How Long Before The News Is Delivered Direct to Our Computers? (Part 1)
The move to start charging for access to News Corporation ’s newspaper websites has generated much heat and probably very little light amongst commentators and aficionados who see this as the “evil empire” subverting the ethos of the “free web”, free access to information and the general all round edification of mankind. It’s not the first time Murdoch has taken the Internet to task of course, having previously accused Google of poaching content it doesn’t own and urging media outlets to fight back.
“Google Devalues Everything it Touches”
It would appear that newspapers have seen new distribution channels changing the whole dynamics of their business.Murdoch continues to say that Google, who don't actually produce any news of its own, have actually managed to make themselves a fortune simply by changing the work of others and in turn selling advertising against it.Mr Robert Thomson, who is the managing editor of Wall Street Journal has been quoted as saying that "Google devalues everything it touches. It divides content quantitatively rather than qualitatively.” Google of course see it differently, maintaining that all they do is show just enough information to make the user want to read a full story with the headline, a line of text and links to send more than 300 million clicks a month to newspaper web sites.
It’s clear that hard news (even if it is from Fox) is a valuable and precious commodity.Any sort of journalism costs money, whether the revenue comes from a national daily newspaper, or perhaps a monthly trade magazine. Whatever you think of him, Murdoch is a smart cookie and has long regarded free-to-access news websites as a “malfunctioning” business model. The booming online subscription revenues at the Wall Street Journal have convinced him that it is possible to charge for content on the web. I think he is absolutely right and not just because Murdoch needs to generate revenue to compensate for the declining earnings (led by newspapers) across News Corporation.
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