The Web is Not Paper
The web is a relatively new medium - in fact, it's often
referred to as just that, 'new media' - and practical graphic
design on the web is still less than ten years old, by all
accounts. This fact means that plenty of so-called web designers
are really just print graphic designers trying to transfer their
old ways onto a compuuter screen. What you have to remember
though, is that the web is not paper.
Paper Doesn't Scroll
If you design a site as if it had to fit entirely onto one sheet
of A4, you're doing your visitors a disservice. Text on the web
has a potential infinite amount of space. Why make me press a
button to go to your next page? Are you stupid? Are you just
trying to increase your pageviews and ad views, or what? Stick
to the rule of one page for one article, and you'll do much
better.
Paper Has No Bandwidth Issues
You can cover a sheet of paper in all the pretty pictures and
backgrounds you like, and it still doesn't take any longer to
pick it up and read it. That's just not true on the web. I'm
sure you abandoned dial-up years ago, no doubt, but there are
still plenty of people out there using the web at those kinds of
speeds. It's downright rude to make them sit and wait while your
design loads, when all they wanted to do was read some text.
Columns Work on Paper
One of the biggest issues with print designers find it difficult
to get over is the web's lack of columns. You really, really
can't do columns on the web. You just can't. It doesn't work.
You have to spend hours writing a set of custom scripts, only to
break functions like text selection and browser resizing that
your visitors would rather have seen work properly - not to
mention that reading left-to-right on a computer screen is
unexpected and altogether quite unpleasant. Get over yourself,
and leave your columns on the paper, where they belong.
Paper Isn't Linked
One of the easiest ways to spot a site designed by a print guy
is by looking for the links. If there aren't any, the chances
are the designer used to do paper layouts. Even more so if
they've added notes like 'go to our downloads page to see...' -
you can link to it, you know! Don't be afraid to link far more
than you'd think is sensible. Linking is what the web is all
about.
Paper Will Only Be Seen One Way
Web pages, on the other hand, will be seen in a variety of web
browsers, at all sorts of sizes, in lots of different fonts...
the list goes on. It's daft to think that you can control the
way your website looks to every visitor: what you're doing is
offering a set of guidelines, for their software to interpret
however it wants. If they choose to make all their fonts massive
because they have trouble seeing, who are you to set your page
to override that? Yet many designers do.
Never forget that your role isn't to make sure that everyone
sees the design exactly as you intended - what you're trying to
do, really, is let as many people as possible see the site, and
make it look as close to the intended design as possible, if it
doesn't interfere with their wishes. That's the difference
between a user-hostile website and a user-friendly one. If
you're not a print designer, you're probably nodding your head -
and if you are then, well, I suggest you take some time to think
it over. The End of Paper?
Paper and the web aren't adversaries by any means: the web is
highly unlikely to destroy paper layouts as we know them, no
matter how many 'technologists' might predict it. The important
thing, though, is that paper and the web are different, and you
need to realise that their differences are something to be
celebrated, not worked around. The best layout for the same
content will be very different on the web to the way it is on
paper - but, in the end, why is that bad?