Photo via @CliffordLevy on Twitter
The New York Times is forcing employees at the New York headquarters to use the mobile and tablet versions in the website.
Staffers were alerted to the weeklong “experiment” via an email.
The main thinking behind this experiment is forcing the employees to think and prioritize mobile. Newspapers especially have grappled with how to adapt to digital altogether, but they are now working to stay competitive with mobile users. Due to this experiment, it effectively expands the mobile tea, especially brainstorming, to the entire headquarters. Potential improvements could come from any employee.
Another impact is that it could lead to the employees thinking in a mobile-first mindset. Reporters and editors would be increasingly mindful of how mobile visitors read the content and also think of ways to better present news stories.
How to adapt to mobile and tablet readers is a question that almost all news organizations are dealing with. Internal teams are looking on how to optimize their webpages, which is why several news organizations have revamped their websites to more responsive web designs.
Quantcast estimates that the New York Times website receives about twenty million users per month and the email says that more than half of the visits are on mobile devices.