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Annoying Site Designs

One wonders who sites such as GoogleNews and YahooNews haven’t managed to adopt the hyperlinking protocol that has existed since the earliest days of the web: Words being hyperlined are themselves hyperlinked rather than putting a parenthetical (link) after them i.e., (news - web sites).

About the Author: James Joyner is the publisher of Outside the Beltway and the managing editor of the Atlantic Council. He's a former Army officer, Desert Storm vet, and college professor with a PhD in political science from The University of Alabama. He lives just outside the Beltway in Alexandria, Virginia.

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I believe that's what either AP Style or Wired Style says. Both are out of date, though AP Style less so. Wired Style came out five years ago -- kind of like using a 1950s history book to teach class in the 1980s. Oh wait, that was my high school US history class in Oklahoma....

Posted by dw | May 18, 2004 | 12:46 pm | Permalink
 

They really sorta have to do it that way.

On google especially, they search 2 different databases. One is a web search and one is a news search.

How can they do that more elegantly?

Posted by Paul | May 18, 2004 | 01:34 pm | Permalink
 

I think the clutter is worse than the limited service provided by that. Just linking the term to the news search would be much more elegant.

Posted by James Joyner | May 18, 2004 | 01:49 pm | Permalink
 

OK different argument- if you want to ditch some function for form, I'm right behind ya.

If people are too stupid to use a search engine too bad.

But remember...

The purpose of their news pages is NOT to give you the news. (provide you a service) Its purpose in life is to sell advertising. The links make people click more pages, selling more advertising. I ignore it just like I ignore the ads.

Posted by Paul | May 18, 2004 | 01:59 pm | Permalink
 

It's only mildly annoying when I'm reading; it's mainly a problem when I'm doing the cut-and-paste for the blog.

Posted by James Joyner | May 18, 2004 | 02:21 pm | Permalink
 

I figured.

I've been wondering for some time why nobody wrote a good piece of blogging front-end software. MT and others are fine if you just want to rant but the act of blockquoting text with hyperlinks and the like is quite tedious.

Posted by Paul | May 18, 2004 | 02:27 pm | Permalink
 

True. Some MT hacks make it a little easier and there are programs like Zempt that help, but they've all got substantial drawbacks.

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Posted by James Joyner | May 18, 2004 | 02:31 pm | Permalink
 

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