That trend will only continue. The editorial imperative can be seen everywhere. The Drudge Report does much excellent sleuthing, but a big part of its popularity stems from Matt Drudge's news judgment and his links to breaking or interesting stories. Arts and Letters Daily , easily the best site of its kind on the web, is nothing more than a series of links to the most interesting highish-brow items around, based on the editorial judgment of one or two people. The same holds for Romenesko's Media News and other buzzy sites.
Some sites use their readers as the editors.
News forums like FreeRepublic rely on thousands of readers to find what's interesting or hot. But the point remains that editorial judgment is always needed. And the best shorthand for editorial judgment is a good brand name, like the New York Times , NBC, or National Review . People trust that certain organizations have too much invested in their reputation to squander it by running a shoddy web operation. As a result, eventually, the elite media rise to the top again.