On the design of Newspaper websites...

As has been well reported Scotland has a new newspaper in the shape of the Caledonian Mercury. Its innovation is to be paperless and to only make its content available online. The reasoning behind this is fairly simple – with no massive overheads to spend on print costs they can produce this news portal for a knock-down price. An ambition not to be sniffed at when print papers are feeling the pinch.

There are plenty of other staffers in the blogosphere who will give comment on the content of the Mercury so I`m going to cast my eye over another area – its design. A critique of the design is perhaps unfair at such an early stage in the life of this online organ. Another caveat is that this is just the musing of a bloke in an armchair and should not detract from the impressive effort and drive that it has taken to bring a new Scottish news portal into a reality.

The main issue I have with the design of the site is that it looks and feels like a blog.

As a purveyor of a little read and infrequently maintained blog I do tend to view them as being (happily) a wee bit ramshackle. For me blogs aren't journals of records, whereas newspapers should be.

By far and away the poorest element of the design is the ‘masthead’. A wee image search for the old Caledonian Mercury (a heritage of newspapers in Scotland I simply wasn’t aware of until it was highlighted by the modern incarnation) returns a rather splendid looking mid-19^th century front page with an audacious masthead which, like the modern incarnation of the paper, is unashamedly Scottish. However, it’s clear that producing a modern version of this old school masthead really wasn`t an option for the Mercury team as the banner of thistles is pretty much covered by the Scotsman.

As the likes of the Record have claimed the lion rampant the Mercury has chosen to go for a different heraldic symbol of Scotland – the unicorn. This would be fine...except that what they have produced looks dreadful. I`d wager there are still a few folk out there who haven`t twigged that it’s meant to be a unicorn. An additional touch seems to have been incorporated in the low-res unicorn and that’s to make it look like it’s made of mercury...a conceit to far for me.

Another element of the masthead that I’m not convinced by is the typeface. ‘Grand Central’ has been used and its a nice typeface for old signage (as the name suggests it was developed for Grand Central station) but I’m not convinced it works here – the Rs lack authority (and pretentious comments like this should probably discount this critique being taken seriously!). Since it’s a fairly modern endeavor I would have been tempted to go for a condensed clean and simple san serif typeface – perhaps a variation of the popular newsroom typefaces like ‘Bureau Grot’ or ‘Antenna’.

One final thought that should be given to the masthead is to include the .com . This is an online only publication – why not trumpet that? Have a look at the online versions of Le Monde, the Irish Times or El Pais and you will see that even these established old organs are incorporating the URL into their online masthead. The URL is not just the address where you find the paper its also part of its identity.

While there are plenty of examples of online publications that the Mercury could learn from - I`ll direct you to just one fairly good example - the Flemish newspaper De Morgen. Recently revamped it demonstrates fairly well what and online paper could do. I can`t read Dutch but this site is instantly recognisable as a news site. The masthead looks like it belongs to modern times and reflects the domain name. Scroll through it and it’s fairly packed with information – something perhaps the Mercury can`t compete with, understandably, due to scale and the fact that the Mercury is only a week or so old!

Like many news sites De Morgen has video content and podcasts – could the Mercury look to this area? On the spot reporting may not be an option but discussion with the Mercury’s own contributors possibly could be. One final thing to highlight from De Morgen is that if you scroll right to the bottom of the page you have a lovely wee TV guide – something that most all newspapers carry.

The design of the Mercury by comparison looks like a fairly rudimentary wordpress blog. Using wordpress is not in and of itself an issue, it’s a fairly user friendly content management system. Even Number 10 uses it for their site. Perhaps it’s not yet departed far enough away from the standard wordpress models for it not to be too bloggish (I think I may have just invented a word).

The Mercury is looking to compete with the Herald and the Scotsman online but those two established papers (and sites) look more convincing as sources of news (although the Scotsman online is looking increasing ropey these days). Take a look at the English language online Swedish news site ‘The Local’ – it’s in the same boat as the Mercury as being online only but its design, while not fantastic, looks like a serious enough news site and not like a standard blog (like the one you are reading now).

I think one of the reasons that De Morgen and The Local have the edge on the Mercury is that they emulate newspapers more effectively. The top story is always illustrated with a large image to draw you in etc.

I`m no expert in these matters, I’m just a reader of news not a reporter or publisher of it, but if I was to make a few suggestions to improve the look and feel of the Mercury...

Change the Masthead.

Improve the logo.

Drop the use of serif fonts – including for headlines.

Keep the colour scheme simple – drop the multiple colour section bar at the top.

Try and look more like a newspaper – utilise columns.

Explore creating wee podcasts.

Consider the creation of a G24 style output.

Get a mobile site that is designed for smartphones.

Hardly exhaustive and in terms of cost...I`ve not idea. Some of the above may be lovely in theory but expensive in reality.

The Mercury does have a real chance of being a different sort of newspaper but its design should be as authoritative and credible as its output. But given that I've never created an online newspaper and am never likely too the good people of the Mercury are quite entitled to ask “and what the hell do you know?”

If you are interested in newspaper design spent a bit of time browsing the Society of News Design website - especially the competition winners.

From New Labour to Kamikaze Labour

The bells for New Year had hardly stopped chiming when the UK generally election campaign was off in full swing. Lots of talk of the start of the ‘phoney’ war before the real election campaign – my own view is that it looked very much like it had really begun in earnest.

The Conservatives rattled off a couple of policies but left question marks over funding. Labour’s response was an attempt to be of the old instant rebuttal school they employed so well in 1997 but it faltered and the Tories came out sounding like they were prudent (to coin a phrase) while Labour where fritter away public money. Whether it’s true or not was lost in the stramash.

The Conservatives looked to have made a rod for their own back by sounding confused on Marriage tax – precisely to policy which slipped up Cameron back at the start of his tenure when Labour looked to be on surer ground.

This should have been the opening for Labour top paint the Tories as all over the place on policy and unfit to govern. Their actual response instead was...try and bring down Brown...again.

It’s truly bizarre behaviour. At the outside we’ve got a maximum of around 5 months for the election to be held. The last chance that Labour had within its own rule to challenge Brown was in the Autumn at their conference. The only hope of replacing him is forcing Brown to quit. To do this (just months from an election remember) substantial numbers of his own party would have to knife him in the front.

Even if they did manage to persuade him to go (which they won`t I don`t think) there would need to be a breakneck speed election for the new leader – and there would certainly be some sort of contest.

The only conclusion to be drawn from this is that substantial numbers of Labour MPs have already given up on this election and decided that they are getting gubbed. Rather than band together for the fight against the Tories they are turning inwards and fighting themselves.

If, as most people are now assuming, Labour lose the election just how long are the recriminations going to last?

RBS Board

The RBS Board have threatened to resign if they aren`t allowed to pay out £1.5bn in bonuses...

Er...bye then!

It may be a bit of a simplistic view but seeing as you lads seem to have a spare £1.5bn then why not pay some of that money (you know, the stuff that came from the taxpayers) back to the Government.

Remind me, how much do you lads owe us?

Dear Secretary of State

The Release Florence and Precious Mhango campaign has fired out the text of an email that the News of the World's Scottish Political Editor Euan McColm sent to Jim Murphy about the pair who are still in detention in Yarls Wood.

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Dear Secretary of State,

How are you? I hope you and your family are all doing well and looking forward to Christmas.

I think you’ll remember we met this summer, out in Arden, the tough Glasgow scheme where you grew up. I was struck by how you described the way your upbringing had shaped your politics.

You spoke about your desire to make life better for some of society’s most disadvantaged people. And you know what? I believed – and still do - that you were sincere.

You told me how spending your teens in South Africa, where your black playmates were victims of the disgusting Apartheid regime, had further concentrated your mind.

I found your words eloquent and compelling.

And it’s with this in mind that I’m writing to you about Precious Mhango.

You may have heard about this 10-year-old girl. She was born in Malawi, into poverty, and at the age of three was brought to the UK by her parents.

She and her mum, Florence, came to the UK with her dad and Precious soon set about making new pals, first in England.

But life was still tough. Precious and Florence moved to the Cranhill area of Glasgow in December 2006, to get away from her dad, who had started mistreating them.

It was – you can imagine – a very traumatic time for a wee girl. But the great news is that Precious soon started to flourish. She’s a model pupil at St Maria Goretti Primary and a keen churchgoer. And she speaks with a Scottish accent.

But that counted for nothing last week when Precious and Florence were taken from their home in Scotland and sent to the Yarls Wood detention centre near London to await deportation.

The terrified pair were on a plane awaiting the return to Malawi when, at the last minute, QC Paul Chen, took up their case. He’s now fighting for their right to stay.
You may be interested to learn that Precious’s dad has already been given leave to remain in the UK – effectively, by breaking free from him, they have sacrificed their chance of a life here.

Do you know that the Home Office actually told Florence that since her ex-husband lives here, she and Precious would be at no risk of him in Malawi?

That seems terribly wrong to me. Are we really welcoming the right person?
You and I discussed Scottishness when we me last met. You argued that being Scottish was not about politics. You said that both you and First Minister Alex Salmond were equally patriotic Scots and I happily accepted that.

You said that Scottishness was about playing a part in the life of our great country and, again, I found that difficult to disagree with.

Well, Mr Murphy, I want to argue that Precious Mhango is a real Scot. She’s been playing a part in our country. She’s a success at school in a part of Glasgow often written off. She is, I think, the sort of person who good people got into politics to help.

If Precious is sent back to Malawi, her estranged father’s family will have a claim on her. There are genuine fears that, before long, she could fall victim to the barbaric practice of female circumcision. Although this is rare, Precious’s in-laws are said to believe in it.

I know, Secretary of State, that this is a difficult issue. The Government is right to be tightening up immigration procedures. This action must not only prevent bogus asylum claims, it must also make the procedure more efficient and humane for those seeking refuge.

I wonder if you might consider, on behalf of Scotland, raising this issue with your colleague, immigration minister Phil Woolas?

Surely we must know that deporting this little Scottish girl is the right thing to do before we do it?

I’d contend that being sent to Malawi will be as traumatic for Precious as it would for any other 10 year-old-child living in Cranhill.

SNP MSP Anne McLaughlin has been fighting for Precious and Florence. She’s a new MSP, but Anne has already started to build cross party support for this mother and daughter.

And the good people of Cranhill – the same sort of folk as the good people of Arden about whom you spoke so warmly – are rallying round, donating to legal funds and lobbying hard.

These people can only do so much. Your political career has taken you to the top. You know the system – and you have real power. I don’t expect you to abuse that power – but please think about using it.

Jim, this is not about politics. It’s not about policy. It’s about doing the right thing.
From one dad to another, I hope you can help.

With best wishes

Euan

PS-I have copied this email to readers of the News of the World.

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You may be interested to know that there is a campaign fund for Precious and Florence (to pay for the legal fees of fighting their case).

The details for donations are...

Account: CRANHILL WORLD CAFE
Sort code: 83 21 27
Account number: 10015466
Royal Bank of Scotland
1304 Duke Street
Glasgow G31 5PZ

Surprise!

The Telegraph's own Benedict Brogan has highlighted a piece of speculation from Morgan Stanley that will make for unhappy reading in HM Treasury.

Morgan Stanley predicts a number of 'surprises' for the world's economy, including;

"Surprise #3: UK becomes the first of the G10 to have a major fiscal crisis as elections lead to a hung parliament.

UK fiscal crisis exacerbated by political gridlock. The poor state of government finances is one of the key risks we see in the medium-term. Therefore, one tail risk and potential surprise is that a government bond and FX crisis materializes already in 2010.

One candidate for such a scenario is the UK where the upcoming elections could provide a catalyst, particularly if they result in a hung parliament. Such an outcome would likely lead to either a coalition or minority government where the ability to govern effectively will depend on the main party's ability to forge a consensus view to drive through necessary change.

In the run-up to the election growing fears over a hung parliament would likely weigh on both the currency and gilt yields as it would represent something of a leap into the unknown (given that the last hung parliament in the UK happened in 1974) and would increase the probability that some of the rating agencies remove the UK's AAA status."

This argument seems to be that a hung parliament would lead to the collapse of the economy. So if it looks like a hung parliament is in the office look forward to the smaller parties dusting off their wishlists...you want a stable Government Mr Cameron/Brown...then you have to deliver policy X for us.

The SNP, Lib Dems (and maybe even a few Green MPs) could have considerably more clout after the election than people might think.