November, 2006

In the mostly frivolous movie 13 Going On 30, the main character, after jumping magically to age 30 and the physique of Jennifer Garner, works as a creative leader at a fashion magazine she practically worshiped as a pre-magic 13-year-old.

The magazine publisher, under escalating competitive pressure, tosses out a word and a prospect that sends the whole staff reeling in horror:

Redesign.

In this Hollywood-coated glimpse at the magazine world, the term signals utter failure and bleak chances for recovery.

I've spent most of my career in the newspaper industry, including several years as an editorial creative director. I don't remember redesign projects taking on that air of disaster. I loved doing them, if only because of the ego feed of feeling like an auteur, and in no small part because I did redesigns in an era full of ugly papers that really needed them. It was hard not to improve a paper under those conditions.

Sounds like Web sites circa, say, now. :-)

But that's the perspective I bring to the conversation about return on investment for newspaper redesigns, which started in part here and extended to NewsDesigner's timeline charts showing circulation of several papers before and after redesigns. Pepper in a spirited discussion of redesigns' effect on newspaper revenue, and you start seeing people's true colors.

I chipped in on that discussion, too -- it's worth the time to read the whole debate in the comments on NewsDesigner. Some excerpts follow.