Form versus Content

Form versus content is the big question this week. What's more important when creating a website or blog, how it looks or what's in it. The form of the website catches the viewers eyes and makes the viewer read the page. However to keep the viewers attention the content needs to be interesting or newsworthy. Reading about someone’s day, from when they woke up, went to work, came home and then went to be would not keep the reader interested and therefore would leave the website. Aesthetic is a common phrase that tends to be used in the artist world. Art usually needs to be aesthetically pleasing to be successful.

When thinking of an aesthetically pleasing website that I constantly go to I think of my bookmarks, these pages are marked for content rather than form. Therefore finding a website I go to for form rather than content is harder that I originally thought. Therefore my initial thought of placing an importance of content over form is questioned. For a page to be successful in my eyes there needs to be easy access to relevant links, easy to read and have the right amount of information needed. I like my web pages being ordered. Information overload is one of the aspects I hate on a web page, I don’t want to read lines and lines of pages to find out something I could have read in 2 sentences.

I use the internet to search for information and stay in contact with friends and family. Therefore when researching an assignment or simply a release date for a movie or dvd I find a search engine on the website is the best way to find the appropriate material. Sites that fail to have a search engine frustrate me as I can never find the material I need quickly and therefore I end up searching another website. I often shop a Big W for they have the cheapest dvd’s but using the internet to find prices and availability is impossible. For a start they have no search, there links are hard to find and there is very little order to there website. However JB Hi-Fi is another cheap dvd retailer and there website is more user friendly. I am able to find the dvd I am after with a simply search, the price and the availability. Therefore I now will choose JB Hi-Fi over Big W when shopping simply because the internet has allowed me to know what’s in store.

An important factors of web design is the legibility of the content. The correct colour combination ensures legibility. Orange writing on a red background is near impossible to read, it is important for the designer to use colours that the viewers could read with the greatest ease. The speed of the page is also an important factor, a page which is slow to load will frustrate viewers and consequently will stop viewers from revisiting the site. These factors along with form and content are important to keep in mind when designing and constructing a successful web page. This is why I use the internet every day and will continue to do for a very long time.