USA Today Redesigns Web Site

In one more nod to the changing newspaper reading habits of a nation, USA Today has unveiled a new web site that that is even more visual, easier on the eye, and more attuned to the social web.

The paper that heralded the no-jump story, factoids, and visual charts, says the redesign is an extension of its mission that started with the paper's birth more than 25 years ago. "But it is a mission recast for an era in which readers are inundated with information, have little allegiance to a single news source, struggle to assess the credibility of what they read and have the capacity to share their own insights with a wide audience," Editor Ken Paulson writes in this letter to readers.

That's why you'll find the ability to scan news stories from other sources from the USA Today page, comments on every story page, avatars to personalize reader pages, and the ability to submit photos to the paper's web site and review movies and music.

The paper stresses it is now in a two-way conversation with its readers, and it is. Comments on the redesign are mixed but strong. (They're at the bottom of the letter to readers.)

At first glance, the web site's front page looks a little too spare to me, the headlines separated too much in an effort to be pleasing to the eye. It is too simple. There's nothing there that would make me want to make it my home page. Just as readers of broadsheets blanch when their daily papers make major changes, I'm sure there will be a lot of unhappy USA Today online readers. Change is rarely easy.

Expect to see a lot more changes from your favorite newspapers in the coming year. Declining readership and advertising dollars will force them to try to reclaim more readers and advertisers on the web.

As a former newspaper reporter, I'm fascinated to see how newspapers cross this major juncture. Hence, these related posts:

Newspapers Embrace the Web, This Time for Real
Newspapers in Transition
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