Planet Designs New Look for Center for Independent Media's Six Localized News Sites
June 23, 2008 | Levent OZLER
Applying its interactive expertise, local media experience, and a shared philosophy, Planet Propaganda developed a new look for The Center for Independent Media's (CIM's) six local progressive news sites. Launched in March, April, May, and June respectively, the Washington Independent, the New Mexico Independent, the Colorado Independent, the Minnesota Independent were the first CIM sites to be refreshed. The network's Michigan and Iowa, sites will be re-launched during the next one to two months.
A non-profit organization, The Center for Independent Media fosters diversity of ideas in the national debate by educating and training people on the use of new communications technologies, like the Internet, as alternative publishing and distribution systems to traditional broadcast and print media. Planet helped CIM unify both its appearance and its functionality across all of its network news sites.
"It was really important for us to find a partner with a great eye for design, but also one that just intrinsically understood our mission," says David Bennhaum, CIM's president and CEO. "In bringing our brand to life visually, Planet was able to imbue the independence, credibility, and accountability of our organization into every level of our sites' designs."
As examples of Planet's conscientious design, Michael Murray, brand manager at Planet, says the Gothic "I" in the network logos intentionally contrasts and complements the modern type of the rest of the mark, to symbolize the convergence of old and new journalism ideals. Further, the shining rays of light across each site's masthead communicate the network's belief in transparency and the illuminating intent of the stories covered. "Following a similar look and feel, all six of CIM's news sites will share a common aesthetic, while retaining their independence and localized focus," says Murray.
Such attention to detail also was invested in CIM's informational hierarchy. Murray explains, "We used a flexible, blog platform to allow reporters to post up-to-the-minute news coverage, and we established a graphic look and tone that takes its cues from traditional, print journalism to convey the credible legitimacy of the heavy-hitting journalists participating in this digital format."
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