The end of news. Again.
Newspapers are, if not dead, in palliative care. The model is broken and can’t be fixed. Bits, not atoms, etc.
Newspaper websites are also broken. Splitting up 500 or even 1000 word articles over two or more pages is inexcusable. Chairman Gruber has pointed out that newpaper websites know that most people don’t read past the first page but that the tenth of a cent that they get for everyone who does click through makes the extremely user-hostile practice endemic.
And yes, I’m looking at you too, Gawker. Just because it’s news-as-confectionery, doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t also be readable without ten page reloads.
I tried reading what aboveandbeyond said was an interesting article about Target on the Mineapolis-St. Paul Star Tribute website. I have no idea how long the article was because after the second page of a narrow column of actual content surrounded by flashing ads and links to other content I gave up.
Why is this? Is it the economic model of cents-per-impression ads? Is it like phone directory websites and directory-assistance services that suck in order to drive you to use the actual printed phone book? “Here’s our crappy web service. Use our expensive-to-produce printed service instead”. Urgh.
