We're definitely of the same general opinion, Dave. We need to create rich learning environments. What reading online offers though, is something different from reading print.

If you read online with the perspective of a writer (blogger), then you are reading and formulating your comments at the same time. In the age of print, how many people were writers? Now we can all be online writers. Also, hyperlinks bring in more of the context of the conversation, instead of just a boring list of footnotes, that only academics read.

I think that online writing can have a very different dynamic and can be more cognitively demanding as well. However, as you say, reading an online newspaper is no more stimulating than the print version, and maybe even less so.