{"id":210,"date":"2011-11-29T02:46:38","date_gmt":"2011-11-29T02:46:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jackspeer.net\/wordpress\/?p=210"},"modified":"2011-12-17T15:04:41","modified_gmt":"2011-12-17T15:04:41","slug":"slate-functunality-or-funky-a-little-of-both-i-think-7","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/?p=210","title":{"rendered":"Slate- Functional or Funky? A Little of Both I Think #7"},"content":{"rendered":"

Our topic this week is how clean and functional is Slate?<\/strong><\/em> The short answer is its quite functional, but perhaps not so clean. As I have mentioned\u00a0in previous posts on this blog\u00a0it is one of the busiest online journalism sites I have ever seen. While I have learned to work with the site, and even come to appreciate some of its quirks, I have to say that for first time users it is really extremely confusing.<\/p>\n

By way of example; the\u00a0front pages of Slate<\/a>,\u00a0<\/em><\/strong> The New York Times <\/a><\/strong>and NPR<\/a> <\/strong>are very\u00a0different. While all three online publications have a basic three panel layout, Slate<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0looks much different to\u00a0me\u00a0than the other two sites. It also, at least to my eye, appears more cluttered.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Times<\/strong> and NPR\u00a0<\/strong>are laid out more like a traditional newspaper. Slate<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0has gone in an entirely different direction. There is much more interactivity here than on the other two sites.\u00a0And there\u00a0is also something else at work here. Namely, that Slate<\/strong><\/em> is a different animal from the other two aforementioned online sites.\u00a0 <\/strong>I think it speaks to the fact Slate <\/strong><\/em>clearly views itself as a “media” site and not necessarily as a pure ” news” site.<\/p>\n

Having been brought up with newspapers, its the format I find most comfortable and easiest to use. From a design standpoint it may\u00a0not be as functional as Slate<\/em><\/strong> with its many buttons but its just more pleasing to me. I will acknowledge that some of this might be age and prejudice on my part.\u00a0However, I also find the\u00a0traditional newspaper format easier to navigate than a format like Slate’s. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

So at least in my case form\u00a0comes before\u00a0function,\u00a0which is\u00a0one of the problems I have with Slate.\u00a0<\/em><\/strong>In this case it\u00a0really is a matter of perception though, since I’am sure there are plenty of people who find the New York Times<\/strong> website to be quite stodgy.<\/p>\n

I think this is the topic I will ultimately pursue when I interview the folks at Slate<\/em><\/strong>. Why did you design the website the way you did?\u00a0 Could be an interesting discussion.<\/p>\n

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Our topic this week is how clean and functional is Slate? The short answer is its quite functional, but perhaps not so clean. As I have mentioned\u00a0in previous posts on this blog\u00a0it is one of the busiest online journalism sites … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"gallery","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pfbyK0-3o","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=210"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":213,"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210\/revisions\/213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jackspeer.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}