Charles Apple, pointless design cheerleader

[rknil]

http://www.visualeditors.com/apple/2010/02/an-apology-to-the-lewiston-sun-journal/

This stuff gets stupid fast. First Charlie praises the page. Then he busts on it. Then he apologizes for busting on it.

That's the problem with trying to analyze dollar-sized pages based on their appearance. It really doesn't make much sense to begin with. It leaves readers out of the equation, but designers probably call them viewers.

The dialogue with this is amusing. First we have the sputtering design dolt defending the page:

I don’t mind your criticism of my page, but I didn’t cut out the photo and put it on a black box. I don’t have time for that stuff. I did put the type over the photo, but that’s all.

Yes, that's all. Next time, dolt, just run the photo properly -- with the background and without text on it.

Charlie's apology is not worth reposting, but a subsequent comment is:

The Sun Journal PDF appears to have been generated as an RGB profile with embedded CMYK proofed photos. This gives it the unnatural colors and extreme contrast, often supersaturated. You can achieve the same effect if you open a CMYK photo in software that doesn’t natively support that colorspace. The Arizona Republic front image appears to have either been exported as RGB or converted at some point.

Thank you, Mr. Wizard, aka Adam Gerik.

On the flip side, Gerik does provide a link to his blog, which actually is fairly well-written and somewhat interesting. So I guess reading Apple's worthless ramblings can be rewarding, as long as you wait for the sensible people to respond.

[rknil]

http://www.visualeditors.com/apple/2010/03/thursday-was-a-day-for-large-unusual-objects-on-a1/

The Chicago Sun-Times — circulation 275,641 — wrote about the nationwide tomato shortage with a larger-than-life vegetable (or fruit, depending on your culinary politics):

This is nothing new. Designers often take ordinary objects and make them too large. Then they try to call it art. They're wrong. And they're dolts.

The amusing part of this, though, is the newsfeed that brings up this link:

http://www.visualeditors.com/apple/2009/03/responsible-for-the-death-of-newspapers-design-directors/

Walter explains: ... (E)ventually layout editors were replaced by something called design directors, and design directors took to running pictures of large vegetables, first in black and white and later in color, and newspapering went all soft and squishy as hell.

The designers froth and roil against these types of criticisms, but the proof is against them. If you're running a giant picture of a tomato, you're guilty.

[rknil]

http://www.visualeditors.com/apple/2010/03/turning-the-world-on-its-ear-in-fond-du-lac-wisconsin/

There's a lot of the usual silliness in this Apple post.

Richard writes:

The Reporter has been known for a lot of creative front-page designs over the years. The starting point for that approach was to create more compelling above-the-fold front pages, to foster more community interest and excitement about the news, in particular to target younger or more casual readers and to drive more single-copy sales.

He cites no numbers to back up the claim about single-copy sales. Apple doesn't bother to try to get them. Weak. Doesn't pass the sniff test. Again, it's just designers making claims they can't or won't back up.

It’s nice to know that newspaper readers in Wisconsin are in good hands.

Maybe; maybe not. There's nothing to indicate this approach is what readers want. In fact, I would say they are not in good hands, based on this part:

The credit goes to Copy Editor and front-page designer Gary Clausius.

Designing is not copy editing, except in the world of visualwordstuff that dolts like Apple live in. Designers are not copy editors, and it's an insult to copy editors to claim they are.

[rknil]

http://www.visualeditors.com/apple/2010/03/headline-fail/#comments

Wrong again, Charlie.

http://archive.easternecho.com/content/republicans-turned-size-obamas-package?page=8

The column and the headline are attempts at humor. Not necessarily successful attempts, but attempts nonetheless.

This is yet another example of Apple not doing his homework. He's fast to jump on text mistakes, even though he often has no clue what he's talking about. Then he waves the design banner and makes stupid, unjustified claims about single-copy sales based on the appearance of the front pages. Either cite numbers or drop the claims, Charlie.

[rknil]

http://www.visualeditors.com/apple/2010/03/a-look-at-how-papers-covered-the-oscars-on-a1/

Charles apparently is continuing his habit of being wrong about these pages.

The very best A1 picture of Bigelow, however, was the one on the front of today’s Los Angeles Daily News, circulation 95,938. Somebody at Oscar Central — with a wicked sense of humor — seated Bigelow directly in front of her ex-husband, James Cameron, who had also been nominated for directing Avatar. When Streisand made the announcement, Bigelow apparently cast a glance back over her shoulder…

Two commenters object.

First, from Michael Whitley:

This photograph is NOT from when she won by the way. It is from earlier in the broadcast and she is looking back to see another winner coming forward, not looking at Cameron. I think that changes the value of the photo considerably since what you “saw” in the photo Charles isn’t what actually happened at all.

Interesting. The lack of comma use by an alleged journalist also is interesting, but we can't expect much from page designers.

Comment two, from known moron Steve Cavendish:

As a matter of fact, the cutline for that photo say nothing at all about that moment.

It certainly is not when she won the Director award and it’s a little dishonest to run that as the main shot when everybody assumes it was (and they don’t actually write a good enough cutline to tell you when it was).

Again, we have some writing problems, but that's to be expected.

It should also be noted these two are within the Tribune visualwordstuff "empire," and they are attacking a Los Angeles competitor.

There's probably more to come on this one.

[rknil]

http://www.visualeditors.com/apple/2010/03/paul-wallen-named-design-director-of-the-huntsville-ala-times/

You can almost hear the "Duh" and see the drool rolling from this guy's mouth. He's a dim bulb who's been criticized at more than one of his many stops.

It'll be entertaining to see how this one turns out.

[rknil]

http://blog.syracuse.com/future-news/2010/03/q_and_a_with_charles_apple_on_the_future_of_news_design.html

Full disclosure: I did one of these Q&As with Brian Cubbison about 18 months ago. He presented some questions that enabled good answers.

This one is much the same. I'll have to say Apple did branch out from the design-based cheerleading at his site. But one comment deserves mention:

If you put journalists out of business by doing better journalism, then I say you've cornered and beaten the market and you deserve your market share. But if you put journalists out of business by replacing them with mediocre work, then I'd argue you've cut the quality of your product.

Does he not see the hypocrisy of this statement? Newspapers have not succeeded with the design-based approach, and yet he keeps trumpeting it. The problem lies with the shaky definition of "copy editors." People like Apple try to straddle the fence; they include designers in the copy editing group when it suits their purpose, but when the focus shifts to content and text issues, then he plays the shallow "word people vs. visual editors" game that has really grown tired.

Some comments follow about the need for designers to learn HTML and CSS. With new technology, there's always the risk of it becoming obsolete shortly after it's learned, so that is a significant issue. But in addition, I just don't see designers who can't be bothered to handle text suddenly picking it up a notch to deal with this coding. If they can't scale back the obsession with visuals long enough to deal with text -- which should be an integral part of any designer/"copy editor" job -- then they probably won't handle coding responsibilities well, either.

Again, it comes down to the definition of the position. I have a hard time believing, though, that too many newspapers still have the resources to hire one-dimensional designers.

[iambecomedeath]

This from a recent Apple blog post ...

For your consideration…
An effective use of white space? Or a total waste of newsprint?
I think it’s awfully effective. And a bold thing to do out front.
What do you think?

Naturally, we had comments like this: "WOW. Totally effective and very bold. I love it!
I would buy that if I walked by the newsstand."

But some folks didn't like it (surprisingly). One commented: "To answer the question as you phrased it, Charles, I’ll say it’s a waste of newsprint. What does the white space add to the story? What point does it help to illustrate? I don’t see one. And I have to throw this out there: A clip art white guy represents Las Vegas?"

But when the voices of reason start to speak, we get this juvenile screed in response: "Disagree with most comments. It has you all talking, right? Enough to turn a page for a reader then. Love it."

Seriously? That's this kid's logic?

So why not just put any wild, outrageous photo out there with this story -- even if it has nothing to do with the story? After all, since it has us talking, it'll be enough for readers to buy it. Good grief ...

[rknil]

But when the voices of reason start to speak, we get this juvenile screed in response: "Disagree with most comments. It has you all talking, right? Enough to turn a page for a reader then. Love it."

Seriously? That's this kid's logic?

So why not just put any wild, outrageous photo out there with this story -- even if it has nothing to do with the story? After all, since it has us talking, it'll be enough for readers to buy it. Good grief ...

You beat me to the punch on that one. I was going to post almost exactly what you have here, but I have been distracted with the NCAA tournament games.

Later I'll get that page image posted over here. I will say there are far more voices of reason in that thread than I remember encountering in any previous design debate.

[rknil]

This is the page being discussed. I think it has way too much white space. Looking at dollar-sized PFADs does not give an accurate portrayal of how much real estate is wasted here.

Also, his hand does appear to be stuck inside the O, rather than grasping it.
    

[rknil]

His latest and greatest:

I had difficulty finding a page from Ohio that could go up against this brilliant photo on the front of today’s Washington Post. Originally, I resorted to using the Ohio University front page. But then I was tipped off by a former student editor that the OU paper wasn’t publishing this week, which is finals week. The page I posted here earlier today was from last week’s MAC championship win over Akron.

So let's get this straight: He decides, based on the appearance of dollar-sized pages, which ones are the best. But he can't even figure out that one of them is a week old.

Reading, Chuck. Magnify the pages. Act like a journalist would, even though you never have been one. Don't just look at the pretty pictures.

Something is badly flawed with his methodology.

[rknil]

http://thepost.baker.ohiou.edu/ftp/HomePage/frontpage.pdf

This is the one that threw him. (We'll see how long this version stays active.)

It's dated March 12. Ohio played Kent State, not Georgetown. This list could go on and on.

No wonder this guy didn't last at The Sporting News. He can't even figure out when a page is a week old!

[rknil]

Also, he STILL has the details wrong, as he thinks Ohio played Akron in the MAC title game.

Does this guy read? Can he? I'm starting to wonder.

[rknil]

http://www.visualeditors.com/apple/2010/03/ncaa-tournament-page-one-madness-day-two/

He's back with this again.

First, I see where this idea might have a little merit. But rating front pages based on how they played first-round NCAA tournament games is sort of silly. I would hope that many of these newspapers have better things to put on A1. At one paper I know too well, the lazy solution was simply to poach a photo or capsule from Sports, and often we were just filling space.

He also is completely clueless (I know, no surprise) as to how this works. Houston and Maryland played a late game that probably did not start until at least 9 p.m. Central, and he wonders why the Chronicle did not have a result on its front page.    I'm sure his response would be: "Well, the Baltimore Sun had it!" I'll assume the Sun either updated an early edition or ran a late one to add the game result.

Apparently he's now too skittish to find backups when the university's city has nothing about the game. For example, he takes Morgantown, W.Va., to task, but the Huntington paper had the Mountaineers' result in its rail. He falls into the same trap with the New Mexico State result, which ran in the rail of the Roswell paper. He questions why Albuquerque did not mention the game, but NMSU is not even in the city.

(Aside: Years ago, the Missouri Valley Conference included NMSU, which made almost no sense, but I still remember the school being in Las Cruces.)

Let's summarize additional omissions:

* UCSB: He says he could not find a mention of it. The Santa Maria Times has it in the skybox.

* Gonzaga: He really drops the ball here when he claims the Spokane paper had little mention of the Bulldogs' victory. There's a skybox that mentions an entire pullout.

Yeesh. Does this guy need to make an eye appointment?

If he keeps doing this, I'd suggest he spend more time looking at the pages. There are fewer games, so he should be able to improve on his performance, which right now is on the level of a No. 15 seed.

[rknil]

This page fits into the most recent discussions. It's another example as to why "evaluating" dollar-sized PFADs is silly.

I held this broadsheet in my hands, and I can say with certainty this is WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY too much white space. It's the equivalent of waiting through a long list of movie credits for now-47-year-old Matthew Broderick to come out and say the movie is over and to go home.

For this page to work, it should have brackets emerging as air from the ball and fading from view. THAT would have ruled. This does not.