# From Rigidity to Exuberance: Evolution of News on Online Newspaper Homepages
## 2 Evolution of the Design of Online Media
### Adaptable Web Design and Apps (2014-Current)  
Since then, the emergence and later success of mobile devices as a format for news consumption has led news media to prioritize rapid, versatile publication of contents in all kinds of formats and media. The number of platforms from whence information can be consumed has multiplied, and all of them (desktop computer, laptop, tablet, mobile phone, watches, etc.) need their own specific format.  
The first response to this need was adaptive web design [33], with which several design versions of the page are created in different formats adapted to the most common screen widths (for example, 320 px, 480 px, 760 px, etc.). The website detects the screen size of each device that connects and offers the option that best fits that size with previously programmed style sheets [34]. This is all in a complex set of languages into which the webpages are structured in HTML5, giving them a style with the CSS, and adding functionalities with Javascript [5].  
Adaptive design, however, bears certain limitations. Since it is based on rigid templates, it forces one to make different designs for each one of the most customary screen widths. For this reason, regardless of the size of the screen making the connection, the website can only offer one of the pre-established designs.  
The adaptive design evolved, giving birth to responsive web design [34; 35], which allows one to fluidly adjust the content of the website to any device. To this end, instead of using predefined templates, grids that automatically adjust in number and percentage size to the window used to view the content are used, which in practice means a practically unlimited number of viewing options.  
These adaptable web design modalities, whether adaptive or responsive, provide for content that adjusts to very different screens (mobiles, tablets, monitors) from whence news is accessed, and are the key to the success of mobile and multi-platform news consumption. On the other hand, from the perspective of media design, adaptable web design has limited options for journalists to control page architecture and how users view the information, preferring accessibility and ease in news consumption. On the other hand, content distribution can substantially vary from one browser to another, which creates completely different user experiences with one same product.  
Figure 3: elmundo.es app (24 July 2012) (accessed on 17 April 2021). Compiled by the authors.  
In parallel fashion, in this last stage, mobile apps also appeared for the consumption of online news [36]. More than anything, they provide for more complete multimedia integration of content [37]. Apps are the first real alternative to the almost exclusive consumption of news through web browsers.  
For the media, apps are formats that garner high loyalty, since they are a source of monomedia consumption; however, for the time being, they have not yet managed to take over a significant portion of news consumption. Their complex development, their exclusive nature (with a specific app for each media outlet), constant changes in formats, and the consequent need to update apps, as well as the impossibility of showing all formats, has limited their implementation until now [4].