Organization (or Lack Thereof) in Magazines

While many magazines are fun to just flip through, there are others we like to read for the articles. However, layout artists make magazines extremely hard to navigate through, with the following three reasons standing out most:

1)    No semblance of an easy to find, let alone read, table of contents

2)    Lack of consistent page numbering

3)    Stories that start on a page near the front, then continue on a page near the end

For the purposes of this blog, let’s use the August 2011 issue of Vanity Fair as an example.

Table of Contents

While the magazine and its articles did actually turn out to be quite interesting, it took TWENTY-SEVEN pages to get to the first half of the table of contents – Features (articles featured on the cover). Then, another eight pages to get to Columns, Vanities, and Et Cetera – stories, blurbs, and articles not long or important enough to make it on the Features page. However, this is just the beginning…

Page Numbering

…because once you’ve found the article you’re looking for and its page number, you still have to find the actual article within the magazine. And this is no easy task, for two reasons:

a)    The first numbered page is 32, meaning there are no page numbers on pages 1-31.

b)    Only 73 out of the 148 pages in the magazine are numbered

Stories that start near the front and continue near the end

Great, you’ve found the article’s location both within the table of contents and the magazine itself. You’ve read the first, maybe second page of the article, and then you see the dreaded, “CONTINUED ON PAGE 555.” What?! I have to hunt for the end of this story now?! Why are you people torturing me?! All I want to do is read interesting articles about Groupon and Emma Stone!

Organization (or Lack Thereof) in Magazines: Having a table of contents and page numbers is a start, however there is significant room for improvement here.

Let’s start a petition for a revamp of magazines where the table of contents all fits on a single sheet, every page has a page number, and the stories continue on linear pages. Either that, or we’ll all start reading magazines on our iPads and other tablet computers. Who’s with me?!