The Trib?

The Chicago Tribune is trying to go the splashy graphics route, in hopes of making itself more enticing to people who don’t want to pick up the physical paper on a regular basis.

There’s only one problem with the look, as far as I’m concerned. It’s still a broadsheet, not a tabloid. Take a look at the Editor & Publisher story (http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003842794) for a glimpse of what could become this city’s leading circulation newspaper.

SERIOUSLY, THE GRAPHICS that try to play up a single story or two (rather than the six or seven that now make up the front page of the Tribune on any given day) work well on a tabloid-sized newspaper. It’s almost like one can think of the newspaper as a daily news magazine. But on a broadsheet-sized page, it looks bad. It looks like the graphics are trying to overtake the content.

If the quality of writing is good, it creates an intriguing publication. Of course, if the writing is worth squat, then the publication merely becomes trivial.

That’s the problem with too many of the redesigns being done for newspapers today. Ultimately, a publication lives and dies with the quality of its writing. Graphic elements can support prose, but they can’t replace it.

Also, I couldn’t help but notice the potential new slogan “Home of the Midwest’s largest reporting team.” That’s the same rhetoric that Tribune executives are using to try to distract attention from all the staff cuts they have made in recent months.

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