Sample Post Number 4

DESIGN OR (DIS)CONTENT

Among design professionals, there’s a bit of controversy surrounding the filler text. Controversy, as in Death to Lorem Ipsum.

The strength of lorem ipsum is its weakness: it doesn’t communicate. To some, designing a website around placeholder text is unacceptable, akin to sewing a custom suit without taking measurements. Kristina Halvorson notes:

“I’ve heard the argument that “lorem ipsum” is effective in wireframing or design because it helps people focus on the actual layout, or color scheme, or whatever. What kills me here is that we’re talking about creating a user experience that will (whether we like it or not) be DRIVEN by words. The entire structure of the page or app flow is FOR THE WORDS.”

Lorem ipsum is so ubiquitous because it is so versatile. Select how many paragraphs you want, copy, paste, and break the lines wherever it is convenient. Real copy doesn’t work that way.

As front-end developer Kyle Fiedler put it:

“When you are designing with Lorem Ipsum, you diminish the importance of the copy by lowering it to the same level as any other visual element. The text simply becomes another supporting role, serving to make other aspects more aesthetic. Instead of your design enhancing the meaning of the content, your content is enhancing your design.”

But despite zealous cries for the demise of lorem ipsum, others, such as Karen McGrane, offer appeals for moderation:

“Lorem Ipsum doesn’t exist because people think the content is meaningless window dressing, only there to be decorated by designers who can’t be bothered to read. Lorem Ipsum exists because words are powerful. If you fill up your page with draft copy about your client’s business, they will read it. They will comment on it. They will be inexorably drawn to it. Presented the wrong way, draft copy can send your design review off the rails.”

And that’s why a 15th century typesetter might have scrambled a passage of Cicero; he wanted people to focus on his fonts, to imagine their own content on the pages. He wanted people to see, and to get them to see he had to keep them from reading.

FORM OVER FUNCTION

So when is it okay to use lorem ipsum? First, lorem ipsum works well for staging. It’s like the props in a furniture store—filler text makes it look like someone is home. The same WordPress template might eventually be home to a fitness blog, a photography website, or the online journal of a cupcake fanatic. Lorem ipsum helps them imagine what the lived-in website might look like.

Second, use lorem ipsum if you think the placeholder text will be too distracting. For specific projects, collaboration between copywriters and designers may be best, however, like Karen McGrane said, draft copy has a way of turning any meeting about layout decisions into a discussion about word choice. So don’t be afraid to use lorem ipsum to keep everyone focused.

One word of caution: make sure your client knows that lorem ipsum is filler text. You don’t want them wondering why you filled their website with a foreign language, and you certainly don’t want anyone prematurely publishing it.

BECAUSE IT’S THE INTERNET

There was that time artists at Sequence opted to hand-Sharpie the lorem ipsum passage on a line of paper bags they designed for Chipotle—the result being a mixture of avant-garde, inside joke, and Sharpie-stained tables. Those with an eye for detail may have caught a tribute to the classic text in an episode of Mad Men (S6E1 around 1:18:55 for anyone that didn’t). And here is a lorem ipsum tattoo.

Of course, we’d be remiss not to include the veritable cadre of lorem ipsum knock offs featuring:

• Bacon Ipsum – Served all day. “Bacon ipsum dolor amet chicken turducken spare ribs.”

• Hipster Ipsum – In case you’re in need of a “shoreditch direct trade four dollar toast copper mug.”

• Corporate Ipsum – “Leveraging agile frameworks to provide a robust synopsis” from eight to five.

• Legal Ipsum – Fully unlicensed legalese for those times you don’t want to pay $400/hr.

Not to mention, Cupcake Ipsum, Bob Ross Ipsum (“happy little clouds”), and the furry Cat Ipsum. And in case that’s not enough, check out our very own Ultimate List of Lorem Ipsum Generators.

So there you have it. Lorem ipsum: the nonsense words unable to fully escape meaning.