Made by Many event: John-Henry Barac on the Guardian iPhone app

We’ve held some interesting talks here at Made by Many over the last couple of years, and I’m thrilled to announce that we’ve got an exciting one coming up next week.

We’ve invited John-Henry Barac, the designer of the tremendously successful Guardian iPhoneapp, to come and share his experiences in designing a newspaper app for the iPhone. Our friends at BBH London have kindly agreed to provide a room for the talk, for which we’re very grateful.

The Guardian iPhone app has been a huge hit, and recently won the innovation award at the AOP awards, where the judges said that it “broke the mould of how content to mobile can bemonetised”.

We’ve held some interesting talks here at Made by Many over the last couple of years, and I’m thrilled to announce that we’ve got an exciting one coming up next week.

We’ve invited John-Henry Barac, the designer of the tremendously successful Guardian iPhone app, to come and share his experiences in designing a newspaper app for the iPhone. Our friends at BBH London have kindly agreed to provide a room for the talk, for which we’re very grateful.

The Guardian iPhone app has been a huge hit, and recently won the innovation award at the AOP awards, where the judges said that it “broke the mould of how content to mobile can be monetised”.

The Guardian have long had a reputation for small innovative projects that help to point the way towards a future for quality online journalism, and the iPhone app is an excellent example of that approach. While other newspapers circle the wagons, the Guardian is committed to quality journalism that plays a full part in what Steve Jobs calls ‘the open web’, but have still scored a hit with a paid-for application.

What specific issues were there in developing the Guardian app? Can print publications simply transition to tablets and phones by preserving the page metaphor, or do they need to re-imagine what they do at a more fundamental level? Should they follow Apple’s lead and adopt skeuomorphic interfaces, or should they turn their back on the paper-based past entirely? How can newspapers and magazines develop new services on this new class of mobile device?

These are just a few of the issues that John-Henry will offer an opinion on, and he’s ideally placed to do so. He spent a decade at the Guardian on the print side as an art director, and is therefore both an insider and an outsider; a print man helping to forge a digital future. His is a fascinating perspective on this most hotly debated areas of digital culture.

The talk will start at 1pm on July 15th at BBH London’s offices at 60, Kingly Street, London, W1B 5DS and will last for between 45 minutes and an hour, depending on the number of questions.

We’d love you to come to hear what John-Henry has to say, and to put your own questions to him in person. If you’d like to attend the talk, please email me at james@madebymany.co.uk. There are – obviously – limited spaces available, so it’s best to book your place early.