Content Consciousness

May 2001

The content that is normally generated for use online is often treated in isolation and not referred to henceforth for other kinds of organizational communication works. It is in this context that the content and the Web managers need to understand the multiple dimensions of being able to re-use and re-cycle the content, increasing its usability and value. It's actually all about one aspect of content management wherein the content is modified to meet the needs of the different audiences.

Re-purposing

Re-purposing involves the reflection of content organization on the basis of user needs. The content should be able to convey the real message to the audience. In most general terms, re-purposing can be described as manipulations of space, time and meaning within the new medium. Most often re-purposing involves some kind of compression.

There could be two kinds of re-purposing:

Re-purposing is historically not a new occurrence. A clear example is a shift from oral tradition to written transmission of myths and folk tales.

Transferring (re-purposing) content from any other to the digital medium will be affected in a similar way by properties of the digital medium. In order to anticipate the effects this transfer will have on content accessibility and usability (and user interface design), it is important to identify in advance the specific characteristics of the new medium in terms of:

• Reproducibility – so that it has a longer life-span
• Transferability – to facilitate the medium change effectively
• Manipulability – the ease to be able to change it from one form to the other to satisfy varied audience needs

Re-delivering

Re-delivering is about the print content translated online.

Content developers should make content understandable and navigable. This includes not only making the language clear and simple, but also providing understandable mechanisms for navigating within and between pages. Providing navigation tools and orientation information in pages will maximize accessibility and usability. Not all users can make use of visual clues such as image maps, proportional scroll bars, side-by-side frames, or graphics that guide sighted users of graphical desktop browsers. Users also lose contextual information when they can only view a portion of a page, either because they are accessing the page one word at a time (speech synthesis or Braille display), or one section at a time (small display, or a magnified display). Without orientation information, users may not be able to understand large tables, lists, menus, etc.

Re-vitalizing

How does it help?

• To extend the life of existing media
• To be able to adapt to multilingual audiences
• To establish visibility at conferences
• To provide a dynamic database of information in-house

Preparation for it

• Clarify the outcomes you want
• Ensure that key people are clear about the process and benefits
• Decide who will audit it