People used to terrified about outbound links. I once worked for a company, that shall remain unnamed, whose marketing manager insisted that we should not link stories from a newsletter to destinations outside the company. She loved the ‘sticky’ concept so bad, I could’ve cried!

So I was happy to hear that there are bigger names who have written (even this week) the obituary for stickiness. Brian Steller, writing for the New York Times, describes a trend in newsrooms that are suddenly engaging in ‘link journalism‘ –a newly minted term for something we have been practicing for years, to substantiate, acknowledge and cross-reference a story. It’s a big editorial and mental shift for some –like my sticky manager — because it displays a sense of confidence to let readers come and go as they please.