Jack Shafer sure is
right about this. The linking norms in the online versions of newspaper articles betray a very narrow-minded effort at profit-maximization that doesn't seem to understand that at the end of the day a website is only going to be profitable if its content is something people are going to want to read.
This article available online at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2008/04/links/44189/