Nick Masuda to help compile Alan Jacobson’s daily BFD critiques
Alan Jacobson dropped a minor bombshell on us Thursday.
His BFD quick-critiques of the country’s top front pages had been a daily must-read for many of us. But then other pressures occupied Alan’s time. The frequency of his BFD posts dropped lower and lower.
Thursday, he announced:
Recently, I have been unable to complete my daily posts because of other overwhelming business demands. As a result, it has become impossible to critique pages with the frequency I began and that you had grown accustomed to.
But there is a silver lining.
During the course of BFD there has been one voice that seemed to show the reason and logic necessary to not only produce fine design, but to explain through his comments, the “why” that will let others learn how to make their pages better. His name is Nick Masuda. Nick will be taking the lead on BFD sometime in October after he completes his move from Maine to Florida.
Nick, of course, is a newly-hired senior designer for The Orlando Sentinel.
Can there be a downside to all this? Perhaps. It appears that Alan is giving Robert Knilands a license to post comments freely on the site.
As long as Mr. Knilands behaves himself, that might not be so bad. If Thursday’s barrage is an indicator, however… well, it ain’t pretty.
Anyway, good move, Alan, my friend. Nick will be a real asset to your BFD franchise.
Congratulations on this high-profile gig, Nick. And congrats again on the new job. You should find Orlando warmer than Maine this winter.
Find Alan’s BFD here.
September 21st, 2007 at 5:31 pm
Aren’t there ethical concerns with an existing industry newspaper designer awarding pages that ultimately can get a cash prize?
Alan as a consultant certainly is not as much of an issue, although ethical concerns with his former clients certainly came up quite a bit on BFD.
September 22nd, 2007 at 1:45 pm
Rob…it was certainly a concern that I spent some time thinking about. I am looking at some different ways of awarding the monthly prizes. The Quark contract only runs through the end of the year, so I am not sure if there will be any monetary payoff after 2007. It has been successful, so I will have to bounce some ideas off of users of the site to see what they think.
In one way or another, I will make sure there is a prize, but it could be much like sportsdesigner.com did their awards this year, or maybe something entirely new. Please stay tuned, I am a firm believer in ethics, so I promise that no corners will be cut.
September 24th, 2007 at 7:03 pm
Let’s hear Nick out on his thoughts for elevating the commentary on this forum.
As for ethical questions, I’m afraid I don’t get your point. Journalists serve as judges in competitions all the time that award cash prizes, from company awards to the Pulitzer Prize - even SND’s “The Intern” competition has a nice chunk of change attached to it. Designers and visual managers take paid consulting and freelance jobs all the time, as long as doing so doesn’t create a conflict of interest with their employer.
So far, the service Nick has volunteered to provide on BFD - or whatever it becomes - poses no such conflict for Orlando. I say if he can get an industry discussion about what makes a great front page back on track, more power to him.
November 20th, 2007 at 4:03 am
So, will there ever be another Best Front Design critique?