop and a newspaper on iPad would offer a comparable reading experience: they have different screen sizes and a different navigation, but in the end they are both screens and they have all the advantages of digital media such as searching, bookmarking, sharing, etc. But the reading experience can be quiet different.

The iPad app shows an exact copy of the newspaper

I recently installed the De Standaard iPad app (De Standaard is a Belgian quality newspaper). I was disappointed the iPad app showed the exact image of their printed newspaper with some navigation elements. But – apart from a number of navigation issues – it turned out to be a pretty good reading experience. The reason? Page layout! Page layout gives structure to page, it shows the relationship between articles and their relative importance. This helps users to navigate and to scan pages or the whole paper. In news sites there is little hierarchy or relationship between articles. Clicking on a certain headline may lead to a 5-line gossip story or a 3 page interview. You couldn’t tell until you click.

If rich the page layouts of newspapers and magazines are so important for the reading experience, why don’t we use them for websites, instead of the current restrictive templates? Well, our Content Management Systems (CMSs) are not up to that task. The philosophy behind CMSs is that content and layout should be strictly separated. For a good reasons: if content and layout are mixed up, the content cannot be reused in another format. Therefore the content is stored in a database and when a user opens a page in his web browser, the content is poured into a fixed lay-out, called a template. If a user wants to open the same page on a mobile device, the content stays the same but it is poured into a different template to accomodate to the different screen size and the capabilities of the device. To create a rich lay-out, you could create a different template for each page, but the creation of templates is hell. Most templates require meticulous manual editing to be compatible with all current browser versions. On top of that I doubt that many web designers who have been focussing on navigation and usability for years are able to step out of the template paradigm. So readers end up with the lowest common denominator: a template that works for any piece of content in any browser version.

In the past we hardly noticed the need for rich and sophisticated layouts, because we were still impressed with the advantages of digital media: we could save, bookmark, search, share and have it anywhere at anytime. But now readers see how magazine and newspaper publishers are offering superior reading experiences on the iPad. The noble craft of lay-out is being reinvented for screens. Very soon readers may demand the same reading experience from websites.

CMS developers, graphic software manufacturers and graphic designers, you might want to talk. Your end-users are getting bored with the uniform and crude web templates.

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