Stand and Deliver!

“Context,” Richard Neville once informed me over the phone, “is everything.” It was back in 1994, before I even knew how email worked, let alone had an address. And I hadn’t googled him – had no idea how the internet worked – rather I’d found his number in the phone book and had been chasing him by phone and fax for an interview. “If I hadn’t returned your call, would you have continued to destroy rain forests to get in touch with me?” he’d asked when he finally phoned me back. I’ve no idea at which point during the ensuing interview he’d pointed out the necessity of context, to render a thing relevant.

But you know what? Apart from the quote itself – “context is everything” – Richard Neville has nothing to do with this blog post.Context and relevancy does, however.

Note the lovely image above. I saw the top of a page of the Daily Telegraph out the corner of my eye in the local café as I bought a coffee to take back to the office. And I couldn’t work out what the picture had to do with the headline.

Turns out to be nothing.

It’s just that, that’s exactly what Obama appears to be whispering into the woman’s ear: sweet nothings. Is she a prime examples of one of the things he’s getting ‘done’?

In the digital age, it seems we’ve forgotten how to construct a page of information so that it makes logical sense. Proximity between two elements suggests a relationship where there is none. Particularly when they are positioned next to each other – since we still read left-to-right, even if virtually every portable source of information requires that we scroll down.

Irrespective, it made me laugh.

"Sexy Pills for Women: Viagra Trials a Success". Meanwhile, in other news: page design not as simple as it seems.