The problem with journalism on the Web today is that it's being contaminated by the Web form factor. What I mean is, journalists are being pushed to do things like slide shows -- stuff meant to attract page views. Articles themselves are condensed to narrow columns of text across 5, 6, 7 pages, and ads that are really distracting for the reader, so it's not a pleasant experience to 'curl up' with a good website.
Journalism is being pushed into a space where I don't think it should ever go, where it's trying to support the monetization model of the Web by driving page views. So what you have is a drop-off of long-form journalism, because long-form pieces are harder to monetize.
What the tablet does, for the first time, is let us hit the reset button on the presentation of content to readers.
So now you're getting these newspaper- and magazine-reading apps that do a much better job of showing the content on a full screen, and with nicer, larger advertisements.
Read more at the LA Times
