1. Read Dave Winer on Rivers of News
2. Read Doc Searls on Rivers of News
I don’t know how many times I have had this discussion on rivers of news with clients in the publishing business. I don’t think that I have ever been able to convince them, especially journalists, to go with a river approach of just displaying posts with a simple reverse chronologically order.
Because they want control. They want to decide what goes at the top of the page. They truly and deeply believe that the home page of a site is sacred ground where they can unleash all their editorial power.
The fun fact is that more and more they are seeing these precious home pages (at least from the advertising point of view) being skipped altogether by users who find deep links on social networks…
…all of which display posts in what is in all effects a “river” format. ;)