The Digital re-mediation of Print
How to (not) make a digital text with leather-binding and gilded edges
How do we create a digital equivalent to the luxuriously furnished book with goatskin cover, gilded page edges and matching headbands and ribbon markers? Is that even possible? To be able to adequately answer these questions, we would need to dig deep into some preliminary questions: What is a medium? How do media mediate? And how do differences between media influence the design of the “re-mediation” – the transition of a message from one medium to another?
Medium – the thing in between
The word medium simply means “middle” or “in between” in Latin. And etymology, though is not always the case, is actually a useful start point for our quest to understand, what media are and what they do. The medium is the “thing” between us and the world. It is the thing that connects us to our world and its other inhabitants, and as such, it is the vehicle by which our ideas, thoughts – yes, even our lives – are transported. It enables the conveying of a message (in whatever form it might take) to others. All of this means that a medium must be tangible. A medium needs a physical component allowing it to step “in between” me and the world around me. And this physical component (including sound and light) must be comprehensible for all parties between whom the mediation takes place.
This exploration of the physical form of a medium leads us to one of the most influential media theorists of the 20th century: Marshall McLuhan. His, in many ways strange and obscure magnus opus, Understanding Media, first published in 1964, is subtitled the extensions of man. According to McLuhan, media are simply tools for humankind to use in its interaction with the world. These tools extend its natural capacity for a given task. The mega-phone extends the natural capacity of the voice. And the telephone further extends the natural limits of oral communication. Following McLuhan’s definition of media as extensions of man, most if not all, technology and not only communicative tools, can be defined as media. As such McLuhan describes clothes and even houses as media extending the sheltering capacity of the skin and wheels as extending the transportation capacity of legs.
Mediation
In this very broad understanding of media as encapsulating all technology – which is, admittedly, detached from every day use of the term – we could try to understand the action of the media, i.e. the mediation: If a “calculator” is a medium, what it mediates is obviously “calculation”. If a wheel or a car is a medium, what it mediates is transportation. If a house is a medium, what it mediates is shelter. All the media, we usually think of as media, namely communication media obviously mediates some sort of communication, whether the format might be image, text, audio, video, etc.
This serves to illustrate, that there seems to be another distinct component to a medium: what we could describe as the semantic component i.e. “what” gets mediated. This component coupled with the aforementioned physical component i.e. the tool used for this mediation – the object in between me and the world – forms a basic theoretical definition of a medium.
In communication media, the semantic component is the implementation of the message and the physical component is the deliverer of the message. The semantic component is closely related but not identical to the message, since the message is framed and shaped by the characteristics of its mediation, both in terms of implementation and deliverance.
This corresponds well with McLuhan’s famous phrase: “The medium is the message.” This might very well be an exaggeration, as aphorism-like statements tends to be,¹ but even as such it is an important reminder to not simplify matters by erecting a wall separating message from medium, content from form, text from context.
Re-mediation
But if we take McLuhan’s phrase at face value – if the medium is indeed identical to the message – then re-mediation, as the proces of mediating a message through another medium, becomes impossible. If we are to succeed in preserving an existing message while presenting it through a new medium, e.g. publishing the content of a book in a digital format, we somehow need to be able to distinguish between the message and its medium.
But moving forward with McLuhan’s point in the back of our mind, we are reminded that remediation is not easily done. It is a complex task that requires deep knowledge of both the implementation of the message (the semantic component) and the manifestation of medium (the physical component). There is a widespread tendency to prioritise the latter while neglecting the former. It feels more interesting, more hands on, to focus on what is new and shiny (i.e. the new technology) than to focus on what should ideally remain the same or retain its “function” (i.e. the message).
Note 1: That was my subtle meta-illustration of the point McLuhan and I are trying to make here: Genre connotations, “platform affordances” (see note 2 below), “situational traditions,” or simply put: the medium present essential guidance towards the most viable interpretation of any cultural expression.
Yet a successful re-mediation is evidently something more than knowing how to burn the texts and images (i.e. the message) of a multi-volume print encyclopaedia onto a cd-rom (i.e. the medium). This is presupposing a message totally independent of its medium. To successfully re-mediate the “message of an encyclopaedia” to a digital platform one needs to carefully consider how the so-called affordances² of the new medium informs the message – think of the rise of Wikipedia as opposed to the demise of Microsoft Encarta.
Paper in one hand, Screen in the other
To describe digitalisation as taking the printed text (possibly adding hyperlinks – and interactivity) and put it on a screen would be simplistic. Such a description overlooks the vital insight that the text (i.e. the semantic component) does not sit “on the screen” (i.e. the physical component) in the same way as the text sits “on the paper.” Or: the relation between the semantic and the physical component of a digital medium is completely different from that of the printed medium.
In fact, this is a defining difference between digital and print media: In print the relation between the semantic component (the text) and the physical component (the page) is fixed and static. In digital this relation is fluid and dynamic.
Holding a newspaper in your hand means that you have a selection of news articles in your hand. No more, no less. If you want newer news you would need to buy a more recent edition of that paper. Text on paper may not be set by hand anymore, but the relation between them is still set in stone.
Note 2: The term "affordance" is used within the field of Human-Computer Interaction and interaction design to describe "suggestions within" an object for how to use that same object. The term was popularised by the usability expert Donald Norman through his book The Design of Everyday Things (1988) in which he e.g. discuss how buttons "affords" to be pushed and chairs "affords" to sit upon. As such the affordance captures the most likely interaction with an object or a design.
Holding a smartphone in/on the other hand you might for a moment hold a newspaper with a set selection of texts.³ But the next moment you might be holding a calendar, a calculator, a tiny television, a tele-phone or even a flashlight. The same -pixels (i.e. physical component) can present a host of semantic components mediating a host of “messages” – or “functionalities” if we keep in mind the broad understanding of media as extensions of man.
In the digital medium the message is a volatile independent possibility behind every (re)loading of the page.⁴ In the printed medium the message is a contextually embedded constant behind every turn of the page.
Note 3: And even that would be unlikely given the affordances of the digital medium. See the example with the analog vs the digital watch face.
Note 4: Note the unfortunate ineptitude of “the page” as metaphor for the content of the screen that is particularly striking in this context.
A straightforward way of illustrating this difference would be to consider the analog watch as compared to the digital watch. The analog watch face presents the entire day at a glance with the hands pinpointing the current timestamp. The “now” is presented within its context of before and after. Nothing is hidden, every move of the hands is predictable. (This is comparable to the way that the progression through a printed book is effortlessly gleaned by comparing the depth of the right and the left side of the current page position.)
With the digital watch face on the other hand we have the entire screen showing us only the most current second of now, only the second it appears to be replaced by the new current now. We have no context, no visual clue of the progression, no way of telling what was before and what comes next.
And indeed, with a concept as predictable as that of time with its progressive nature intuitively understood, these observations might seem ridiculous. Nevertheless they provide important hints about affordances or inherent tendencies of the digital medium: the information provided is temporary and tentative, the context is excluded and the most current and new is prioritised.
Print rocks, digital flows
Going back to the mediating of textual communication: Paper comes with presumptions of permanence, predictability, and sensation, while screens come with presumptions of impermanence, unpredictability, and sensationalism – there is a drive towards entertainment, the emphasising of the spectacular, and the attention-grabbing, that is the financial model for most digital platforms and content providers. Paper is a calm -medium, the screen is not.
“But,” one might think, “that this is not always the case.” Paper can be “noisy” as tabloids and gossip magazines show. And pixels can be calm as sustained immersive digital reading does obviously occur. But it is my argument, that these examples are results of designing against the grain of the medium, and as such, they are hope-infusing exceptional reminders, that design work matters and can make the difference in order to successfully remediate a message.
For example, the typographic ideal of a text page in a printed book is even and rock solid text columns monumentally gracing the pages being framed by generous white margins. The calm permanence of the text on the paper is consolidated by its design. As an object, a well designed book is both visually and sensorially rewarding.
The field of digital design is still, when compared to print, in its infancy, and as such we have more “conventions” than we have “rules”, more “trends” than “ideals”. One of the established conventions of digital content design is that of the stream in which new diversely aggregated content continually trickles down from the top of the screen; and preferably so automatically to best keep hold of the reader’s⁵ attention. The temporality and independence of the content of the screen is consolidated by its design.
Whereas the ideal of the book medium is the rock solid text column; the convention of the digital medium is the constant flow of the content stream.
Obviously these fundamental differences between print and digital media have repercussions on the way we perceive the message they hold, and subsequently have repercussions on the way we best design the relations between the medium and its message.
Note 5: The reader is symptomatically for the medium most frequently refered to as a user. We read books. We use digital media. Sometimes we read, but mostly we skim, swipe, tap/click, like, share, swipe, skim, like.
Design of Print, Design for digital
Print design – which should indeed, considering the endeavours of the publisher of this magazine, be covered at greater length than is possible here – involves both the typesetting of highly readable and immersive text columns (the semantic component) as well as the optimisation of experience and lick-ability⁶ by designing and crafting of the physical component of the medium – the carrier of the message.
This is why we cover the books most important to us in leather and gild the page edges with golden foil. We want to signify that their message is treasured and we want to craft the medium with a quality matching the content it holds. If the medium is indeed the message, then we would be at fault for not doing so. As such print design is optimising the relation between the message and both the semantic and the physical component of the medium.
Unfortunately, this cannot be the case in the field of digital design – unless you are a hardware designer as well. Digital design is actually not design of the medium but rather design for the medium – at least if we, as we should, include the physical component of that medium. As such digital design is optimising the relation between the message and the immediate context in which it embedded, keeping in mind both the affordances of the medium in general and the different ergonomic or physical constraints/opportunities that it is most likely exposed to.
Evidently – when compared to print design – the digital designer is forced to give up some of the control enjoyed by his print design colleague. Digital designers do not have the physical medium at hand. He does not “own the canvas”. He might control the immediate context of his message – the interface – but even this can be overtaken by the digital medium in the form of notifications and other “disturbances” of the system.
Note 6: No, that is not a typo. That is a wonderfully evocative term describing exactly what I am trying to say here.
But to compensate – both for the “ontological deficit” that is a trait of the digital medium and for the fact, that the physical component of the medium is out of reach – digital designers often feel the need to add some impressive interactive bells and whistles and animations to make the product more involving and sensorially stimulating. Such initiative function as skeuomorphic⁷ virtual substitutes for the haptics of a leather-binding and the sheen of gilded edges. But as long as they do not offer relevant functionality, as long as they do not support the understanding of the message, they are at best unnecessary. And such faux representations of physicality is based on a misunderstanding of the basic divide between the two components of medium and how re-mediation works.
What about the Leather-bound digital texts then?
The short but nevertheless unfulfilling answer to our initial question – “How do we create a digital equivalent to the luxurious print book?” – would be: “We can’t!” And while it is to some extent true, it is also true, that we can do so much else; that we can do here what we can only dream of doing in print. The interactivity of the digital interface opens up endless possibilities for controlling and manipulating the presentation of the text.
Generally speaking, the interface allows the user to utilise the functionality of the technology (i.e. the physical component) to manipulate the presentation of the message (i.e. the semantic component) in order to optimise the accessibility and comprehension of the message by serving the immediate needs of the user – be it immersive reading, search for information or annotation. The design of this proces is where the digital designer is allowed, even obliged, to shine. This is where innovation and distinguished quality work is found.
So the answer to our question will be: The continuous expanding and refinement of the content of Wikipedia is the leather-binding of the digital encyclopaedia. The GPS-assisted location indicator of Google Maps is the gilded edges of the digital roadmap. The algorithmic search-functionality of BibleOn and similar apps are the ribbon markers and beautifully matching headband of the digital Bible.
The [innovative use of the technology] of [your digital product] is the [traditionally distinguishing mark of excellence] of the [product your product remediates.]
Note 7: A skeuomorphism is simply a design made to resemble something else. Modern use of the term mostly refers to the way digital interfaces imitates the look of physical counterparts such as knobs and dials in order to capitalise on known behavioral patterns and/or to appear more engaging.