What is user-centred design – and why do editors need to know about it?

Book and magazine editors are used to mapping out design basics with designers, in terms of agreeing the basic template or structure for each spread. Once they've agreed the number of levels of heading, the number and type of feature boxes, pull quotes and everything else that lies beyond the main body of the text, they brief the author to write to these guidelines. At least, that's how it works in theory. (Unfortunately the design process often begins after the author's been commissioned, in which case the editor has the unhappy task of unpicking the text before pulling it back into its new shape, which is the equivalent of unpicking a Victorian costume and using the material to fashion a pair of jeans. Always interesting, but slightly nerve-wracking.)

Editors remodel the text to make it easier for the reader to find and read the information they want. And it works, to a certain extent, but in truth it's only a nod towards true user-centred design, because print products work largely on assumptions about readers, while websites offer hard data and instant feedback. And print readers are generous with their time, so the model only needs to be fairly user-friendly, while web users are always in a hurry, so if they can't grab and run, they just run. There's so much to look at, and so little time!

So what's the deal with user-centred design?

Can Print Editors Do Digital?

Editors have always loved to cut. It's our favourite pastime. Sure, we fiddle around with the author's words, rewriting here and there, but when it's time to get the text on the page, we do what we love to do. Cut, cut, cut.

Luckily, this trait turns out to be perfect for the web. Because while non-fiction print editing requires some pretty nifty cutting to fit, the web demands a ruthless amount of cutting. Everything has to be immediately obvious, both typographically and semantically. Readers have to be able to spot what they want on the page immediately, seeing and identifying what they want within milliseconds. If you make them pause to think, they're gone.


Readers Vs Users
Why the impatience? It seems that the big difference between print and web readers is