Web Necessitates Alternate Comic

Posted Wednesday, July 9, 2003 12:00 am

By: The difference between newsprint and the Web caused Casey Shaw to create an alternate version of a USA Weekend cartoon.

Shaw's drawing, slated for the July 20 edition of the newspaper magazine, invites readers to "scratch 'n' sniff: smells just like newsprint!"

This concept wouldn't have worked online, so Shaw made the version for the Web site (http://www.usaweekend.com) read: "Scratch 'n' sniff: smells just like a computer screen!"

"It's a weird time in journalism," said Shaw. "In writing the original cartoon, I hadn't really thought about the fact many people access our content online and wouldn't experience this drawing on newsprint."

He added: "I don't know what to do if they decide to print out a copy from the computer and give the cartoon to a friend. I guess we should do a third 'smells just like laserprint paper' version."

USA Weekend appears in 590-plus newspapers with a combined circulation of 23.7 million.

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Web Necessitates Alternate Comic

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