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The following is a list of high level advantages of each medium:
Advantages of print
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- Palpability and dimension
There's something about the experience of going into a store and
trying on that pair of slacks or shirt that simply cannot be had in
looking at them online. The palpability -- tangibility -- sensorial,
touch-feel experience of something has a lot of merit in its own
right. A brochure, for instance, has fixed characteristics that can
be equally felt as well as seen: the paper type, weight, size,
orientation, overlap; the ink's embossed, raised or flat appearance;
the use of foil. Even the smell might have something to do with it: a
crisp, new, fresh company brochure, or a purposely old, attic-infused,
burnt-effect antique-store ad; a perfume ad. These things can't be had
on the screen.
- Permanence
Print media has a certain permanence to it. "I want that in writing"
does not ordinarily evoke images of a JPEG or GIF image. "I want that
in writing" means "I want that on paper." There's a certain
"disposable" quality to online content -- symbolic 0's and 1's that
can be here today, gone tomorrow with one power surge, failed backup,
hacking, or bad mood. True in the case of acts of God with print
media, but much more rare than electronic malfunction. Communicating
a love letter on paper is arguably more "personal" and permanent than
sending the same in an email.
- Immediacy and accessibility
If you're out and about, you can get a brochure while at the store.
You can get a business card from your friend. You can read them now.
You can put the card in your wallet. You can throw the brochure in
your car. No power-on, no clicking, no scrolling. You can buy a
magazine at the store, open it up, read it, throw it away
(disposability in a good sense).
- Ownership
The book you buy at the store is yours to have, to hold, to read. You
own it. It's not stored in a server that you own *access* to. You
own the book itself. You could own the book in electronic format on
your computer, but is it really "the book?" Yes and no. Arguably,
it's "the contents" of the book -- an electronic representation, a
facsimile. Does owning the MP3 audio files of a record make you own
the record? Technically. But the continued existence of CD's reflect
the sentiment that some might not completely feel like we "officially
own" the work of art fully, if it's not in a fixed medium that we
"own." There's a physical association with an object that is missing
online.
- Portability, and independence from an intermediate access point
Electronic print requires electronics to access. I need to have a
computer to access someone's online brochure (read "website"). The
business card serves its purpose as a very small piece of fixed data
that can be passed around with very little effort. It doesn't need to
be scanned, filed, or retyped to be readable. I don't need to buy or
employ anything to access its information. It's there, it's quick,
it's permanent yet transient if need-be.
Advantages of Online Communication
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- Convenience
The first benefit of online communication is convenience. Sending out
a corporate memo to everyone in the department is simply much easier
via typing up an email, and with one click, sending it to hundreds of
people on the mailing list. This is in contrast to having someone a)
print out the memo, b) photocopy physical pieces of paper and c)
distributing them to onsite and/or offsite mailboxes. Sending an email
is much quicker and easier than the physical letter, granted at the
potential expense of intimacy (see above). You can access any company
brochure (in the form of a corporate website) typically from your
bedroom, whereas a physical brochure would have to be waited on for
physical snailmail retrieval or in-person pick-up. Publishing online
has great advantages in the realm of editability: it's relatively easy
to alter content in electronic fomat. Once physical print is written,
it's permanent.
- Economy and environment
In many cases, virtual print is less expensive than physical print.
Thousands of dollars worth of paper, toner, sorting, stapling, mailing
can be purchased every year by a company for physical print that is
much more economically handled by virtual print. Additionally, the
cost to the environment is saved by conserving resources, through the
conservation of trees and the minimizing of accumulated waste.
- Hypertext/linkability
Fixed, physical print media is very limited in its interactiveness.
The web offers instant-access, almost stream-of-thought linkage to
"the next relevant topic" by way of hypertext linking. Reading about
George Washington on one page can offer a link to information on
cherry trees on another, which could in turn link to environmental
protection information -- and it can all make sense via hyperlinks. A
pamphlet is static in its presentation of information, with references
to content within itself being the only thing immediately accessible
in "hyperlinked-esque" form (typically with a lot of page flipping);
information outside itself must be physically located, and isn't
nearly as readilt available as on the web.
- Animation
No matter how eye-appealing -- physical print, at present, is static
in nature. That same static, printed corporate brochure as seen on
the Web can have logos spinning, arrows blinking, and text aflashing
-- offering many more possibilities to entertain and express points in
different ways. A moving picture may ultimately be more moving and
memorable in many cases.
- Sound
In tandem with animation, sound and music can be used to create highly
impacting content. Sound, especially music, can be incredibly
memorable if done right, as evidenced in the use of jingles in
corporate marketing. The written word can be accented with sound
effects and music, heightening a user's experience with the material
being conveyed.
- Interactivity and targeting
The web offers a level of interactivity previously unattainable by
traditional print. Web pages can be interactive advertisements. A
website can be configured to offer the user an "on-demand" information
retrieval experience, providing instant-on access to multi-format,
multi-media data that is most pertinent to his/her desire or needs.
The web offers a flexibility of presentation which can engage the user
on a personalized level, often seen with targeted advertising.
- Exposure and reach
Communicating online through the web's one-to-many architecture
enables information to be seen by a limitless number of individuals
across the entire globe instantly. With one address, a person in
Australia can access an American periodical online; an American can
access a certain cafe's menu in the UK.
- Archivability
The storage capacity and accessibility of today's systems in online
environments can enable access to data that wouldn't otherwise be
practical to offer in traditional arrangements. For instance, entire
catalogs, back-issues of newspapers, magazines, libraries, databases,
etc. are available more easily online than in traditional print.
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A comprehensive look at the subject from the Writing Center at
Colorado State University can be found at this link:
Online Vs. Print Publishing: Advantages and Disadvantages
http://writing.colostate.edu/references/processes/onlinepub/list3.cfm
Print Vs. Web at Cuyamaca College, with a nice "when to use" section
http://cis2.cuyamaca.net/jreedfp/cis212/presentations/print_vs_web/default.htm
Print Versus the Web: Advantages and Drawbacks
http://www-jime.open.ac.uk/98/2/marion-98-2-03.html
"Print has some disadvantages, but that does not mean its death knell
has been sounded. Print also has some powerful advantages. First among
them is that compared to today's computers, books are utterly
"user-friendly"; we may sometimes be tempted to fling a book across
the room, but never because we can't figure out how it works. Using
computers and navigating the Web, on the other hand, can be an
inefficient, anxiety-ridden experiences. Another issue is expense.
Although the price of technology continues to descend as power
increases, current low-end computers cost ten to fifteen times as much
as textbooks.-->"
Print Publishing vs Electronic Publishing
http://freereads.topcities.com/printpublishing_electronicpublishing.html
"Perhaps "versus" isn't the best word choice, as they aren't against
each other. The two are not mutually exclusive, and the same book can
be published in both mediums. I will always try to publish everything
I write in both mediums, because each attracts a different group of
readers and I want all the readers I can get.-->"
Publishing on the Web Is Different
http://www.cs.tut.fi/~jkorpela/webpub.html
"Publishing on the Web is very different from older methods of
publication. A Web publication is inherently a general,
device-independent and program-independent document with structural
markup. The presentation of a document may vary greatly, and it must
vary, to allow viewing (or hearing) the same document on a wide
variety of devices, ranging from wristwatch monitors to full-size
movie screens.-->"
Differences Between Print Design and Web Design
http://www.useit.com/alertbox/990124.html
"In print, navigation mainly consists of page turning: an ultra-simple
user interface which is one of the printed medium's great benefits.
Because page turning is so limited, it is often not even thought of as
a design element. Print is immensely superior to the Web in terms of
speed, type and image quality, and the size of the visible space.
These differences are not fundamental -->"
Print Publishing vs Electronic Publishing
http://www.authorsden.com/visit/viewarticle.asp?AuthorID=1913
"A comparison of the two mediums, the reasons I want to be published
in both, and how I'm going to do that-->"
Reconciling Online and Offline Marketing Strategies
http://www.wrmarket.com/reconciling_online_and_offline.htm
"The solution is slightly different for every company, but two
fundamentals apply to all situations. First, owners must begin to
think differently about online versus offline. In many important ways
they are two different worlds. They are not, however, different
worlds to your customers, who move freely between both looking for
information about products like yours. Think about online and offline
marketing opportunities as you would any marketing opportunity. Use
parts of both to the extent each make sense. -->"
The 7 advantages of Marketing online vs. Marketing traditionally
http://marketing-of-training.com/overview/seo_vs_marketing.htm
Integrating Online and Oflline Marketing
http://www.clickz.com/experts/archives/b2b_mkt/b2b_strat/article.php/825131
"One of the weakest areas of modern tactical marketing is the
integration of online with offline. The finest web site and the most
carefully planned print or broadcast campaign are both significantly
hobbled if they aren't tightly interwoven. To show you what I mean, I
examined the May 29 issue of The Industry Standard. My conclusion:
When it comes to integrating offline advertising with the web, a full
87 percent of the advertisements in that issue are either wasted or
doing a fraction of the job for the advertiser that they could (and
should) be doing. -->"
Breaking down the barriers: developing online communication in an
offline environment
http://www.ascilite.org.au/conferences/wollongong98/asc98-pdf/bensonhewitt.pdf
"This paper describes the trialling and evaluation of a computer
conferencing system with a group of undergraduate social work
students, where structured tutorial tasks were provided for students
who were able to participate online. Other students were provided with
an offline alternative. The paper
highlights the problems experienced by the online students (and those
who intended to participate online but were unable to) and some
suggested solutions for dealing with them. However, in particular, it
outlines the benefits available to those who overcame the barriers,
not only in terms of student
support, but also in terms of the pedagogical gains resulting from a
guided collaborative learning experience. Task responses indicated the
value of the experience for developing analytical and negotiating
skills which were fostered by the need to evaluate different
viewpoints and modify arguments in response
to the contributions of others. -->"
IAB?s 28 Reasons to use Interactive Advertising
www.onlinesoldier.com/Basics/onlinevsofflinemedia.htm
Posting from a forum
http://www.e-consultancy.com/forum/1190-offline-versus-online-publishing.html
"The power of Online Advertising is that you don't have to shotgun
your message to a broad demographic, as in traditional media. The
promise of one-to-one Internet marketing is that the inefficiencies of
offline media could be remedied - that the right message could be
delivered to the best target consumer, at the right time. Mere
demographic targeting sells Internet marketing short. Translating an
audience like "car buyers" into a target demographic, then attempting
to reach that demographic online doesn't take full advantage of the
insights that the Internet offers versus offline media -->"
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