Stoicheff and Taylor's reading is rather compelling because it actively forces me to think about things that I have become accustomed to, therefore don't second guess - for example, I have never questioned the make-up a page. To me if it is vertical, columnar, has a heading, etc. that is a page. I already have a preconceived notion on what defines a page and the article made me question...what is a page?
The "typical" web page uses a three column arrangement, however just like paper is evolving into digital pages, even the digital page is now evolving and re-defining what is a digital page. Today, we live in an information-rich society, and the way information is arranged depicts this: we want information to be easily viewable and easily accessible. Popular social media site, Facebook is the perfect example of how even the original "epitome" of a web page is also changing to reflect today's culture in which information needs to be fast and easily accessible - people don't want to search for information, they want everything now:As the screenshot from my personal Facebook account (above) shows, there are a lot more than 3 columns on the page and several more functions are available on the home page. The right hand pane shows not only recent updates, but below it allows messaging. In addition to three more panes that contain quick-links, recent posts by friends, and additional information such as event invites, birthday, etc. Throw out everything you know about 3 columnar web pages because in out information-rich society today, the web page is evolving in order to present even more information and have even more functions.
References
Furness, Colin. Information Design I [PDF document]. Retrieved June 16th, 2015 from University of Toronto's Black Board site.
Stoicheff, Peter, and Andrew Taylor. Introduction to The Future of the Page. University of Toronto Press, 2004.
3-25. Retrieved from https://portal.utoronto.ca/bbcswebdav/pid-5002718-dt-content-rid-30386368_1/users/galeyala/Stoicheff%20and%20Taylor%20-%20intro.pdf
I think this is interesting and never would have thought of it myself! When I've worked with web design, I've used platforms like Drupal, which force you to have a certain kind of interface: in Drupal's case it works with nodes, which serve as your left-hand column, and then you always have a strip of related pages at the top. It's interesting how this method of organizing information comes "hard-wired" into the system--how does someone who is used to reading information vertically (as in Chinese or Japanese) or right to left (Hebrew) interact with this interface?
ReplyDeleteThere are several platforms that force you to organize your information into specific pre-determined zones! I've used Drupal before (and even Wordpress) and doesn't allow for much creativity in terms of how the page is organized. That being said, when I worked with Drupal, I was working on the web content for a University's web pages, so creativity and design definitely took a back seat to the actual content.
ReplyDelete