Newspapers Can Assist Google
April 13, 2009
Steve Outing’s “How Can Newspapers Help Google?” here struck me as an old goose trick–just flip the argument 180 degrees. I read the essay and noticed this passage:
So here’s an idea for newspapers, the AP, et al: Think through how you can help Google make more money! Figure out how to spread your content much more widely instead of focusing on how to restrict its flow.
I know this is an idea that will go nowhere. I gave a talk to some of the Associated Press management and made the point a couple of years ago to “surf on Google”. I recommended that four of the “owners” or stakeholders of the AP contribute one young, Googley type person to serve on a joint task force. The goal would be to come up with demos of products that would make money from various Google programs.
What happened?
No one talked with me. One senior executive insisted that he would get in touch with me and never did. I did get paid for my talk and left wondering it seemed difficult to look at a popular service as a source of revenue. My impression based on the chill response my talk received was that Google was not something that most of those in my audience knew much about nor cared to figure out how to exploit.
Now it’s too late. Newspapers are, like other traditional media companies, on the downward side of a tilting business model. Mr. Outing’s idea is a couple of years behind mine. I can tell you that it won’t happen if my addled goose fortune telling machinery is working.
Stephen Arnold, April 13, 2009
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2 Responses to “Newspapers Can Assist Google”
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Stephen: I will admit that there’s an element of desperation in what I wrote, and you’re right, newspaper execs, in particular, seem now to prefer to take the ship down rather than correct the course. I wrote the blog item you cite and a previous one in hopes that the news industry can avert the “iceberg that won’t get out of my way” problem by calming down the attacks from leaders within their industry, and realizing the suicidal path they’re on by calling out the lawyers to force Google and others to “pay newspapers’ fair share.”
Frankly, I’m as pessimistic as you these days, yet I retain a tad of optimism that news companies’ CEOs will finally decide “it’s bad enough now” that they’ll try the “new” things that you, I, and many other pundits and consultants have been imploring them to try for years.
I also think that Google itself could stop some of those news execs from following each other over the cliff by creating a rev-share program that supports ALL news providers online. Since what I propose Google do is in line with shareholders’ interest, not to mention society’s, I don’t understand why Google sits idly by as the legacy news system that its Google News service still relies on sinks.
Steve Outing,
Google makes an offer. You get it, you take. You don’t get it, Google doesn’t care. The GOOG offered opportunities to publishers. Most didn’t get it. Now the GOOG has moved on. Such is life for the Google and the non-Googley. Now the traditional media outfits have to live with their decision. Google owes traditional media nothing, so the company in my opinion is overly generous. Brutal efficiency doesn’t leave much room for “nice to have” touches.
Stephen Arnold, April 13, 2009