Watch the paper: Christina Ullman's winning entry in the Tomorrow's Newspapers design contest is called "The Virtual Paper." Ullman writes, "Once accessed, the unit would project a viewing beam area the size of the publication using hologram technology. The viewing beam would be tangible, using light and electromagnetism to 'hold' particles together. This would allow the person to hold the publication if he or she wished."

Pros and students: Left, the students from the Rochester Institute of Technology propose a paper that individualizes newspaper sections for each family member; all are easy to access because the front page indices are in an escalating arrangement. Right, the Seattle Times' Denise Clifton submitted the idea, "electronic news boxes," that would produce a letter-sized newspaper that could be printed in the home.

Contest gives publishers glimpse of paper of the future

It's pretty dad-burned hard to beat a wristwatch as the most convenient personal digital assistant invented: it weighs almost nothing. Many of us have been wearing them since childhood. They are so ubiquitous, so integral a part of our lives, that it's a shock to find we've left home without them.

Dick Tracy was clearly onto a good thing. First of all, he only appeared in the newspaper, a plus to this audience. And second, he was clearly way ahead of the rest of us on the convergence trend. The guy was clearly an early adopter.

The thing was, though, he still had to schlep around a newspaper, and wash his hands so he wouldn't contaminate the crime scene with inky fingerprints. Granted, that probably wasn't his major concern.

But in a world where the big money usually goes to the people who solve problems, whether we knew we had them or not, Christina Ullman's idea for a holographic wristwatch newspaper is a hands-down winner.

Ullman won first place among professionals in this year's Tomorrow's Newspapers Design Contest, which is co-sponsored by the University of Missouri School of Journalism's Harte Chair in Innovation and the Society for News Design Foundation. The contest, started in 1998, asks professionals and journalism students to "brainstorm design ideas that would make your news operation even better." Entrants are encouraged to design a full-sized prototype for either print, on-line or both and to attach a short essay explaining what the innovation would accomplish.

First place in both professional and student categories receives $500 and a "best of show" wins $1000. A panel of Society for News Design members and the faculty in Columbia, Mo. make the choices.

Ullman's idea is appealing. Subscribers would purchase a portable transmitter unit the size of a wrist watch, or incorporated into a wrist watch (Timex, are you listening?), that contained a computer chip capable of picking up satellite signals uploaded by the newspaper and to return readership data -- such as readership habits -- back to the newspaper. The paper would be available immediately -- any time, any place.

Even better, the device would incorporate controls allowing readers to access the variety of publications to which they subscribe. Once accessed, said Ullman, the unit would project a viewing beam area the size of the publication using hologram technology: "The viewing beam would be tangible, using light and electromagneticsm to 'hold' particles together."

This would allow the reader to hold the publication, to enlarge or reduce the beam area to adapt to uses in different locations -- whether you're reading in a subway car, the open skies of Montana, or with a cup of coffee at the proverbial kitchen table.

A 'tangible hybrid'
Ullman, an assistant professor at Ohio University in Athens, believes this would address industry problems such as newsprint and production costs, and problems with color reproduction since the concept relies on properties of light for displaying color and eliminates any color-conversion issues.

It also achieves the immediacy of Internet news delivery methods, without requirements of toting a laptop around. "It would be a tangible hybrid of newspaper and computer screen," she said. "I believe that people like to have something tangible to hold when reading; that somehow the tangible nature makes the story or information more 'real.'"

Though Ullman's idea for this year's contest was the only one that tapped into my fondness for detective stories, it was not the only one that responded to industry concerns about share of market.

Denise Clifton, who is a news designer at the Seattle Times, proposed an electronic news box, which would produce a letter-sized Headline News edition. For a dime, customers could select from the usual sections -- sports, news, business and entertainment. The idea, said Clifton, combines a paper's strengths -- availability and portability -- with the news immediacy of television, radio or the Web. It also connects to the tradition of a newspaper's ready availability to anyone with some spare change in their pocket, in some ways narrowing the gap between technology haves and have-nots.

"I am a news designer and editor, not a technology expert," said Clifton, "but it seems the mechanics of today's modems and printers make such a concept possible."

The bottom of the seven-column "Headlines" edition would provide referrals to the complete newspaper, as well as the newspaper's web site. The design would allow editors in the on-line department of a newspaper to update the page as the news happens.

Optionally, there could be a space for a small-stripped ad at the bottom of the page, which could be sold in blocks. Clifton's vision also included the potential to automatically deliver the same "Headline" edition to a subscriber's home printer at a pre-determined time.

Clifton added that since most newspaper web sites are still updated on their traditional print cycles, morning or afternoon, there's often no reason for readers to visit a newspaper's web site more than once a day, even though reporters produce stories almost continuously.

"Part of my idea behind the electronic news box [which would stand about 18 inches taller than the average news box]," said Clifton, "was wanting newspapers to be more actively immediate. Why wait until after the printed paper has gone to bed to post stories that were completed and edited by 6 p.m.?"

'A leg up on TV'
An idea that came from a team of students from the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) in upstate New York, and sponsored by the Xerox Corp., would provide each family member with an individualized newspaper section -- made easily accessible via a front-page index. Behind their vision of Tomorrow's Newspaper was giving newspapers "a leg up on TV" and giving newspapers a more magazine-like design.

The concept, conceived by Amy Beaudreau (who was the lead designer), Abel Gonzales, Samir Talhami and Kristin Schrader -- all students at RIT at the time of the contest -- provides an opportunity for newspapers to offer readers the tactile feel of paper as well as a personalized product.

It also recognizes that trying to produce a single product with news, advertising and features that will fit all customers is difficult, if not impossible. The team wrote that the magazine approach to their concept provides designers with freedom to personalize design elements in new ways. And by personalizing sections for children as well as adults, it goes beyond current Newspapers in Education programs.

Schrader, now a senior at RIT majoring in newspaper operations management, said the team's entry draws from the concept that newspapers have a potential for change and growth when they are willing to examine current modes of operation and to put profits to work in redeveloping current products.

The Tomorrow's Newspaper contest is one of the ways Judy Bolch and co-contest founder Daryl Moen use to stimulate a collective industry imagination to invent new opportunities or solve problems for media -- especially newspapers.

Bolch holds the Harte Chair for Innovation at the University of Missouri School of Journalism, where Moen is a professor of journalism.

"Why such a contest for designers?" Bolch asks rhetorically before she gives several reasons. "Although all of us believe in content-driven design and abhor the idea of design as a mere 'prettifying factor,' we nonetheless consider design the beginning point for any product, including newspapers."

Designers are the architects and engineers of our profession, she said, adding that this group is also among the industry's most creative members. "They tend to embrace change and ideas more easily than do many print people."

Bolch said she hopes the contest will reinforce the idea that "a 'newspaper' is a concept, not necessarily a print product," and lend support to the goals and principles of that concept, "no matter in which medium they make an appearance."

Print should converge
Bolch has found, after two years of contest entries, that despite "interesting exceptions," there is a clear, emergent theme: "Designers believe that the print edition should converge with the electronic edition in more practical and useful ways. They envision methods that connect the newspaper's strengths -- portability, availability and branding -- with the Web's immediacy."

While technology took the leading role in two of this year's winning entries, designers are encouraged to let their imaginations roam beyond the realm of the currently possible. The contest philosophy is informed by the belief that if the idea is strong enough, the technology will follow.

And lo and behold, one of last year's contest winners has been showing up in commercials in my local viewing area lately. Swedish designer Svenåke Boström of the paper Sundsvall Tidning, created a newspaper with a scanning pen that used bar codes to access longer versions of the stories on-line.

Bolch said that the judges liked the idea but scoffed at its practicality.

Now there are millions of the hand-held devices -- some distributed free -- from companies such as Digital Convergence Corp. of Dallas, and GoCode Inc. of Charleston, S.C., that let readers bridge the gap between print and the Web with just such a bar code device, said Bolch.

"We have no evidence that the concept came from our winner, but we rejoiced to see proof that even the most far-out ideas can become reality," she said, then added, "We can't wait until we hear that an Ohio University professor's holographic news-watch is in production.

"In general," said Bolch, "the entries attempt to offer new ways to maintain our audience without losing our credibility. In a society where people are carrying laptops in their left hands and cell phones in their right hands, news people are coming to understand that we are selling information and that it can come in many guises."

Contest guidelines encourage judges to look for entries that get beyond the mundane and that "clearly see a market where information seeks its own level," and that will "encourage the technocrats to provide the technology," in much the same way that the culture of innovation in other industries has been built through a historical connection between the professions, the academy and research.

While other industries, such as drug or engineering companies, pour millions of dollars into research, Tomorrow's Newspaper judges are reminded that the newspaper industry "not only does not spend much money conducting research itself, but has never sought answers from the academy ... and even if they don't want it from the universities, they haven't seriously sought it elsewhere. There is no history of R&D, and it's only been in the last couple of decades that they've even started serious market research."

-- L. Carol Christopher, lcc@colepapers.net

All the Tomorrow's Newspaper design contest winners for 1999 and 2000 -- as well as contest entry information -- are on a web site: http://www.digmo.com/tnc/.

From THE COLE PAPERS, November 2000, Copyright © 2000, All Rights Reserved.