Posted by Sarah Dunleavy (Head of Design)
As Esquire and GQ launch full-issue versions of their magazines as iPhone apps, it raises questions about the best way to handle deeper content when designing for mobile platforms.
The GQ and Esquire apps, neither are anywhere to be seen in the Top 100 paid apps list, despite their credibility. The reason being that if people want to read a magazine in a print format they will buy one, rather than looking at it on a small screen zooming in and out until they have no idea what page they are on. Magazines are designed to be easy and engaging for readers to navigate their way through. I can't see how the same format would work on a digital platform a quarter of the size.
The apps try to recreate the feel of a magazine environment, which, as a designer and lover of print, I should be able to engage with. But there is no interactivity, content sharing or bookmarking, which defeats the whole point of a digital platform. It reminds me of how we used computers before the internet.
Meanwhile, Rodale (publisher of Men’s Health and Women’s Health among others) went a different direction with a series of branded on-the-go apps: the latest is the Eat This, Not That app. It has topped the healthcare and fitness paid app chart in the iTunes App Store. They have successfully repurposed the magazine to suit the way people view content on mobile devices. Perhaps that is why they are in the top 50 best-selling apps storewide.
Maybe GQ and Esquire are looking ahead to larger mobile formats, such as the tablet, but for now it is safe to say that literally recreating print in digital is more of a designer's fantasy than a useful tool for the reader.