Two Notes to the New York Times
First, giving space to vlogging is a mistake. Common wisdom says that television does two things well: sports and talking heads. But, talking heads on the internet isn't ready for prime Times. Whatever their politics or however smart they are, I don't care to see Ann Althaus, Daniel Drezner, or Matt Yglesias drinking soda water or sucking down a cup of coffee while trying to carry on a conversation. In fact, I don't care to see them, at all.
Second, links are there for a reason. The Times uses them very poorly. It being the"newspaper of record," the Times restricts all of its links internally – that is to other Times documents. And it links to Times documents from some data bank, so that it's rarely obvious that the link is either important or relevant. Proof of that pudding is in David Oshinsky's"Heil, Woodrow!" NYT, 30 December, an excellent review of Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning. Through no fault of his own, Oshinsky's reference to the National Recovery Administration (NRA) is linked to the Times files on the National Rifle Association (NRA). Hat tip.