The Seattle PI is now America’s largest online-only daily “paper”. Going online only provides an opportunity that most newspapers don’t have– the ability to use a modern, link-rich writing style. But most of the articles at the PI are still written in a dead-tree, link-free style, unfriendly to both readers and crawlers.

For example, an article Eastside light rail has only two links. A properly linked paragraph might look more like:

Owners of businesses and homes along some proposed routes told Sound Transit’s board Thursday that the line should go elsewhere; Bellevue business owners and city officials agreed on the need for a tunnel through their downtown, but not on the type or location of the tunnel…

“Done right, East Link will be a great addition to the region,” Bellevue Mayor Grant Degginger told the board Thursday.

Linking to related content on the PI and elsewhere would be a great chance to promote their own articles and become the link-authority for content related to the Seattle area. Using a few well-chosen rel tags, they could start to become a semantic web for local information.