BROADSHEET, BERLINER OR TABLOID: I AM SORRY, BUT THIS IS NOT THE PROBLEM

I found this "before and after" via Newsdesigner:

The long-awaited Berliner-format Lafayette Journal and Courier (a Gannett paper of 36,000 copies) has hit the streets.

It’s the first North American daily to switch to the Berliner format, which in this case is 12” by 18.5”, and if it’s a success, it may not be the last.

Well, not a very excitingting redesign.

But, again and again, the same mistake:

If you change your format, you must compact.

And a compact and compelling newspaper is not just a smaller one.

It is another animal.

I have explained this in one of the chapter´s of our 2006 global report about Innovations in Newspapers, that we do every year for the World Association of Newspapers (WAN).

In "The compact revolution: still waiting to happens" I said:

"The lesson is clear: a mere graphic re-design of a newspaper is like putting make-up on a corpse, or rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

Newspapers are in crisis today not because they are broadsheets, or Berliner or tabloids, but because they tell too many irrelevant stories in too many words to readers whose time is limited."

Period.