Is Graphic Design Murdering Journalism?

Graphic design isn't journalism, and journalism isn't graphic design. Designers aren't typically concerned with prose, and journalists don't usually care about layouts. But they’re always tethered together in a three-legged race of communication. And sometimes I feel like good journalism is being slowly murdered by poor design.

At the end of the day, designers have the final say about how a story looks and reads, and most designers don't actually read the article before it goes live. Or, worse yet, the website's content management system automatically controls the layout.

However, there are a few publications that fuse journalism with graphic design, and the results are incredible.

In 2013, the New York Times won a Pulitzer Prize for SnowFall, an interactive report about the 2012 Tunnel Creek avalanche. And last year, a couple of journalists launched Epic Magazine, which concentrates on long form non-fiction.

The news cycle moves far too quickly for journalists to partner with designers on every story. But are we using the Internet effectively when designers are a necessary evil instead of an intricate part of the journalistic process? After all, that's not how we feel about photographers.