IP News Fall 1996 Table of
Contents IP News Title Page
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Overview
"Exploring the Internet as a Publishing Environment" provided attendees with a hands-on forum specific to WWW sites relevant to the publishing arena, as well as an overview of the do's and don'ts on the Internet.
The seminar was open to novices and experienced surfers wanting to enhance their knowledge of the Net, the Web and e-publishing. Presenters of their informative wealth were Czeslaw Jan Grycz, Consultant, D&D Associates, and Pat Sabosik, Director, News and Navigation, GNN, an American Online, Inc. Company.
The meeting notes that follow are a combination of the information provided by the presenters through their discussions and/or visual aids and this reporter's own interpretation of what was heard. However, full credit for the ideas and material covered rests with the presenters.
The seminar consisted of two sections, the first a lecture on principles; the second a demonstration and online site review of selected WWW sites. Among the topics covered in the lecture sessions were the following:
Characteristics of a WWW Site
Quality Indicators
One advantage of the assessment of quality material is that in print, ways have been developed to determine the quality of material, whereas on the Net, this quality control issue hasn't been resolved, particularly when it comes to Web sites.
Billings and Security
By Fall, more activity will be seen on encryption and credit card payments.
Design and Presentation
As part of a discussion exercise, several Web sites were reviewed and critiqued. Among these were the: Greenwood Publishing Group, World Health Organization, University of Michigan, American Geophysical Union, American Chemical Society.
Purpose
The main learning points that came out of these evaluations were: Has there been some consideration to the design that moved beyond what appeared in a printed page? Is the purpose clear? How can a Web page be made attractive, keeping in mind that it will be browsed potentially by many different types of Web browsers with varying technological capacities? Does a listing in alphabetical order provide a more clear presentation? Is the site highly linked to other useful information? A particular consideration mentioned was that most people will be looking at the Web site with a 14.4 modem, so this must be kept in mind when designing the site.
Navigation
Representation of organization via a Web site is important, as it provides the viewer with an image of that organization and a glimpse of its culture. Navigational tools are particularly important, as the viewer must always be provided with the option to move easily, particularly through buttons that allow the viewer to go back to the home page, back a single page and move forward on every page.
Ease-of-Use
Can the reader easily discern from the information on the screen what this particular site is going to provide? Is the reader being provided numerous ways on how to get varying pieces of information from the site? The dating issue is very important. It offers the reader the ability to see how fresh and current the content in front of him is. Even in instances where the content does not readily lend itself to a lot of change, it can be presented as current by checking and changing the date of last update with frequency. It's recommended that a global perspective be kept in mind when defining the parameters not only of the information provided but also of the technological differences around the world. As such, providing text alternatives to images is key.
Graphic Content
How heavily image-based is a site? Bitmap images can be very slow on the user's end so these ought to be kept small. A fair number of sophisticated compression technologies are now available. Above all, it must be kept in mind that the management of a Web site is a serious responsibility. Considerations such as firewalls and content are not ones to be taken lightly. On the maintenance side, it is key for the reader to be able to communicate with the Webmaster and for the Webmaster to be able to take the necessary steps to make changes as needed.
Access
If a site is text-heavy due to the goal of the site, key word searches are an important consideration so users can find the information sought immediately. PLS has a search index for about $5,000 as do other companies. (It can be used in the same type of environment if there is a lot of content on a CD-ROM). It might be a good idea to include in the search engine page something that reads along these lines: "This is a searchable index of information. This form can only be used from a forms-capable browser."
Link editors are now being hired. They represent a new job classification recognizing the fact that there are new kinds of editorial processes to be undertaken.
Search and Retrieval
The library community is reacting to the "relevance scores" used in search results. Librarians want to know what algorithms of relevance are being used to know on what basis that relevancy score is used. With private search indexes, the basis of the relevance can be controlled. But with commercial ones there is no control. A lot of money is being thrown at filters so the results are not just spammed documents. In the future, agents will be sent out by the reader to reach what information is wanted.
Legal Aspects
It is very important to include a copyright statement on the Web site. It ought to be included so creations aren't lifted without due credit. There is a movement to copyright text and design.
Aesthetics
Imitating printed pages is not really using the capability of the Web. In an online environment, the presenters went on to add, not only is the page metaphor outdated, but the very control of typeface and form has been shifted to the user, instead of the designer.
Evaluation, Critique and Incremental Improvements
The above mentioned considerations fall into six particular elements that were discussed as being imperative. It was suggested that each is considered on a scale of "Poor" to "Good." These were: Content and Purpose, Appearance, Navigation, Functionality, Performance, and Maintenance. A handout was provided with specific questions to address for each of the elements when reviewing and evaluating the effectiveness of a Web site.
Framing Elements
The presenters also outlined nine "Framing Elements" that are key to a Web site. The idea is to ensure that the Web site in review contains: Company/organization name; logo and/or logo type; email address that's different from that of the Webmaster's; street address and phone number; copyright statement; a table of contents or listing of sections to be expected in the Web site; ordering information, such as instructions, forms and terms of payment; date of last modification; and contact list, with particular emphasis on ensuring that email addresses are provided.
Hosting a WWW Site
A brief discussion took place on explaining the purpose of "hosting services"—companies that are renting space on another company's place. These hosting services entities will in essence rent out a machine or space on that machine based on various criteria, such as how large the files are, how much information is to be hosted, how much traffic is expected to come in or to go out. Examples of Web pages from the GNN site were handed out. According to the presenters, this is a low margin business for those doing the hosting.
What Publishers Do
Marketing
It is estimated that there are 10 to 40 million users of the Internet. But this is a rough statistic because a lot of people have several emails, so this is not the number of people reached. When marketing, the world is told where to find an organization's information and those who want to access it can do so. It's 180 degrees different than traditional marketing. Supposedly, Simon & Schuster get about 100 book sales per 200,000 Web hits.
Catalog Description & Ordering
These types of capabilities are not being used as well as they could. But they are starting to be improved upon, for example, by providing sample text. Some publishers are beginning to put up teachers' manuals and guides and exercises. Also, the AAUP has launched a site providing a unified catalog of all of their publications online.
With CD-ROM, many people are requesting samples to try out. This capability to sample is quite important. Shockwave, a Web implementation, provides animated sequences which can then be download on the computer or on a server base. But this needs to be based on the systems of the user community and need of that application. Shockwave files are huge. It's also a Mac platform. Sidebase has a beta version of this type of capability at 1/10th size of files. Before pursuing any of these options, consideration ought to be given as to whether it will further the organization's cause: otherwise it may just distract the customer.
Innovations
The world of proprietary systems is going away. Most people don't want to be stuck with non-open systems. The robustness from proprietary software needs to be taken into open systems. The industry is being rebuilt. Chat, feedback, lists, quality control mechanisms (agents are getting better). These innovations are extremely important—an imprint of mentoring will be able to provide lists of worthwhile reading material, etc. Increasingly the domain will be electronic in publishing. It must be ensured that methods are no less rigorous for quality assurance measures in electronic text content. Some abstracts services have alert capability systems reviewed by authors who are experts in certain areas. Consideration should also be given to putting up pre-prints, which the academic community says are important as "Working Papers" or feedback types of models (participatory dialogues).
Building Loyalty and Community
This is something else publishers are working on through their Internet presences.
Setting the Stage: What Publishers Ought to do in Setting Up Web Pages
Graphic Design Elements
Knowing the product is a must; not everyone has figured this out and it shows on their Web pages. Obtaining reactions from the internal organization to see how people react to the site is a good idea.
Knowing your audience is another must. Distribution statistics of who's an Internet user can be misleading. Staying in constant touch with the audience is imperative. Asking frequently who is the target audience sought is a good idea. Some experimentation is necessary.
Goal recognition is key. Smaller organizations can be nimble and innovative. Webmasters must understand the reasoning for the Web site at all times. Other considerations are level of interactivity, the process of making the decision about the site, and purchasing decisions.
Knowing what materials need to be assembled, designed for a plan, and executed are key.
Commercial Web sites can cost around $400,000 to do a good job (as mentioned by big companies). For the academic and professional community, the price may range between $5,000 to $10,000.
Online Product Design
Content consideration should be given, along with the affordability of paying for its online display.
Goal evaluation is important.
The way in which information ought to be organized needs to be considered (which is dependent on goals, audience, and medium).
What Sort of Content is Involved?
Are the following types of items in place: title portfolio, flap copy, press releases, reviews, interviews with authors, staff listings? It is extremely important that publishers include information on how to reach their staff on the Web site. It's surprising that often this isn't found on many sites.
What Sort of Technological Choices Ought to be Considered?
The pipeline of communication is going to grow a great deal (phone, cable companies). The ability to continually change with what the audience wants is imperative for survival.
Among the choices for consideration are CD-ROM; Online (Internet, BBS, dial-up); E-mail, E-discussions, FTP, Gopher, Telnet, IRC, RealAudio, WWW; Server; Internet Provider; Security/Billing. The most interesting experiments have to do with replicating banking systems. In the future, people suggest there are going to be different types of currencies (i.e., frequent flyers to pay for hotel) or vouchers type of models. OCLC was a product of many librarians—every new listing received an affordable price. This builds community. Most of the technology right now is on the server (a software package mounted on software).
Encryption is somewhat of a problem in the US. The State Department does not want the public to use these very good encryption technologies (hence problems with drugs and the underworld). The ability to use this type of secure technology is limited.
What happens now: document-based security systems—with header—read abstracts for free and rights may be purchased for reading this (by some currency exchange). It also says the individual has loaning rights. The moment the individual sends the document to someone else, the system checks to see if the individual has authorization to lend this document out. As soon as this happens, the individual's copy dims out. When the person with the loaned document returns it the individual, her version dims out. There's a testbed for this at Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center) in Palo Alto, CA. The permission is granted and decrypted by keys private and public. IBM has a similar technology. There will be document managed systems and fee-based systems.
Examples
If the goal is to have users buy from the Web site, the following must be provided: a presentation that's clear, navigation that makes sense and is user friendly, user controls, and a strong database of information behind it.
If the goal is to get answers from the Web, the following must be provided: a presentation that's clear, a table of contents, effective searching tools, concise definitions, and robust explanations.
If the goal is to attract authors to the Web site, the necessary communication tools to that allow effective flow of communication between author and readers must be in place, e-discussions ought to be hosted, classroom support must be provided in addition to developing ways to further the goals of the authors.
Analysis of the Audience
Good design should be dictated by the circumstances of use.
Thorough market research, one can learn who this audience is, how they receive their information, where they are in the scheme of the organization and/or their use of the Net, what software they are using, what hardware they have access to, and what sort of bandwidth they are working with.
It's important for the organization to ask what specifically it is interested in having the audience do.
How easy is it to accomplish all of this?
Focus Sessions
These types of sessions are extremely useful in Chet's experience. Following are the types of considerations to keep in mind in focus sessions: Internal (Intranet)—of marketing, editorial, head of the company, CFO; External (Internet)—of authors, bookbuyers, stores, surveys; Integrated—what's coming through consistently, what's paramount, what can be measured?
Medium and Design
The separate electronic division outside of publishing is now being brought back in-house. Originally, it was thought to be a good idea to have this outside but not anymore. The following should be considered: design from the perspective of the user; it is important to provide different levels of detail that are robust (building different Web sites to accommodate audience's system is probably an important consideration); ensure that there's appropriate interactivity, that misuse is anticipated as well as poor access, and a number of platforms. It is also important to understand the options available and their pros and cons (i.e., bit maps, forms, browsers, images, database).
Project Management
Presenting a very well-defined RFP is crucial as is knowing the where and how the mounting of the Web site will occur. Realistic budgets must be set (that include the cost of management, research, design, permissions, technical support and, of course, maintenance). Above all, the Web site must be reviewed over and over, and the sponsoring organization must be open to incremental improvements based on feedback and the organization's own innovations that are user-driven.
Structure & Organization
Developing an inventory of the possibilities, considering the various potential arrangements and designing a level of hierarchy that's purpose dependent are good sound action items. It must be kept in mind that there is no single right way. Getting distracted by the shininess of a Web site rather than the functionality of it is a danger, and developing storyboards and flowcharts to get a good grasp of what's being developed is a smart route to take.
Interactivity
The following items ought to be kept in mind: the speed and pacing of the information presented; the types of links and sequencing of the data provided; the decisions made on these considerations and the review of them; the types of actions taken, and what to do with the feedback received.
Effective Design: How to Judge it
A super snazzy design probably competes with the content. And in the publishing business, content is very important. Balance must be found. The clarity of design is important, and the Table of Contents is a very important design issue. Navigational buttons must be given thorough thought as they must be very clear. Other considerations include granularity, functionality and efficiency.
Rules of Thumb
In the process of printing, the speed, the quality and the cost should be considered. In the area of Internet resources, platform independence, high-resolution imagery, and performance also need to be considered.
Elements
These include the content structure, the layout of the graphics, the navigational buttons, the background selected and the technical tricks (i.e., compression, sampling, imaging).
Testing
It's a good idea to start with a prototype, test it on the local community (i.e., the organization), and then expand to wider circles and finally to doing live tests.
Evaluation
An overall evaluation of the Web site should include the content, appearance, navigation, functionality, maintenance.
Mounting Internet Resources
Is this being done on the organization's own server? The organization's own server at an ISP (Internet Service Provider)? The ISP's server (consider transaction controls, instrumentation, cost, management)?
Evaluating Outsources
Four key issues ought to be considered when contemplating the use of an external source for the Web site: their level of experience with the industry, the Internet, technology, and their delivery consistency.
LAN Design
Issues to keep in mind here are the topologies, servers and platforms being dealt with, the protocols, pipes, providers and, of course, the hidden costs.
Action Plan
It may be useful to review the notes from this seminar, outline a structure, test out ideas, share information with others attending this session, consider whether a listserv would be useful and consider what SSP's role should be in all of this.
Observations
- Publishers don't want to author in a lot of different formats.
- More campuses are becoming more Intranet oriented.
- Advertising on the Web hasn't turned out to be as profitable as originally expected.
- Decency Act: Created a market for a lot of filtering companies.
- Panels must be developed to examine the quality of what's presented on the Internet. Narrow, deep or general information is difficult to assess as good or not.
- Great authoring tools are not available; the ones out there are OK. It's important to push for collaborative authoring tools.
- Increased competition from unexpected sources is what enterprise people are saying is their biggest challenge.
Sample Commercial Web Site
The commercial site for World Music has bells and whistles and is worth checking out. When looking this site over, it's useful to think of it in terms of journals/publishers. It provides the kind of functionality that would be useful for a site with scholarly articles.
This site is fairly straight forward and not too cluttered. The layout is nicely done and the purpose is clear. It allows the reader to add selections to a "basket". At the basket level, the reader has options—order now, keep in basket or remove. It also prompts the reader with statements such as "I noticed you bought these items, would you like to see a list of topics in that area?" Or when the user logs on the next time, it will remind him with something like "You selected these items to be removed from your basket. Would you still like to have these removed from the basket or would you like to buy them?"
Some Search Engines
Lycos is based on agent activity. It is a massive database of extracted words and offers customized ads by whatever industry or category might be applicable to the ad. For example, if Lycos is queried on Chevrolet, the user will be brought up to his hits and an ad banner will also be display that deals with cars such as dealernet.com. In this example, it is in essence linking a word to an ad. It also provides random rotation of ads. The question advertising professionals need to ask themselves is what kind of terms would be associated with their products.
Making a site dynamic is key to repeat visits by users. InfoSeek does concept searches and WebCrawler allows the user to do concept searches, too. Like Lycos, WebCrawler is a database.
Excite is really an excellent search engine. It's not a database. The descriptive sentences that appear after a query are grammatically correct and don't exist anywhere on the site queried. It does this through artificial intelligence and linguistic algorithms. It's quite a successful engine. It's useful to become the interpreter of these search algorithms for authors and customers. If an organization wants to create its own search engine for its own Web site, it has to license that type of technology, such as Excite, then re-create it itself. Harvest also has this type of licensing software at the University of Colorado.
Metasearch is a very good place to find search engines. AltaVista collects and grabs.
Other Sites Reviewed
Other sites were reviewed as part of an open exercise for the group to interact on based on the pointers given on what makes an effective Web site. The critiqued sites were those of Jossey-Bass Inc., The Institute of Government at the University of North Carolina, American Mathematical Bookstore, Carfax Publishing Company, Information Express Online, and Suck.
Among the points raised as a result of the critique on the above sites:
- Letter from significant person at organization included as an element in a site is a nice, personal touch. While frames allow the organization to put content next to each other and allows movement around in one area, it must be remembered that not every browser is able to interpret frames. One must weigh how imperative it is to have another logo besides the company logo that takes too long to load up. If a second logo is important for the purposes of the site, a shorter logo should be considered. Also, including a corporate identifier on each page of the site is a good idea. Links are a very good idea. This in essence provides a service that's quite larger than a publisher would be expected to sell.
- Including email addresses for customer feedback/contact is a must (better to email directly to staff members in addition to Webmaster). Also, it is useful to provide ways for readers to contact the authors directly. Bullets can provide good guidelines on a page, but they shouldn't overpower the page. The purpose and goal of the site must be kept in mind—is it to sell products, to answer questions and hence be more service oriented than sales oriented?
- Organization of information on the site is key. Too much information without links is not a good idea, especially when text-heavy. Also, when presentation is text-heavy, it's helpful to provide subheadings to break down the information and make the presentation more appealing to the reader. Conventional wisdom says it makes sense to go to small bite size links of information to give the reader the impression he has control of the information. Otherwise, people may leave.
- When presenting a listing of products available online, it's nice to provide the reader with a sentence or two that gives him a brief description of the item. Including dates on when the information was created and/or last updated should be remembered. If the organization has a toll-free number, this item should be displayed prominently on the site as opposed to buried. The clear and up-front placement of such a number is a plus, according to a librarian in the audience.
The End
Ana Arias Terry
Director of Business Development, NetPubs International
& Managing Editor, IP News
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