In 2004, the video was as much of a novelty as was the blog–in terms of covering the election.

But traditional news was already losing its grip on public interest and advertising revenue four years ago, and newspapers in particular knew they had to change the way they presented the facts to the public–but how? It should have been an easy answer–after all, it wasn’t as if the video camera was a brand-new invention at the turn of the 21st century–but the video didn’t burst onto the news scene in one day. It’s slowly crept from novelty and experiment in 2004 into what we now view as the norm on any newspaper’s web site. No matter what newspaper it is, if it has any credibility at all, some video will be featured above the fold–er, at the top of the screen.

The New York Times, though its dusty old-guard reputation precedes it, picked up on the video craze fairly early and has now officially gone video crazy. With every hour, it isn’t just the headline story that changes on http://www.nytimes.com, it’s also the featured video! The New York Times now has a membership on YouTube and has in just one year posted more than 700 videos to its profile. Here’s one of the latest videos, dealing with the topic that hasn’t yet escaped the forefront of Americans’ minds: the 2008 election.

Just viewing this one-and-a-half-minute clip shows why the New York Times has so violently embraced the video as a source for news: it tells the story of a revolution in The Bronx better than text and any amount of photos could.