Online Writing Exercises

Okay so I choose my favorite spot for mainstream news: nytimes.com, the website of the New York Times:

Go to a news web site and see if it measures up to these criteria for online writing:

a) Do the news items reflect immediacy?
Yes most certainly. Here are some of the headlines for Friday, December 5, 2008 at 4:40 pm, notice the time stamps (highlighted in red):

At Least 22 Dead in Pakistan Blast 36 minutes ago
Stocks Rally Sharply Despite Heavy Losses of Jobs 4:34 PM ET

They even have a 'news from AP and Reuters' Section:

Police: NY Hotels Vulnerable to Mumbai-Type Attack

11 minutes ago
Students Get Sick After Eating Peer-Prepared Food

13 minutes ago
Sources: 5 Blackwater Guards Charged in Shooting

14 minutes ago
b) Does the site try to help readers save time?
c) Is it quick and easy to get information?
Yes it does and it is: Each headline has a lead that gives you the very basics of the article so that one could just read the lead and nothing else to get the jist of the main headlines. The website is also arranged in a way that makes it easy and quick to navigate, with the main headlines on the top of the page and then the paper broken up into sections with the three main headlines and leads from each section underneath the bold print of the title section.
d) Does it provide both visual and verbal information?
Yes it does. Along with the many, many words, there are many photos, pictures, diagrams, and even video clips, some of the reporters themselves, telling a story that is in print.
e) Do the stories contain lists and bullets to make them easier to scan?
f) Are the stories broken into “chunks”?
In some stories they do have lists and bullets, but most of their stories consist of many 1-3 sentence paragraphs (or chunks) with graphs and images to click on, on the side of the story.
g) Do stories provide hyperlinks to additional information?
Yes they provide quite a lot of additional information. Many names and places are highlighted as hyperlinks that lead to backstories and previous stories and sources. Also, at the bottom of each article, there is a list of links to related stories in the NY Times:

Past Coverage

• Obama Places Stringent Limits on Inaugural Contributions (November 26, 2008)
• Obama's Transition Team Restricts Help of Lobbyists (November 12, 2008)
• The '08 Campaign: Sea Change for Politics as We Know It (November 4, 2008)
• POLITICAL MEMO; What Happens to Public Financing, When Obama Thrived Without It? (November 3, 2008)

h) Are there opportunities for readers to "talk back"?
Yes, unfortunately there is a comments section at the end of most articles.
i) Does the site use multimedia to enhance understanding and add appeal?
Yes, as I mentioned above, there are movie clips, song clips, video clips, and slide shows among other multimedia enhancements.