Huge variation in news sites' use of embedded hyperlinks

Hyperlinking is one of the web's ways of showing you around the place. It's useful at finding out more about a story - for instance, if a piece refers to a report from the Central Statistics Office, it would be handy to be able to refer to the document itself.

Glancing at them can be a little distracting, however, and I find that they can disrupt your eye's flow.

There is a big difference among news websites' use of embedded hyperlinks. The results of a sample of 12 websites are as follows:

RTÉ.ie	Usually none, rare internal links, some external links to reports etc.
BBC News	Usually none, some internal links as in this article
The Irish Times	No links, even in articles that would have lots of related internal articles
Irish Independent	Plenty of hyperlinks relating to internal topics, as in this article
Irish Examiner	No hyperlinks, straight transfer of print edition copy
Sunday Tribune	No hyperlinks within the articles.
The Guardian	Links to internal and external articles, as in this article
Daily Telegraph	Links to internal and external sources (links go to examples)
San Francisco Chronicle	No hyperlinks, copy taken straight from agency sources
New York Times	Frequently used internal and external links, as in this article.
Sydney Morning Herald	No hyperlinks within the articles.