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Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

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Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#181

Post by adrr »

internetter wrote: post #164
aetherson wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because people don't value it. I mean, seriously, that's the reason. Back when newspapers were healthy, basically there was all this stuff that was bundled with the actual news that was of more immediate utility to people: classifieds, movie reviews, comics, coupons. And there was less competition for people's leisure time. News is now in a very competitive leisure time landscape and is debundled from stuff that's of…

Completely agree with all this, though my take away is that there's a big vicious cycle of adblockers and paywalls where they keep getting worse. I can't afford to subscribe to every newspaper I read. All the local (and smaller national) papers should unionize and make one subscription for something like $20 a month

Isn't that apple news+?

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#182

Post by alistairSH »

imzadi wrote: post #137
adrr wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the problem with news? Why aren't people willing to pay for it?

I don't think the issue is that people aren't willing to pay for it. The problem is, there aren't currently good options for paying for it. If I go to a news site and it is paywalled, I just leave. I am not going to subscribe to every single newspaper. If I could easily pay for today's paper (not an individual news story or a full subscription) without giving up all my persona info, I would probably buy 2 - 3 papers…

$40/year for the WaPo and you can pay with PayPal or Apple. You don’t give them any more money than any other online vendor.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#183

Post by unclebucknasty »

izacus wrote: post #158
unclebucknasty wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> free teat to latch on to isn't the answer It's the news sites' content that Google is scraping and monetizing. How is it not Google that's latched on to a "free teat"? Serious question. What am I missing? EDIT: Thanks for the downvotes everyone. I need 'em from time-to-time to ensure I've not succumbed to The Matrix. Of course, you're all wrong. But, keep 'em coming!

What exactly is being "monetized" when a search result is displayed for a news article that will bring the users to news site where they'll earn ad money to the news outlet? The news outlet can use robots.txt to prevent indexing. If Google doesn't bring them value, there's the easy answer.

>What exactly is being "monetized" when a search result is displayed for a news article

The article is part of the overall content that Google displays in its search results. And, of course, Google monetizes its search results with ads.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#184

Post by marcosdumay »

paxys wrote: post #150

"The news media industry is dying because of tech" is a massively successful myth perpetuated by the news media industry. Back in the day before tech platforms there used to be 5 successful news companies and 5 failing ones. Today there are 5 successful news companies and 500 failing ones. Tech reduced the barriers to entry and made the playing field more level, giving rise to smaller publications and indie journalis…

AFAIK, the news media is dying because it was taken over by malicious short-term focused MBAs that turned all of it into crap.

Honestly, I don't know what 5 successful companies you are talking about, but it's true that it's being replaced by lots and lots of small players that don't look anything like "big journalism".

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#185

Post by unclebucknasty »

olyjohn wrote: post #157
unclebucknasty wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> free teat to latch on to isn't the answer It's the news sites' content that Google is scraping and monetizing. How is it not Google that's latched on to a "free teat"? Serious question. What am I missing? EDIT: Thanks for the downvotes everyone. I need 'em from time-to-time to ensure I've not succumbed to The Matrix. Of course, you're all wrong. But, keep 'em coming!

Let's stop trying to pick a side here... Maybe it's more of a symbiotic relationship. Google gets a useful news page, the news media get links to their articles. I honestly could care less about either of them. I think they should just fight it out on their own and keep our legal system and tax payers time and money out of it.

>Let's stop trying to pick a side here... Maybe it's more of a symbiotic relationship.

There's definitely some symbiosis here, but it's ultimately Google that's dependent on the news (and other) sites' content, which it gets for free. That is, the news sites (and other content providers) could exist without Google. But, Google could not exist without their content.

At least that's my observation. So, I wasn't picking a side as much as earnestly asking how OP concluded that its the news sites wanting something free from Google versus the other way around.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#186

Post by [deleted] »

paxys wrote: post #150

"The news media industry is dying because of tech" is a massively successful myth perpetuated by the news media industry. Back in the day before tech platforms there used to be 5 successful news companies and 5 failing ones. Today there are 5 successful news companies and 500 failing ones. Tech reduced the barriers to entry and made the playing field more level, giving rise to smaller publications and indie journalis…

[deleted]

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#187

Post by akira2501 »

notatoad wrote: post #178
zmmmmm wrote: post #170

I have sympathy for news publishers but I worry a lot about the principle of asserting that linking to something is an act that the link target has proprietary rights to over. At some level, it is almost a free speech issue. If I can't refer to what you are saying, without owing you something, you have power over not just my speech, but a power to limit how your work is subjected to criticism and debate. It's effecti…

>I have sympathy for news publishers i have very little sympathy for news publishers. I have sympathy for the journalists actually doing journalism, but news publishers have spent the last couple decades making their websites absolutely unusable, so that unless somebody links to an article externally there's almost no point in going to their site directly. And even after you've followed that link it's almost impossib…

> News websites are terrible, and it's their own fault.

To be fair they were just playing the game Google asked them to play.

> make sure the fund is actually funding journalism

I don't think you can do that. Journalism is publishing articles, sure, but it's also doing research, arranging interviews, travelling to get documents, it's a lot of street work, and a lot of it needs to be paid up front. How a fund can manage this relationship correctly based on view counts is beyond me.

Let alone.. do we want "clicks" to substitute for editorial process?

The deeply sad part about all of this is News and Broadcast have traditionally had very strong commission based internal sales operations. They have the people to go out, get advertisers, take their money, and then just /inline/ all the advertisements. They spent decades refusing to retrain or retarget this staff for the new market place.

Out of all industries that _didn't_ have to make a deal with Google Ads, it was theirs, and they just completely blew it.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#188

Post by PeterisP »

bevekspldnw wrote: post #125
cherioo wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Genuine question, why don’t publishers stop using doubleclick and build their own?

Google has thoroughly rigged the space, including manipulating bid stream data to underpay publishers while overcharging the advertiser. It’s called Project Bernake which is public now. I have it on reliable sources there is a lot more beyond that. The search antitrust suit was garbage, but the coming trials in the ad auction suit is going to hurt a lot more. They total lost their way, it’s actually insane when you’l…

All of what you write is in support of the parent post suggestion "why don’t publishers stop using doubleclick and build their own?" - the larger margin Google is taking (no matter how) between advertisers and publishers, the better deal publishers can offer when telling advertisers "come to our platform directly and get the same ad placements much cheaper"..

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#189

Post by CM30 »

adrr wrote: post #135
burnte wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually agree with it too. Google and Facebook aren't the reason news outlets have cash problems and a free teat to latch on to isn't the answer. News is important, but let's fix the problem in a better way.

What is the problem with news? Why aren't people willing to pay for it?

In simple terms; lots of competition and much of it is free. If you want basic breaking news, it's all over social media (often from the news sites themselves). If you want sports, tech, gaming, music, entertainment, art or other hobby style news, it's literally on two million websites and forums and YouTube channels specifically made for that one topic, and usually done better than in a newspaper.

So while you could say a decent chunk of the replacement content is worse than what traditional news outlets could offer, it's at least free and exists by the bucket load, meaning the incentive for paying for it is nonexistent for most of the population. Meanwhile the more niche stuff is both free and done better elsewhere, so RIP anyone making money off that anymore.

To make things tougher, getting advertisers to pay for it is becoming a lost cause too, since again, they can advertise in places where metrics and tracking options are better. They'll get way more bang for their buck on social media than they will trying to market on a news site or in a classifieds section or what not.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#190

Post by unclebucknasty »

notatoad wrote: post #180
unclebucknasty wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> free teat to latch on to isn't the answer It's the news sites' content that Google is scraping and monetizing. How is it not Google that's latched on to a "free teat"? Serious question. What am I missing? EDIT: Thanks for the downvotes everyone. I need 'em from time-to-time to ensure I've not succumbed to The Matrix. Of course, you're all wrong. But, keep 'em coming!

and they should pay for scraping. but that's not what this is about, this is about charging for linking to news articles.

>but that's not what this is about, this is about charging for linking to news articles.

Sure, but these things are directly related. It's the scraping that generates the links in question and ultimately earns Google ad revenue. And, if they did pay on the scraping side, then charging for linking would be less relevant. As it is, they're collecting the content, but not paying on either end.

So, it seems if you agree they should pay for the scraping (but they are not), then you wouldn't be opposed to them paying on the other end. In fact, this might be fairer to Google b/c it's pay for performance.

But, more to the point, I was responding to OP's specific-claim that the news sites were attempting to "latch on to a free teat".

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