Defining a new era in data journalism on iPad

iPad opened up a new world of possibilities for data-journalism, and a range of opportunities for creating innovative digital content. We created a robust content strategy for The Times as their new paywall was introduced, spanning health, sport, the economy, science, current affairs, history and fashion.

Digital Strategy

The Times was the first UK newspaper to produce content for iPad. They recognised the potential for innovation and asked us to collaborate on developing their mobile digital strategy and product delivery. Pushing the boundaries of emerging technologies was key to producing rich visual stories that rewarded readers with an authentic and distinctive iPad experience.

Times News Desks

Using a common canvas size and reusable code base, we worked closely with editorial teams to develop data visualisations that were easily transferable between web and iPad platforms. Establishing a consistent framework enabled us to quickly conceptualise and build products to meet tight editorial deadlines. We took on big stories and hard data, turning complex issues into simple interactions that added value for subscribers.

Common code
The Times is collaborating with Applied Works because not only do they understand the newest technology, they also approach every project with an intelligence that has the audience at the front of their minds.

Jon Hill Art director

The Economy

We connected a wide range of government published figures and presented them in easy-to-understand visualisations that made sense of all the big numbers to support coverage of George Osborne’s 2010 emergency budget and spending review.

Wall of debt 2 retinableed
Pillars of spending retinableed

Sport

We designed three groundbreaking, data-rich dashboards to accompany the 2010 football World Cup in South Africa, the 2010 Ryder Cup and 2010–11 Ashes series, offering new ways to deliver a second screen experience for sports fans.

Times World Cup Group F
Times World Cup Players1
Ryder Cup 3
Ashes 3

Health of England

We visualised data from the Department of Health, highlighting England’s north / south health divide. Regional scores were graded against the national average using 32 different indicators of health.

Times Health 1
Times Health 2
Times Health 3

Current Affairs, History & Science

We designed a series of interactive timelines to support coverage of George W Bush’s memoirs, the Pope’s visit to Britain, the Royal wedding and the Battle of Britain anniversary, featuring photographs, press cuttings and audio clips. We created an animated sequence to introduce a sports science special iPad edition of the Times’ monthly science supplement, Eureka Magazine.


Times bush 1
Times pope1
Times royal wedding
Times bob1
Times bob2

Growing traffic and revenue

Our collaboration with The Times paved the way for introducing a digital paywall in 2010 and subsequently helped build website and iPad app subscriptions to over 25% of the paper’s paid-for sales. The content we created defined a new generation of data journalism and was acknowledged with a prestigious Design Week Award for Digital Information Design, and a Gold for Digital Media at the European Design Awards.

Times page2 enlarged