When it comes to designing tablet apps, can news organizations sometimes be too smart for their own good?

Tom Standage, digital editor of The Economist, recently told the Editors Weblog "Tablet users seem to be particularly keen on reading text, and for long periods."

"That, rather than bells and whistles, is what our apps provide, and what our readers seem to want," says Standage.

To back up his statement, Standage cites a PEW study from October, carried out in collaboration with The Economist Group. The study notes that news users "are highly likely to read long articles on their tablets, not just get headlines." In fact, 42% of tablet news consumers read in-depth articles, versus just 16% who browse news interactively by sharing content on social networks.

Unexpectedly perhaps, readers often do not access these articles through apps. "Contrary to many expectations, news apps have not become the primary interface for news on tablets," states the study. Over a third of users have no news apps at all, and those that do have them don't always use them.

Renowned newspaper designer Mario Garcia was quick to get his hands on an iPad when the Apple tablet first hit the market. It didn't take long for him to realize that tablets can be a "game changer" for the industry.

Garcia has earned his reputation as one of the leading newspaper designers in the world with numerous prestigious redesign projects, including The Wall Street Journal, The Miami Herald and Die Zeit. Naturally, his philosophy that the audience comes first has left its imprint on all the digital projects he's taken up.

Garcia will speak at the 18th World Editors Forum in Vienna (12-15 October) at a session dedicated to successful tablet applications. In this e-mail interview he shares his thoughts on the latest developments in tablet publishing.

WAN-IFRA: You have written a lot about the unique experience that must be found on tablets... How do you feel newspapers' efforts stack up thus far?

WAN-IFRA is hosting its third international conference on newspaper and magazine design next Thursday, 19 May, in Paris.

Whether in print, on the web or any other digital platform, newspaper design can give added value to editorial content. The objective of this conference is to show to participants "best practices" in creativity, originality, but also efficiency.

Topics include:
- Digital design
- Combining high-quality design with interesting content
- Show more than tell
- Best practices in Iberian newspapers design

Please see here for more details and here for registration.

Die Zeit has launched an iPad-optimised version of its website, Zeit Online, the paper reported, to account for the fact that the tablet device uses touch navigation. The iPad-site is just a first step, the paper said, and versions for additional devices will be developed when they become big enough in the German market.

One of the changes is to put much larger touch spaces around text links. Another is to allow finger swipes through slide shows. "The overall design asks for a strict reduction down to a site's very essence for users to quickly find their way around," a blog posting said.

The content will not change, the posting said, specifying that "A core editorial request in regards to our new iPad-site was that our newsdesk would not have to think of different sites, but could focus on one identical sequence and presentation of ZEIT ONLINE's topics, no matter which device they appear on."