I hadn't paid much attention to the nifty online current events encyclopedia being built at the NYT until I read this post. The "topics pages" strike me as quite useful for casual readers seeking additional context and information on subjects covered in Times news stories and blog posts. For example, today's NYT profile of Kenneth Cuccineli, Virginia's Republican attorney general, includes a "Related" link to the "Global Warming" topic page. I checked out the page for the first time and was blown away by its streamlined (yet in-depth) summary of where the science, politics, and policy issues are situated today. I wonder if the Times' long-range plan includes licensing these curated topic pages to other newspapers and media outlets. Seems like they should be able to leverage this budding parallel content factory into some source of revenue, which then could be used to help shore up financing for traditional reporting and news gathering.
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