Picturing Texts on the Web

Very few websites are as engaging and well designed at that of the hilarious fake-newspaper The Onion. As with actual newspapers and magazines, The Onion's website combines the use of images and headlines to pull readers in. Because The Onion's content follows journalistic rules so well (in order to break them), it makes sense that their website would be designed in a way that parodies standard news websites (such as CNN.com), while highlighting its content in a way that draws readers.

Most of The Onion's jokes are made in the text, but the use of pictures makes it seem familiar to anyone who has picked up a newspaper in their life. For example, the first story at the top of the page today has the headline: "Area Man Saddened To Realize Short Jewish Women With An Interest In Theater His Type." The text is similar (in style only) to what one might expect to find in an actual newspaper. The accompanying picture works in a similar way by showing a picture of an average man and a picture of three women which fit the description of "short Jewish women." The picture adds realism to a silly story.

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/area_man_saddened_to_realize_short

The website itself is extremely balanced, with an appropriate mix of text and pictures. The main website is split up into several sections containing headlines followed by small, thumbnail pictures. Also included are links to photo galleries and sections containing video.

While most of the pictures simply act as props for the jokes in the text, the website does include photo-shopped pictures which are pretty hilarious on their own. Without the pictures it would be incredibly difficult to read, even though anyone going to the website is expecting to digest large amounts of text. The pictures serve the purpose of engaging the readers visually in what would be an exclusively textual story. For example, in a story with the headline "Swaggering Down 87%" the accompanying picture shows a bunch of people walking around, heads down and arms hanging limply by their side. Though the emphasis is put on the headline, the picture really adds more to the story. This general principle exist through-out the website, with the pictures almost serving a role of necessity.

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/swaggering_down_87

Only occasionally are the pictures made the feature in the form of weekly galleries of photo-shopped images that are hilarious on their own. One of my favorites features a giant girl playing with a Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld doll. The picture alone is quite funny, but the importance of description comes out after reading the caption: "Giant Girl Forces Playthings Cheney And Rumsfeld To Wed."

http://www.theonion.com/content/files/images/onion_news1382.jpg

The point the author is trying to make in "Picturing Texts" is very much supported by what appears on The Onion: pictures really do add a whole lot to a story. If all the pictures were removed from The Onion's website the content would be unaffected but the presentation would be very underwhelming.