Guardian Media Group
Designing a new way of funding and creating journalism
While much of my recent work has been public sector, I have worked with many different organisations. One of the most interesting was as part of a startup, funded by Guardian Media Group. Contributoria was a platform for experimenting with crowdfunding for journalism projects, as well as democratising the journalism process.
Full-stack design
I joined the team as a designer, responsible for the entire service – the overall service design, interaction design and branding. This involved designing the experience for journalists wanting to pitch ideas to the Contributoria community, and funders who were looking for ideas to back.
Designing an open environment
Working in the open was a key part of the Contributoria concept. Journalists would share early drafts of articles with their backers, to gather feedback and questions before preparing the final iteration. This was a complicated problem to solve from both a usability and technical standpoint. The team worked iteratively and with regular participation with the community to make the service usable, and be guided on other overall proposition by the community.
The service ran for nearly two years, in which time we published a series of printed newspapers for subscribers, with art direction and cover design by me. The final edition was edited by fashion designer and activist Vivienne Westwood.
For more detail on this project, there is a write-up on my Medium blog.