The Medium was born as Screens, a blog that got started almost exactly three years ago, in June 2006, with this post. As a TV critic for the Arts section of The Times, I wanted to try to make sense of the brand-new phenomenon of online video — but not the technology or the business of it. The content of it. Would YouTube feature sitcoms, dramas, reality, talk shows — or whole new forms, unknown to the networks?
The blog became The Medium when I started writing a weekly column about Internet culture with that name for the Sunday magazine in October 2007. Since the column started, I’ve used the Medium blog periodically to explore questions raised by columns, as well as to post unusual video, or video that makes a point about the direction of online culture.
But now the blog is morphing once again. Beginning soon, this link — themedium.blogs.nytimes.com — will redirect users to ArtsBeat, the rising Times arts blog, where I’ll now be contributing digital-content criticism and occasional news dispatches, to go along with the “culture news and views” on offer there. Does this mean online content is finally sharing a stage with the likes of film and TV — and theater, opera, painting, sculpture, architecture and the real arts? Maybe not exactly. But we’re getting close.
So look for my byline over at ArtsBeat. And find The Medium column every week at nytimes.com/magazine, where you can leave comments, same as ever. Thanks to everyone for reading.