As I started working on the OC Register iPad strategy, I became an avid reader of Mario’s blog. You see, Mario “got it” early on. He knew that the iPad would open new doors of opportunity and the time was ripe to start experimenting with this new and exciting canvas.

So, it’s very fitting what started as individual blog posts about iPad design now has become a full-fledged, multi-touch iBook (buy it in iTunes) dedicated to the exploration of tablet design for news apps.

Mario describes his book as a

“digital book for our times, whether you are a reporter, editor, designer, teacher, student, or just a tablet user with curiosity about strategies that lead to good storytelling in this marvelous new platform.”

Check out the intro video:

The book is chockfull of good information. Really, it should be required reading for anyone in news and content industries just starting to explore the tablet canvas. Mario covers these topics in the book: Storytelling, Navigation, Look & Feel, Pop-Ups, Advertising, Economics, and Media Quartet.

Of course, true to his tablet design beliefs, the book has an abundance of photo slide shows, audio and video files, hyper links, and much more. But the multi-media never get in the way of the written words. Fortunately, words still play an important part in the New World.

I’m honored to have contributed a case study for the book in the form of video interviews with my fellow colleagues at Next Issue on topics ranging from introducing Next Issue to talking about creating navigation paradigms for digital magazines. Case studies are a big part of the book by the way. And that’s great. We are all learning and experimenting together.

Congratulations Mario on a great and educational book! (Also congrats to Reed, who I know worked very hard as editor and art director on the book).

Buy iPad Design Lab in iTunes for $9.99 (you can get a sample for free too)

Preparing for the presentation, I made it real simple. I basically stole everything from Brian Solis’ great book: The End of Business as Usual. Ok, almost everything. At any rate, you should buy his book.

My presentation covered:

• Connected Consumers – who are they?
• The golden triangle of SoLoMo
• The new purchase decision making process
• How to acquire and retain customers with SoLoMo

Check out the full presentation on prezi.com

The beautiful thing about social media is that it’s evolving constantly. And if you have the finger on the pulse and you’re willing to play the game, then you can turn it to your advantage. Since last year, a new player has entered the field. Welcome to BranchOut, basically LinkedIn on Facebook. BranchOut has seen tremendous growth already; 4 people join every second. That’s 400,000 per week. Currently, there are more than 30M registered users. Still a far cry from LinkedIn, but who knows if and when BranchOut will reach the tipping point. Are you there, ready to seize the opportunity if they do?

In my presentation, I cover:

• Tips on how to manage your career rather than just searching for a job
• LinkedIn – basic and advanced features
• Introduction to BranchOut

Check it out on Prezi.com:

The Team

The Next Issue team. From left: Claus Enevoldsen, Nicole Martinez and Efren Salinas.

I teamed up with two very talented journalism graduate students, Nicole Martinez and Efren Salinas. In addition to being great writers, they both have specific areas of expertise. Nicole is a master of social media and did a fantastic job of combining original with crowd sourced content to create really compelling articles. When she’s not studying, she works as an Internet Marketing Manager.

Efren is a wizard videographer. He has a knack for boiling down long interviews to compelling 2-3 minute clips perfect for the YouTube age. He’s also an enthusiastic gamer and runs his own gaming site: lonestargamer.tumblr.com. I tell you all of this, in case you are looking to hire, or you know of someone who are. Click to contact Nicole. Click to contact Efren.

Inspiration for digital publishers

On to the content! You can check out all the posts we created at SXSW here, most of them syndicated through eMediaVitals.com and a couple through PubExec.com. For this post, I wanted to call out a few I think are especially helpful for digital publishers.

Digital editions attracting new audiences, not just print readers

During the panel hosted by Next Issue and titled Digital vs. Print: Storyboard to Digital Delivery, four top executives from the magazine digital publishing world gave advice on four topics: User experience, creation process, Business models and personalization. Read the article.

Following, we interviewed Liz Schimel, chief digital officer at Meredith, and Chris Wilkes, VP of the App Lab at Hearst. The result are these two great videos:

Rethinking touchscreen design

Josh Clark is a designer and founder of Global Moxie and an expert on mobile design. And he’s a great guy. We covered his session about designing for touchscreens and following met with him in the hallway.

In particular, I love his thoughts on abandoning buttons for gesture based design. Read the article. Also, check out his blog, lots of great stuff!

Highlight app: Ubiquity trumps privacy

Just launched iPhone app Highlight got all the buzz at SXSW. Highlight runs in the background and notifies you about people around you. After having cleared a pesky PR lady asking me critical questions (no seriously, she was very nice and just doing her job), I got a quick interview with founder Paul Davison in a badly lit back room at one of the many SXSW parties.

Davison had some very interesting and perhaps controversial comments about privacy versus social sharing. I got the Highlight app, and personally I’m not deterred. But, I’m still waiting for critical mass for the app to truly provide value. Read the article here.

BostonGlobe.com: Using responsive design to tell interactive stories

If you are a regular reader of my blog, you know I’m a fan of responsive design. So, I was excited to get the opportunity to interview Miranda Mulligan, Digital Design Director at The Boston Globe.

The biggest take away for me was her insistence that you can tell really compelling interactive stories using HTML5. The biggest obstacle though comes down to resources. The technology is there, but does digital publishers have the right skills and motivation to execute? Read the article.

Viggo is now three and a half years old. We sit down every evening to pick out a book app to read. Here are his favorites. Please leave a comment and let me know which new apps we should pick up:

Below you will find descriptions and download links. The apps are sorted from most interactive to least. Each app passes my test for easy navigation that doesn’t interrupt the story:

Jack & The Beanstalk, $3.99. This is Viggo’s favorite book bar none. Created by Ayars Animation, this book is filled with animations and interactivity, but not so much that it takes away from the story (unlike the other book that’s created by ayars). Download. 

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore, $4.99. Moonbot Studios’ first interactive iPad book is an absolute pleasure to read and interact with- for the parent as well. But here’s what’s really cool about Mr. Morris. In addition to the app, you can also download the short animated film of the same name. I’m crossing my fingers it will win an Oscar tonight (update: Moonbot won. Congratulations!). Download app. Download film.

Numberlys, $5.99. The second app from Monboot also makes Viggo’s list. Numberlys tells the story of the origin of the alphabet. Throughout the book, Viggo and I have to help create each letter. Highly original and entertaining. Download.

Thomas & Friends: Misty Island Rescue, $4.99. Viggo loves trains so he would love this book no matter what. But it so happens that the app is created by Callaway Digital Arts, and honestly, all their apps are great. Like most Callaway apps, it comes with a book, a video, painting, and puzzles. Download.

Miss Spider’s Tea Party, free for a limited time. Another Callaway app with a great story and just as much great interactivity. Download.

Green Eggs and Ham – Dr. Seuss, $2.99. You can’t go wrong with any of Dr. Seuss’ books. Viggo can tap anything on the page and the app will read back to him what he tapped on. Besides of that, there are no other interactive elements, so the focus is on the story only. Download.

Cars 2 Storybook Deluxe, $5.99. Of course Disney is represented as well. Cars is just one of the many Disney apps Viggo has on the iPad. In addition to the story, Viggo can play games, paint and solve puzzles. Download.

Food Fight! $3.99. This is a quirky and fun original story with some interactivity. Viggo just loves it. It has to do with sausages and brussel sprouts. I guess you just have to read it to understand. Download.

The Monster at the End of This Book…starring Grover! $3.99. Yet another Callaway app. Narrated by Grover, he tries to keep Viggo from advancing in the book. It’s highly entertaining. There’s a sequel starring Elmo as well. Download 1. Download 2.

Finding Nemo: My Puzzle Book, $0.99. This is a breeze of a story. Instead of a lot of words, as you advance in the book, you have to solve puzzles. Download.

Violet, $2.99. Book one in an original series created by My Black Dog Books. Violet turns into Phantom Girl and mysterious things happen. Download.

Nighty Night! $1.99. This is not really a book. It’s more of a short bedtime app. Viggo helps turn off the light for all the farm animals, and when he’s done, he knows it’s bedtime. Brilliant! Download.

The Curious Adventures of Pickle Bob, $0.99. Although this app hasn’t been updated by the developer since middle of 2010, it still holds up. It’s a funny and original story. There’s no interactive elements in this app, only sounds in the background to help set the mood. Download.

Melvin Says There’s Monsters. $1.99. Here’s another app that hasn’t been updated since 2010, and because of this there are minor glitches here and there. It doesn’t keep Viggo from coming back again and again though. The story is just cool and I enjoy reading it. Download.

MeeGenius! Kid’s Books, free. This is a library of over 300 books, several of them free. There’s no interactivity at all, and that’s a blessing. I always pull MeeGenius out, when I want Viggo to settle down. Download.

Toca Doctor, $1.99. Toca Boca creates games for kids, which gives me peace and keeps Viggo entertained for quite awhile. This app basically lets Viggo play doctor with simple puzzles and games. Download.

PBS KIDS Video, free. This app let’s you watch videos from any of PBS KIDS television series, and again, gives daddy peace and quiet. Download.

I only read to Viggo in Danish. For all the English speaking apps, I translate real-time. So, it’s nice to see that there finally are a couple of great Danish apps on the market. Here are three:

Rasmus Klump, free. Includes puzzles, painting and sample videos and books. You can buy all the books and videos in a bundle. Download.

Troldeliv, free. An original series of books you can purchase in-app. Narrated by Ellen Hillingsø. Download.

H.C. Andersens Eventyr, free. I cannot raise Viggo as a Dane without exposing him to the greatest children book author ever. This app lets you purchase single videos or books, but just buy the whole bundle and be done with it. Hours of entertainment. Download.

What did I miss? Let me know which children apps Viggo and I should explore next.

So, here’s the deal. I’ll share then you’ll share. Please leave a comment at the end and let me know what your favorite apps are.

The select few

Although I have filled all my 11 screens with apps (I don’t really like putting my apps in folders), I always come back to a select few. The same does my 3-year-old son, Viggo. The apps I use the most are clustered on a couple of screens and his are collected in another area. Let’s explore my favorite apps in this post. Then, for all the parents out there, Viggo will follow up with his favorite apps next week (read here). Check out links and descriptions below the image.

Facebook. Free app. I know you already have this app on your iPad. What I’m really excited about are the Facebook news apps optimized for the iPad. My favorite is the Washington Post Social Reader. WaPo promises “the more you use it, the better it gets.” Basically, the WaPo app will learn which type of articles you like, and then give you more of that. Download.

the guardian eyewitness. Free app. It’s simple. It’s gorgeous. One photo a day (the best) presented in full screen. As an added bonus, for the photo enthusiasts there’s always a pro tip included. Download.

Netflix. Free app. $7.99 per month. Reed Hastings caught a lot of flak last year with the PR nightmare he got himself into, several times over. However, I’m a big fan of Netflix. No, you won’t get the latest blockbuster movies, but that never appealed to me anyway. With thousands of movies and TV episodes, you’ll be plenty entertained. Check out Lilyhammer starring Steven Van Zandt, Netflix’s first original production. More of that please! Download.

Newsstand. This is the only folder I have on my iPad and only because Apple insists it’s on my home page. The content inside Newsstand is great though. (Quick disclaimer. Since I work at Next Issue, I read the majority of my magazines on an Android tablet). In Newsstand one news”paper” and two magazine apps stand out.

The Daily. Free app. $39.99 per year. This is Rupert Murdoch’s brainchild and the first iPad-only news app to hit iTunes. I’ve been a fan of The Daily since day one. I open this app 3-4 times a week and spend about 15-20 minutes per session. Just like a newspaper, articles are conveniently arranged in sections, and you advance by swiping left to right. I like the familiarity, yet this is completely new. The Daily manages to give me interesting articles (some are deep and plenty lighter), packaged neatly with videos, interactive infographics and much more. Only pages I steer clear of are the Opinion pages. You can try it out free with a 2-week trial. Download.

Project. Free app. $19.99 per year. Here we have Richard Branson’s brainchild and the first iPad-only magazine to hit iTunes. This is how a digital magazine should be done. Filled with interactivity, music, video, hot spots, etc. Only downer is that it’s only designed in portrait mode and I really prefer landscape mode. Although you need a subscription, you can check out the free issue ‘Project Sounds’. Download.

Spin Magazine. Free app. $7.99 per year. I have to admit, I’m more of a Rolling Stone kind of guy. But since RS hasn’t figured out that the iPad is the next big thing, I have fallen in love with Spin instead. There are some complications with the navigation, but this is completely outweighed by the fact that there’s a killer playlist with each month’s issue. Read all the in-depth articles while new tunes are playing in the background. The app also includes a feed of news and reviews from Spin.com. Download.

OC The Peel. Free app. I’m a bit biased. I helped create this app when I worked at Freedom Communications. I have since moved on, but I still come back to The Peel again and again. Taking a cue from both Project and The Daily, The Peel curates news articles and publishes at 6pm every day (except Sunday). The news is layered with video, quizzes, and much more. The real standout is the daily feature. Whether it’s a behind-the-scenes of the Fisker hybrid car, a travel guide to Rome or a GRAMMY Awards preview, the producers always manage to surprise and delight me. Download.

Kobo. Free app. Buy books at kobobooks.com. You have iBooks, Google Books, Kindle and Nook, but Kobo wins by a mile. As I have written before, Kobo nails social reading. Check out Reading Life and Pulse. Reading Life is where I keep track of all my reading activity and where I can see what my friends are reading. Pulse is a feature that tells me who else are reading at the same time I am. I can leave comments and give thumbs up for my fellow readers to see. Download.

SubText. Free app. Buy books from various sources. I actually don’t use this app very much, but only because I’m becoming a Kobo loyalist. In fact, SubText might actually be better. You get points the more you engage with other readers. You can highlight text in a book and leave comments for other readers to see. Check out the Steve Jobs biography, and you will see how much these comments truly add to the reading experience. Download.

Shuffler.fm. Free app. I’m not a big fan of the aggregator apps (i.e Flipboard, Zite, LiveStand, etc.), but here’s one I come back to again and again. Shuffler.fm is an “audio magazine made by music blogs.” It basically curates the best new music in different channels such as Indie, Rock, Electronic, etc. Use it instead of Pandora as background music, or immerse yourself in discovering new music. Shuffler.fm is also a Website, allowing you to stream music from your laptop. Download.

Evernote. Free app. Who doesn’t love Evernote? Write notes, scrape Web pages, and then sync the content across all your devices (laptop, smartphone, iPad). I primarily use Evernote on the iPad when I’m at conferences or seminars to take copious notes. I can easily switch from my iPad to my iPhone knowing that my latest keyboard strokes are captured and I can pick up exactly where I left off. Download.

Ghostwriter. $1.99 for a limited time. I actually haven’t used this app yet. I still write all my meeting notes on paper. Evernote works for me at conferences, but in regular meetings I’m simply not fast enough to tap-tap and still pay attention. I wish there was a good stylus, so I could write on my iPad and finally get rid of paper completely. So far, they have all been crap. This is all about to change (I hope). I purchased an iPen from Cregle on Kickstarter. Check out the video, and you’ll see why I’m excited. It arrives in a week or two. Ghostwriter is so far the only note-taking app that’s compatible with the iPen, so there you go. Download.

ABC and NBC. Free apps. I just cancelled my cable subscription two weeks ago. I simply don’t need it anymore. With Netflix, Roku, ABC and NBC for iPad, there’s no incentive left to turn on the cable box. The ABC app gives me Modern Family and NBC gives me SNL. What else do you need? Download ABC. Download NBC.

Huffington Post. Free app. I love the content and I love NewsGlide, which is one of the methods you can navigate the app. If you don’t like the NewsGlide mode, you can pick Classic instead. The app is not perfect. Since Huff Post basically ports over the same news they have on their Website, there are some compatibility issues. When the article promises a video, often times, it’s not there. Damn you Flash! Nevertheless, I keep coming back. Download.

360Panorama. Free app. This app works for iPhone as well. In fact, I’m cheating a bit, because I’ve primarily used the iPhone app. But the app is so cool, it’s making my list anyways. 360Panorama lets you take 360 degree photos and it’s dead easy. Just turn it on and swirl. Check out one of my shots hiking with Viggo. Download.

Trailers. Free app. The only app made by Apple to make my list. Not only does it give you a plethora of trailers to watch (which is cool in itself), it also gives you the best overview of movies playing in a theatre near you. Download.

Chase. Free app. Bank account needed. This app works for iPhone as well. The app lets me check my bank accounts and transfer money. It also allows me to pay individuals directly via the Person-to-Person QuickPay, granted the recipients have signed up. I don’t understand why checks still exist. But they do. With the Chase app, at least now I don’t have to go to the bank to deposit them. Simply snap a photo of the check, front and back, submit and you’re done. Download.

Funnyordie. Free app. Need a chuckle? Just open and start laughing. Funnyordie gives you short, funny videos ad libitum. Search for the classic clip The Landlord with Will Ferrel or find Jeff Goldblum At Coachella (I was there – it’s me with the sunglasses). Download.

VidRhythm. Free app. Make your own music video in seconds. This app is for the whole family. First you record your own video and audio samples, VidRhythm then adds autotune and some sassy tunes and voila, you’re a superstar. It’s just fun. At least the first ten times. Check out our killer video. Download.

Words With Friends HD Free. Free app with advertising. Are you addicted too? Well, it’s been said to improve your mental fitness you should do crosswords 15 minutes a day. I think Words With Friends falls in that category, so I’m not ashamed of my addiction. Search for “Claus Enevoldsen” if you want to play. (Or try Scramble for iPhone and find me there). Download.

Angry Birds HD. $2.99 (there’s a free ad-supported version too). I had to sneak in Angry Birds. I wouldn’t say I’m addicted to this app, but after 15 minutes of Words With Friends, your mind needs numbing. Angry Birds does the trick. Download.

Mog. Free app. $9.99 per month. I almost forgot. My beloved Mog. This is by far my favorite service. Ever. Mog gives you unlimited streaming of more than 13 million songs available on all your devices. Buying music is so two years ago. The app on my iPad is actually just the iPhone app. Mog supposedly is working on an app optimized for iPad, but no one knows when it will be done. Who cares anyway, as long as I can continue to stream the music I love. Download.

Ok, your turn. Do you agree with my list? Which other apps should I place on my home screen right away? Let me know in the comments.

At CES last week, I had the pleasure to be interviewed by Ian Hamilton, my former colleague from OC Register and writer for the OC Unwired blog. In the interview we discuss where Next Issue fits in the digital publishing space. Specifically, Ian asks why we are focusing on Android tablets. Check out my answer to that and my pointers on what makes Next Issue unique. We are just getting started and 2012 will be an exciting year for us. Stay tuned for more news.

Let me know what you think of the video.

Check out Ian’s blog post here.

Revenue: Get serious about e-commerce

I’ve been advocating for quite some time that publishers should get serious about e-commerce, and with the rise of tablets, the opportunity is just getting bigger and bigger. E-commerce on mobile devices alone will top $6 billion in 2011 and is expected to reach $31 billion in 2016.

In particular, tablet owners seem excited about shopping directly from their devices. Even better, they want to shop from within publications. In “The Magazine Mobile Reader” report released by MPA a couple of months ago, 59% of respondents said they would like to buy directly from adverts in digital magazines and 79% said they want to be able to purchase products and services directly from editorial features.

eMediaVitals’ Rob O’Regan sees three ways for publishers to pursue e-commerce:

1. Sell your own stuff
2. Sell other brands’ stuff
3. Recommend other brands’ stuff

Whatever the path, it’s time to take advantage of the relationship publishers have with readers and start selling.

Content: Figure out social reading

Here’s a quote you should pay attention to:

“Every industry, every type of business we think about needs to be fundamentally reinvented in the face of social. Social isn’t a type of layer you slap on after the fact—it needs to be part of the product at the point of inception.”

Not surprisingly, it came from Flipboard cofounder Evan Doll in a recent interview with Fast Company.

There are different ways to attack social (read more about Kobo’s approach here), but with Facebook’s recent introduction of its “Read. Watch. Listen.” concept, there’s a new play for publishers. Using Facebook’s Open Graph, launch partners such as Washington Post, The Daily and Wall Street Journal have created news apps that reside within Facebook. When users read articles, they are automatically shared with friends using ‘frictionless sharing’.

The opportunity is huge. The multiplier effect of users’ passive sharing of articles has propelled launch partners to millions of app users in just a couple of months.  Not only that, early feedback suggests that content is reaching an attractive segment of new and younger readers.

Some have grumbled that ‘frictionless sharing’ is less ideal. First of all, the sender of an article might not want to automatically share that he’s reading about Snooki’s latest shenanigans and his friends might not want to know. For publishers developing news apps, they must make it transparent and easy for users to either enable or disable the ‘frictionless sharing’ function.

Second of all and perhaps even more troubling, when friends click to read one of your shares, they are forced to authenticate with the news app (and thus give up personal information) to read the article. This setup creates friction and as a result, less people will end up engaging with news apps. Publishers and Facebook jointly need to work on solutions to allow for true frictionless sharing.

With that said, the opportunity seems to outweigh the limitations. In a world of many enemies eating away at your business, Facebook seems to be on publishers’ side.

Design: Redesign your site with HTML5 responsive design

I am a big proponent of creating a content experience that fits the platform. In particular, I have advocated for a unique “lean-back” experience designed specifically for tablets. I still whole-heartedly believe in that. This is the type of experience readers will see value in and potentially pay for.

At the same time, publishers have all this online content they are repurposing and optimizing for both mobile, tablet and desktop platforms. It’s a daunting technological challenge to develop for all platforms, especially in a fragmented mobile world.

Earlier this year, The Boston Globe solved the challenge with the launch of BostonGlobe.com. Using responsive design, the Globe’s content is automatically reformatted to fit any screen size.

ProPublica recently rolled our their new look, also using responsive design. They decidedly think mobile first, and unlike The Boston Globe, which has a half-dozen versions based on screen size, ProPublica only has two versions; mobile and desktop. Check out other examples of responsive design Web sites here.

By using responsive design, publishers can save precious development resources and they can create consistency across platforms.

Platform: Place a bet on Windows 8?

Who knows if Windows 8 will be a hit?  But lets agree that it’s an ambitious overhaul of the Windows operating system. With a start screen optimized for touch and with apps optimized for tablets, Microsoft is trying to bridge the gap between tablet and PC. As such, Windows 8 will run on both PCs, laptops and tablets. The beta release of Windows 8 is slated for late February while a general release could happen in October.

Let’s assume Microsoft gets the software right. Then there’s still the hardware to deal with. Samsung is lined up to release a Windows 8 tablet in the second half of 2012, but more exciting is the emergence of Ultrabooks. If you own a Macbook Air, you know what that means.

Ultrabooks are super thin, lightweight laptops running on solid-state disk drives rather than traditional hard drives, which allows them to be turned on almost instantly. They will undoubtedly be the talk of the town at the upcoming CES conference in Las Vegas in January.

Ultrabooks (and MacBook Airs) are starting to close the gap between tablet and laptop. We are definitely not there yet, but you can imagine a world where one device is powerful enough for your work needs yet light enough and touch enabled for your leisurely activities. When the gap is bridged, Microsoft is poised to reap the benefits. Publishers that get started early on Windows 8 will have a first-mover advantage.

There you have it. Four tips. What other strategies do you think publishers should pursue in 2012?

I sent him an email back, and while we wait for the Austrian to English translation of the Horizont article, I thought I would share my response here.

What’s the difference?

“Swiping” happens between two distinct pages, whether they move vertically or horizontally, whereas scrolling is a continuous movement. We are familiar with vertical scrolling from web pages, but horizontal scrolling also occurs with the introduction of “carousels” or “sliders”.

The curated experience – print reinvented

Before getting into the differences, let’s talk about an over arching trend in tablet content apps. Whether they are static (updated periodically) or dynamic (web based, connected to an RSS feed or similar), many apps try to create the sense of an edition based, finite and curated experience. This is true both for newspaper and magazine apps as well as aggregator apps like Flipboard or Editions by AOL.

It can be argued that we are entering the era of “Curated Computing“, a term coined by Sarah Rotman Epps from Forrester. It basically means that people are looking for less but more relevant content, packaged for easy consumption.

This trend is important to note when discussing swiping versus scrolling.

 Swipe signals a start and an end

For publishers attempting to create an “edition based” experience similar to print, swiping from page to page gives readers a sense of familiarity. They’ve done this before. Progressing from one page to another, they use a gesture very similar to what they would have used in the good old print days. Because of that they sense there is a start and an end.

I believe a big group of users are looking for that familiarity and experience. Even apps not founded in legacy newspapers/magazines are attempting to create that sense of familiarity: The Daily, Project Magazine, and all the aggregator apps as I mentioned before, such as Flipboard, Zite, Editions by AOL and the latest, Livestand from Yahoo!. (For more reading on the rise of aggregator apps, check out these articles from Nieman Journalism Lab and Hoosier40.com).

Scrolling feels infinite

Vertical scrolling tends to feel infinite. The page just keeps going. It’s not necessarily a bad thing; it depends on what you want to achieve with your app. For example, CNN’s iPad app uses scrolling for navigation on the home page as well as within each article. Some find that experience overwhelming (the ones enjoying the curated, finite experience), others love it. Huffington Post also uses scrolling. Currently, you can choose between the “NewsGlide” version, which uses horizontal scrolling within each category slider, or the “Classic”, which scrolls vertically. Articles in both versions scroll vertically.

Mixing swiping and scrolling – when it works

But be careful when you mix swiping and scrolling within the same app. In the Orange County Register iPad app (which I helped develop), horizontal scrolling is used for the index page, but each article is swipe based. I think it can work in this instance.

It can also work in apps where you primarily use swipe throughout the app, but if you have to tell a story in a specific way, then you use scrolling. For example, The Daily, which always uses swipe and only horizontally, sometimes use a full page scroll or partial page scroll to show a continuous timeline or alike.

 Mixing swiping and scrolling – when it doesn’t work

Other times, mixing doesn’t work well. I personally love the great content in Spin Magazine’s app (still waiting for a great Rolling Stone app), but the navigation confuses me. Some articles have a fixed position photo with a vertical scrollable text area next to it. The scrollable area is so narrow that it makes the article hard to read and seemingly endless. It’s too much work having to keep scrolling. Other articles use vertical swipes instead, making the confusion complete.

Consistency in navigation is key

The key to success is consistency. Get the reader used to your navigation and stick with it. If you develop your app for both landscape and portrait view, make sure the navigation stays consistent in both views.

Navigational cues

Also, make sure to give the user navigational cues, so they know what to expect and how they should advance. This is helpful for common navigation, and it is particularly helpful, if you are occasionally adding enhanced content such as timelines, 360 photos, scratch-offs, etc. Let the readers know how you want them to interact.

Further reading

For further reading, I encourage you to read “Usability of iPad Apps and Websites” by the Nielsen Norman Group. There are two versions, one from 2010 and one from this summer. They are filled with good info, specific to this topic.

Also, on a related note, check out Josh Clark’s blog. Josh is skeptical about the future of “digital editions.” As he says, ”publishers and designers have to start thinking about content at a more atomic level, not in aggregated issues.” I think there’s great potential in that new line of thinking. But I also think great brands will remain. There’s room for both so to speak. Anyways – that’s a discussion for a different blog post.