The New York Times Website Ads Go Native

The famous newspaper’s getting an online makeover, complete with new advertisements; the U.S. military has tested a laser that could change war as we know it; meanwhile, whether Kim Jong Un fed his uncle to dogs has come into question. These discoveries and more below.

On a regular basis, Truthdig brings you the news items and odds and ends that have found their way to Larry Gross, director of the USC Annenberg School for Communication. A specialist in media and culture, art and communication, visual communication and media portrayals of minorities, Gross helped found the field of gay and lesbian studies.

New York Times Plans Website Redesign For Jan. 8 The New York Times website redesign now has an official launch date: Jan. 8. A “very small percentage” of Times readers will be getting an early preview of the new site.

Egypt Gone Bad This past week the confrontation between Egypt’s ruling regime and the country’s Muslim Brotherhood intensified.

The Quaint Plans for American Cities, as We Envisioned Them 200 Years Ago Charles O. Paullin and John K. Wright produced an Atlas of the Historical Geography of the United States in 1932 that remains, 80 years later, one of the most definitive collections of maps (many of them innovative in their time) from early U.S. history.

Something Weird Happened in North Korea: Report You can do a lot in journalism with the word “report.” For instance, see NBC’s “Kim Jong Un’s executed uncle was eaten alive by 120 hungry dogs: report”.

Clintons Embrace de Blasio’s Inequality Rhetoric, Goldman Sachs’ Speakers Fees On a recent afternoon, executives at Goldman Sachs invited a few hundred major investors to the Conrad Hotel in lower Manhattan.

‘Surveillance Breeds Conformity’: Salon’s Glenn Greenwald Interview Longtime Salon readers will have known for some years that Glenn Greenwald is an unapologetically opinionated journalist with an unwavering skepticism about corporate-government power.

How the Army’s Recent Successful Laser Test Could Change the Future of Warfare In December, the U.S. Army successfully tested a vehicle-mounted laser, destroying more than 90 mortar rounds and several unmanned aerial drones.

In Protest of Indifference: Academic Freedom and the American Studies Association On December 15, 2013, the American Studies Association endorsed a resolution to support an academic and cultural boycott of Israel, called for in 2004 by Palestinian civil society.

Does Journalism Have a Future? People tend to have little sympathy with accounts of crisis in a trade or profession.