What is the role of print media in the digital age?
The aim of this essay is to explore the role of print media in the digital age. It will be looking into the pros and cons of the style and how, instead of becoming a dying art form, it can and will evolve into a new one, as well as discussing the notion that print cannot exist in a digital world as it is too heavy or takes up too much space when you could have one device that carries everything you need, amongst other reasons. In addition, throughout this essay, I will explore the different examples of work within both fields as well as one that brings the two forms together, whilst using information from multiple sources online and within physical texts.
Firstly, one of the most important things to have is a basic knowledge of print media. For example, printed poster art, flyers, magazines and publications are just some of popular pieces of print media. The role of print media in today’s society is huge advertisements which can be found everywhere in the form of billboards, on the side of buses or in bus shelters, smaller printed publications such as magazines, newspapers or postcards and even packaging for anything from food to mobile phones. Print is in so many areas of our lives that we can often forget about it or take it for granted.
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Figure 1. Example of print being used on a large scale (Apple iPhone 6)
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One of the benefits of print is that it is physical which means you actually feel like you own the product. A book is meant to be tactile; you turn the page and take in the information as you hold it. Dooley argues that if you actually hold the book or paper in your hand and read from it you are more likely to take in the information, “participants who were exposed to a direct mail piece (75%) than a digital ad (44%).” (Dooley, R., Forbes, 2015). It is much more likely someone would rather have a beautiful hardback or paperback copy of a book rather than have an entire folder dedicated to literature on a hard drive. Not many people are enticed into reading from a digital folder, yet if a book on a shelf has a beautifully designed cover, it is much more likely to draw them in to picking it up and reading it. Despite the invention of products such as the Kindl and the increase in online platforms for magazines and newspapers, physical copies are still being sold in their millions on a daily basis. In fact, now that books are quick and easy to purchase cheaply online from stores like Amazon, an article in the New York Times suggests that print will remain the way forward for written publications: ‘While analysts once predicted that e-books would overtake print by 2015, digital sales have instead slowed sharply… Now, there are signs that some e-book adopters are returning to print” (Alter, Alexandra, The New York Times, 2015)
For smaller scale printed projects, it used to be incredibly expensive. At first designers had no freedom with the finished product and could only send their work off to specialists to be printed. Davis mentions how nowadays individuals have complete authority and freedom over their finished product if they wish: "Instead of passing off to specialists the various mechanical tasks necessary to bring art to print, the designer gained complete authority over the technical and formal creation of published work" (Davis, M, 2012, pg 208). Print work, like digital, can now be done from the comfort of your own home which means it is no longer necessary to rely on printing companies to do the job for you. However, whilst larger projects (such as Figure 1) cannot be done by an individual, they have an altogether different impact. The purpose of this particular advertisement is to show just how well an iPhone 6 camera works, and therefore blowing the image up as large as possible is the only way to demonstrate this. Whether this advertisement was digital or print, it would be impossible to pull off such a big project alone.
On the other hand, Jarvis argues that, “Whether or not print dies, its business model will” (Bloomberg, 2008). In the digital world we as a society are taught a lot about saving the planet, we are more aware of the environment. This is a great example of why print could be perceived as dying out, as it is harmful to the environment to keep cutting down trees and destroying forests just so we can display some information. Everyone needs to pool together to reduce, reuse and recycle, and for the business men out there it is also cost effective. The amount of money that could be saved just by changing the typeface, let alone the stock or anything else, could cut costs down, for example “a Pittsburgh schoolboy has calculated that the US state and federal governments could save getting on for $400m (£240m) a year by changing the typeface they use for printed documents." (Jon Henley, The Guardian, 2014).
It is also important to consider the costs with regards to the time it takes to print everything. Consider sending a text compared to sending a letter; the time difference is dramatic. This thinking can be applied to all print methods, where as once you have finished work on your computer all you have to do is leave it on there and not have to print it out 100s of times because people can just view it online instead. Although they don’t fall under the category of media, receipts are another great example of a printed product, which could be digitalised in order to reduce waste and save resources, as well as tickets for anything from cinema visits to flights to concerts. We can even take the example of Figure 1 again. Whilst installing a giant billboard screen would take a lot of time, once it is up it would be very easy to just upload new images and take the old ones down, whereas that board would have to be taken down and replaced every time you needed to change the advertisement.
These points suggest that although print media has some good points, it also has some areas for improvement. This is where digital media comes in. Digital media can consist in a variety of different forms; websites, online magazines or eBooks and videos. The techniques used to create them rely on electronics, software such as the Adobe Creative Suite and many others are heavily used in the process but are backed up by being able to post online for free. This is making it more and more accessible for everyone to view many different forms of art or expression wherever you are in the world. News can be sent straight to your mobile, a photograph taken half way across the world can be sent to friends and family instantly. The recent boom in technology has opened up doors to a digital world that we could never have imagined only ten years ago, and Davis tells us how “it quickly became apparent that the interactive media held the potential for bigger and better things" (Davis, M, 2012, pg 209)
A problem that we have found with print media is that it can be slow and time consuming. Technology has quickened processes considerably, meaning that it is no longer necessary to spend time waiting for a certain process to be completed and it is possible to produce much more work in the time you would usually be waiting. Davis highlights this by saying that “as software developed, it became possible to create and output accurate facsimiles of printed work in a fraction of the time spent in hand-generated processes." (pg 208) This may be seen as an improvement as you can get much more done in a shorter amount of time but it maybe seen as a sort of short cut and may not be interpreted as art because people may think the effort isn't there, and that perhaps the heart and soul of the piece has been taken away and replaced with a machine rather than using the hands on method. As I mentioned earlier, digital media means that you can post anything you do straight onto the internet, which means it is possible to save so much time and money if you don’t have to print everything. Paper would not be wasted and forests around the world would be saved as dramatic change to the environment would occur for the better. Digital is all packed away into one place meaning you could carry everything on one device and not have to worry about weight or physical space.
An additional advantage of digital media is not just the speed at which you can share media online, but also the amount of people that you can reach, almost instantly. If you take the idea of digital advertising like bait and click then it can be interactive to have higher rates of viewing. As you can see in Figure 2 the advertisement is enticing the viewer into wondering how the woman manages to stay so young in looks. Then you are tempted to click the button 'LEARN THE TRUTH NOW', and are able to access the information instantly.
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Figure 2. Example of online bait and click advertisement.
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However, this type of advertising can also be more intrusive so resentment to the company may increase. Humans need to feel as if they are being spoken to directly to have a connection with the advertisement this can make them feel more comfortable which it is thought a computer can not do: “…they’ll never truly create the kind of emotional experience that gets consumers excited about your brand.” (Gilad de Vries, Forbes, 2012). Obviously people are becoming a lot more savvy about the ideas of online 'fake' adverts but some people will still click whether they are desperate or just bored and interested. Figure 2 is an example of how these type of adverts can be horribly designed; there is nothing that catches the eye apart from the horrid flashing imagery and the bright colour. Nothing is aesthetically pleasing and not many design decisions have be consulted. Messages like this appear all over the World Wide Web so people are becoming almost desensitised to the idea or have some form of an advert blocker. This comes back to the point of interaction throwing you off or giving a human element to the sale.
As stated earlier people need to engage with the physical not just stare blankly at a screen. Digital isn’t physical it can disappear in a second and would be forgotten as if it was never even there, because of this we have become accustom to ignoring the things we see. ”Television is a negative influence on kids and therefore TV watching must be limited” (Leona Thomas, Newsworks, 2014). The worry has always been there, the fear, that we would all become hypnotised by digital means. Televisions were feared because people would sit and stare for hours at this new technology. Yes, it is an escape from reality but it is not real. If you hold a book you take it in, as you stare at a screen it is hard to pull yourself away. A break is good every now and then but we need to get a healthy balance of the two.
Therefore, if both forms of media have their positive and negative elements, surely, “a combination, a hybrid of the two if you will…is what will strive”. “John Plunket predicted, information would gravitate to electronic media, but that extraordinary content is going to stay in the print domain." (Heller, Steven, and Véronique Vienne. 2012). It is important not to remain stuck in the old ways without evolving or make advancements but it is also important not to get idle and let machines do all the work for us. We should be making our lives easier but we are still using the same methods as before just putting them into digital form, a book on a phone where the page turns as if it were a real book. This is known as ‘skeuomorphism’, an idea that suggests that although we are starting to rely on new forms of media, we still want to keep hold of the old ones.
We should not forget the old methods all together. Instead we should use both forms in harmony to find a middle ground. The rate at which technology has advanced over the past decade, let alone the century, is astounding. Yet, alongside there is still printed media. It is not being shunned away or phased out. In fact, new technology is being developed and people are still choosing the physical. Rather than developing a digital way of how to turn a page instead look at ways to help make print more enticing. Ways of getting people more excited about print. The iPad was invented on the basis that people would be reading eBooks, newspapers would be sent through your phone however it quickly became apparent that people were not turning away from print. Statistics each year show that a lot fewer people were switching to digital than originally thought: "The rate of e-book growth is slowing substantially” (Barry Wallop, Telegraph, 2015)
Technology is needed to print our posters, flyers and books, it makes it easier and quicker but still helps the audience engage with the piece. We can send out the message on a social media website like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and spread the word but it is important not to use it as the only means. Davis talks about how there is “not a fixed point in time where one medium instantly displaces another." (Davis, M, 2012, pg 212). This suggests that not only are both mediums strong (as one cannot just be wiped out by the other), but also that using elements of both is the way forward. This may consist of combining the two processes together instead of leaving them separate and believing that you can only have one or the other. A QR code in a magazine or newspaper could lead to an interview online which would leave more space in the physical copy to go into other details or stories.
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Figure 3. Printed advertisement (Priester)
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In 1906 Lucian Bernhard helped change the idea of overly complicated dtesign to a simpler more minimalist style within advertising. Object poster (Figure 3, Sachplakat), "was the jewel in the crown of large stylistic movement called Plakatstil, or Poster Style." (Heller, Steven, and Véronique Vienne. 2012) The reason for this new style of advertising was because of new technology that helped push the industry into the future, it meant that colour image could be reproduced easily. This is a brilliant example of how technology helped print media but it didn't try to reproduce or change the ideas it just gave new ones and opened a fresh new idea to the world.
However, in some cases you cannot incorporate the two processes. As mentioned earlier, sometimes physical copies are more effective in advertising, for example when looking at a phone often people are bombarded with emails, notifications and alerts about events or new offers that no one either wants or needs. This means people do not look at them but if physically, someone is handed something or it is put on a billboard so large it is impossible to ignore then engagement is no argument. On the other hand sometimes print is just not needed and things like receipts and tickets are becoming outdated. This does not mean that print is dead, just that it is not needed everywhere and we need to be sensible about what we replace, what we develop or change, and what we keep the same.
In conclusion, print media still has a role in the digital world. Humans need physical interaction to engage with something whether it be a product or a simple conversation. We cannot all sit around at computer screens becoming distant from our own existence. Digital media has its benefits too. You are able to contact millions of people in seconds from a click of a button with no cost at all, this beats handing out leaflets in the street that nobody wants to take. The world is constantly changing and evolving, but people cannot just disregard the old to make way for the new. Instead, we can learn from it, adapt it and use it to help mould the future. By using both digital and print together as one it is possible to create a hybrid, save the environment, save costs and save time. This is print media’s role in our 'digital age'. This is where print will come out strong. Print is not dead.
