by Laurie Sullivan @lauriesullivan, June 28, 2017

Google has begun rolling out a redesigned Google News Web portal for the desktop to bring it more in line with other content that it serves on mobile devices. A gray background and white cards around each article make it look a little more like content served on Google Now, but clicking on some of the options under the tabs such as “More About” takes the content a little more time — what seems like several additional seconds — to serve up.

The “card” format serves less information on a page. Google says that leveraging a concept called “material design” to “design for readability” will make it easier for those visiting Google News to scan for content in articles and get different points of view on the same subject.

The new layout focuses on key elements such as publisher names and article labels, and maintains the specific view and place on the page as users click in and out of stories to explore topics and content. The idea is to add depth to the topics, but to simplify searching for information. Longer featured articles will appear in the Spotlight section.

After all, journalism aims to focus on transparency, truth and a variety of points of views, allowing the reader to ingest information and come to a conclusion based on the facts they are presented with.

“People have told us these labels identify important facets of a story and provide more context,” wrote Anand Paka, Google News’ product manager, in a blog post. As a result, Google will serve a second labeled article in addition to the top headline for each story.

Tabs at the top of the page puts the content into categories such as Headlines, Local, and For You. The Story Cards that break out a variety of perspectives are supplemented with directional tags such as Local Source and Fact Check, among others.

Expanding the cards will show similar articles and different perspectives such as options, local sources and most references. The sections such as World and Business feature icons in the left-hand navigation column, and Personalized topics are based on interests and previous searches.

MediaPost.com: Search Marketing Daily

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