Design Without Designers?
“Trumbull” (left) and “Gilman,” two of the canned magazine templates now sold by Ready Media
How should publication designers greet the news yesterday that Roger Black—the magazine design (and redesign) guru who’s had his hands on Rolling Stone, Newsweek, New York, Popular Mechanics, Esquire, and about a zillion other titles over the years—has launched a new venture called Ready-Media to provide “outstanding media templates for both print and web-based formats” to publishers “at a fraction of the cost”? Several commenters on the Society of Publication Designers’ Grids blog were understandably displeased by what they saw as yet another nail in the pub-design coffin:
What a huge setback for designers and magazine makers.
You’ve got to be kidding. Paint by numbers for magazine design?
Working at a city/regional magazine and seeing the ever reducing budget & staff, this sends a shiver down my spine.
Indeed, the templates do seem to have the potential to cut seasoned designers out of the publishing enterprise, allowing less-skilled workers to dump content into one of five canned magazine or newspaper formats. But not everyone in the field is upset by this development. Also writing in the Grids comments section, Paula Scher argues that the emergence of Ready-Media is actually “good news for all terrific magazine designers everywhere” because it means that we have hit “rock bottom” and there is now “nowhere to go but up.” Even more optimistic is her fellow Pentagram partner Luke Hayman, who writes that the templates are “better than 90% of the magazines and newspapers out there” and that good designers will be able to customize them.
The discussion will no doubt continue on the Grids blog and elsewhere. But we wanted to open up the debate to designers of all stripes, not just those in the publishing industry. As we wrote last month, architects are facing a similar challenge with the advent of Building Information Modeling software, which could eventually allow amateurs to realize their own building and interior designs without the involvement of trained professionals. And it seems likely that continued advances in technology will put more and more design power in the hands of consumers. So how do professional designers begin to convince clients and the public of their indispensability? Will these developments just make quality design stand out—and thus become more valuable instead of less? Or should budding designers start thinking about other ways to make a living in the coming decades? Please share your thoughts by using the comments form below.
Blog feed
Newsletter
Twitter
Living with Guild
Architecture for the Other 99%
Behavior, Bicycles, and the Best Intentions
Celebrating the class of 2012 Game Changers
Black Locust: the Sustainable Hardwood of our Future?
Q&A: Guy Horton
Local Hero
Henry Ossawa Tanner, Painter (1859-1937)
Q&A: Tom Darden
Building as Business
BACK TO TOP
It was only a matter of time—an opportunity presented by a shift in culture and Roger seized it in a carefully crafted business-like manner. Would we be so harsh if this were a Microsoft or Adobe product? It stings since Mr. Black is one of us [and perhaps because we did not think of it first?]. It will take work from both above and below the median and force some talented art directors and designers to reconsider the publishing industry [among those that have not done so already]. I agree with those who say this will be used by clients we would not want anyway, but surely there will be instances where non-profits or cultural institutions who appreciate design but are strapped for cash will find themselves considering this as an alternative.
The one thing I can take away from this is it has generated an active and opinionated discussion on design, which is a positive. Last week it was Bruce and Emily in Newsweek talking about social practices. This week Roger has presented something that should make us all think.
Comment by criswell — July 21, 2010, @ 5:45 pm
If one can get basic ingredients at any grocery store, there is still no guarantee that a great meal will be the end result.
As a photographer I could dream that this would open up budgets for truly compelling imagery, but I have a feeling that those who cut corners to use templates, will continue to cut corners with images, and probably with writers too. Templates might lead to a collapse of several publications, but by the time that happens, I doubt many creative professionals will still be around to pick up the pieces. Maybe some of them will head over to MagCloud, and we can work up our own ideas.
Comment by Gordon Moat — July 22, 2010, @ 3:46 am
One size fits all?
I don’t think that this trend will prevail. The reason for new formats in magazines and newspapers is that the public is always looking for something new, bold and not condescending. If an editor decide to go with these templates, he or she will only stagnate and quite probably drive away new readers (specially young ones).
To assume that everything can be “ready made” only leads to mind and soul starvation.
Comment by Fernando Casas — September 3, 2010, @ 11:31 am
I had this idea years ago, but Im a nobody in the world of design.
So I left it as an idea as its unethical to remove talent out of design and to rely on templates like plugin bits like a facebook widget.
I did come up with the idea some else actually made this mosnter and once pandora has been unleashed upon the world she can never be put back into her box.
Last one out of work please switch off the lights.
Comment by Chris — October 30, 2010, @ 4:45 pm
There are perhaps a dozen magazines published in the U.S., out of more than 2,000 “significant” titles that benefit from design. By that, I mean their circulation and reader/viewership is directly affected by their look and feel. The rest are either so iconic that design does not impact their business status, or their readers do not comprehend the notion of magazine design. And if they did, they wouldn’t care.
Templates are not the enemy. Designers use templates all the time. They may not call them by that name, but I have yet to meet a designer who doesn’t (sub)consciously draw from his or her experience to jumpstart a design project. In its own way, that constitutes “design by template.”
Traditional paper magazine publishing is no longer a prime business. General revenues have been steadily declining for the past ten years; ad revenues are becoming harder and harder to maintain. Publishers, with or without deep-pocketed patrons, are beginning to see design as a reduceable cost. In that environment, Roger Black’s solution makes eminently good business sense. Perhaps designers who adopt the “woe-is-me” attitude should re-learn how to sell their talents. Regular study of the excellent journal “@issue” will yield a continuous stream of good arguments for good design. Despair over an inevitable idea such as Ready-Media only underscores the possibility that, perhaps, it’s time to re-assess one’s commitment to the profession.
Comment by axel schonfeld — November 4, 2010, @ 12:32 pm