Both Quartz and The New Republic are abandoning the more predictable ways of organizing content and devising an information architecture to guide their products that defies tradition while properly describing the type of storytelling that will take place within those categories.
At Quartz’ here is how editors describe Obsessions:
At Quartz we organize ourselves around the seismic shifts that are changing the shape of the global economy. We call these topics our “obsessions,” and they evolve over time.
While these obsessions may vary from day to day, and, I imagine, new ones may join the process along the way, here are the main obsessions for Quartz at the moment: the mobile web, digital money, energy shocks, euro crunch, China’s transition, the future of finance, the cloud, how we buy, debt, borders, space business, Abenomics, US Immigration,
Let’s take a look at Quartz’ Obsessions in recent days (pay attention to the headlines, please):
TECHNICALLY SPEAKING
Believe it or not, oil is in a bull market
SPACE BUSINESS
The US government is getting ready for the commercialization of the moon
YEEZUS
Adidas made an app for sneakerheads dying to buy Kanye-designed shoes
HIGH STAKES
Sorry, Greece—you’re not going to get what you want (whatever that is)
Of course, these stories could fit into a variety of traditional topic headings, but what makes the Quartz approach interesting is that the name Obsessions provides editors with a category whose mere name urges them to look for special stories that perhaps would be off the radar if editors were operating with sections like Finance, Lifestyle or World. And, yet, the stories above come from all of these traditional categories.
The New Republic
There is a lot that is new at The New Republic, including a new editor in chief (Gabriel Snyder) and a team of newly hired employees and freshly promoted staff members to rebuild the magazine around what will be called “fixations.” These will be four to six topic areas, like climate change, that are anchored by long articles but will be surrounded by smaller pieces, videos and graphics.
We look forward to seeing how these “fixations” develop and the topics that will be included, which Editor Snyder has said will be based on the journalists he hires.
With Quartz’ Obsessions and The New Republic’s Fixations, it is clear that navigating through a publication will no longer be based on the old models.
