I’m not much of a designer type person but I find Khoi’s answers to some of the questions posed regarding the information design of the NYTimes site interesting since it is a continual battle in trying to add more but use less to say more.
Here’s a quick snippet:
You can think of it as an elaborate logic puzzle, with the onus on my design staff to solve the puzzle using as few elements as possible, in as aesthetically pleasing a manner as possible. We strive to distill every template that we create down to its core parts, and actively debate the placement of nearly every element.