Murdoch fires the first shot. Wants to charge for on line news. He will fail.

[beachmom]

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/08/paying-for-online-news.html#more

Here is a money quote from the Reuters news chief:

Blaming the new leaders or aggregators for disrupting the business of the old leaders, or saber-rattling and threatening to sue are not business strategies – they are personal therapy sessions. Go ask a music executive how well it works.

Here is the interesting thing: news is worth less than music. It is not all that unique, and fair use of news items usually is sufficient (whereas, usually, you want to hear the whole song, not a piece of it). The music industry has been in decline, but more because people have outsmarted the often shoddy products they have been putting out. And so it will be for news.

I wonder if Kerry is going to do another newspaper hearing. We need to make sure he doesn't even think of siding with Murdoch, who will no longer be viewed as a media genius in a couple of years.

The only kind of subscription service I would even consider paying for is almost one set up like cable. You get 100 publications or more for one price. And even there, I might just skip it.

[TayTay]

1. I would be happy to pay the writers, editors and reporters for news

They deserve a paycheck and a living wage, to say the least. I think people who put their lives on the line in war zones and so forth to report the news deserve to be paid for their efforts.

I think that this will happen in the future when the dust settles and this new shift works itself out. We have to have a way to pay people for their work or we won't get it. And there is most definitely a place for a professional media in the country. There is a place for a whole range of media, including part-time amateurs, as we have on the web.

BTW, specialty press makes a nice living selling exclusively to paying subscribers. Defense industry people gladly pay to read Jane's Defence Weekly and other publications. Those are extremely well-written publications that know their audience and can charge hundreds of dollars a year in subscriptions. This news has become MORE not less valuable in the Internet age. One of the effects of the Internet has been to hide a great deal of incredibly valuable information behind the walls of specialty press. No one is talking about that.

We could well enter an era where we have two types of media, across the board. We will have "free" or low-cost Internet reporting and we will have paid media that is behind subscriptions. That is also a possible future.

There is nothing wrong with an artist wanting to be paid for their work. The problem is that a very few artists dictate terms that are not fair or equitable to 97% of the people and artists involved.

[beachmom]

2. I already do pay: I subscribe to several magazines in paper form. But a typical

newspaper article on the web? No way am I going to pay; it needs to create value and not for just one article every 3 months. And as Simon said in the hearing, even when the newspaper companies were making hefty profits, they were cutting staff, eliminating bureaus, eliminating local beats etc. As if the money would go to improve journalism. No way will it.

And this situation is different in one big respect: the radio stations are being charged royalties, some of which they may pass on to the consumer in the form of advertisements or sometimes subscriptions. In this case, the consumer will be asked to pay directly, which is a completely different situation.

If you followed the links, there was one idea that I found attractive, and perhaps may get us past our impasse: "Freemium". This concept is used on Pandora radio, and also on some news sites. If you just read a few articles here and there on a site, you will not be charged at all. However, heavy users (reading past a certain number of articles in a month) will need to pay (at Pandora radio, it's 99 cents per month). I think that may work. I am not going to pay for the London Times. However, sometimes they have a good article which I would like to read. Honestly, I can't think of a news site I would pay for. I guess I would just read less news on the web, and rely more on bloggers who would subscribe and then give fair use excerpts. Which means they will be handing Huff Po an even greater advantage.

Journalism isn't a charity project. If there is value, people will pay. If not, tough luck.

One more thought: their business model is not working. They need to find a new one. But I guess I disagree that this has anything to do with supporting great reporting and great writers. I think some niche type places will get support (how about the ole' tip jar?) in a variety of ways. But general papers who have not done great journalism in a long time, I feel zero guilt for not paying for their stuff.

[beachmom]

3. You represent only 10% of the people. Paid subscription will not work:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/pda/2009/oct/20/uk-survey-paid-content

The evidence is stacking up against the confidence of publishers like Rupert Murdoch who expect their readers to start paying for news online.

A survey of 2,000 people by Lightspeed Research (via Mediaweek) found that…

• 91% of respondents "would never pay" for online news.
• Only 5% said they would be interested in buying single news articles.
• Just 4% would consider a longer-term subscription.

Lightspeed also found that…

• 90% of respondents wouldn't pay for analysis.
• 83% ruled out paying for sports highlights.
• 79% said they wouldn't pay for live sports online.
• Consumers apparently are more keen to paying for music downloads: 49% said they would hand over cash for tracks.

That's the U.K. I don't see America being much different.

This is the reality. And we need to be prepared for it. Murdoch, who I considered quite business savvy in the past has shown he is an "old fart" who doesn't get what is happening.

[sandnsea]

4. When news becomes more than rewriting a press release

I'll consider paying for it.

As it is, I don't have time to hunt down all the first source interviews and press conferences so I don't know why I would bother reading 10 different newspapers that print the same AP article -- or print the same garbage from "unknown sources" that advance an agenda just as sure as Murdoch does.

[Luftmensch067]

5. Boy, you got that right!

Although I'm still reeling from how GREAT that AP article about JK was this week!
(Linked to here in another thread: http://www.seattlepi.com/national/1153ap_us_kerry_everywhere.html)

I guess it's a vicious circle -- in order for real journalism to flourish, besides a return to real standards, they have to get real paychecks!

[beachmom]

6. Today is the day! Newsday now costs you to read it:

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1004031001

NEW YORK As promised, Newsday launched its new pay wall site today, which only allows full access for print subscribers of the newspaper and customers of its Cablevision sibling, Optimum Online.

The site is clearly doing its best to make sure online readers know what they are missing. As revealed last week, all stories, photos and video are accessible only to subscribers. Others get a headline and brief summary. But any further information requires a log-in and password. Non-subscribers to Optimum Online or the print edition can pay $5 per week.

$5/week????? That's $260/year!!!!! What a joke. I think where Murdoch will guage his success is whether his PRINT sales go up. Because only a fool would fork out so much money for on line only.

[beachmom]

7. Oh, this is rich. Now Murdoch is threatening to take his news sites "off" Google Search

Good luck with that:

http://www.boingboing.net/2009/11/08/rupert-murdoch-vows.html

He also claims "fair use" is illegal. If he had his way (which is absurd since his own reporters use fair use), we would not be able to excerpt any article ever.

I used to think Murdoch was an astute business man even if I disagreed with him on politics. No more. He is an old out of it man who needs to retire. He doesn't get the internet at all.

In other news, The Economist has put walls up on their site. Although you can read some things, much more is now subscription only. For them, this is a good move, as their paper magazine is very popular and profitable, while they always lagged behind on the internet anyway. I see them doing well in the future and if anything, they will migrate more to Kindle & Nook e-readers if people want to read them electronically.

I also discovered that the Financial Times has a Freemium pay model. If you register for free there, you can read 10 free articles a month. After that you must pay. Again, all these pay schemes only seem to apply to business-centric publications.

[beachmom]

8. This actually makes sense, and is the kind of thinking for a new business model for newspapers:

http://xark.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/11/the-limits-of-social.html

So let's just stick with that word: Asset. What assets do journalists own?

Information? If the information in their stories was really a tangible asset, then why would the original sources of that information not expect payment? Do journalists own news? Nope. Even a reporter with a big scoop has only fleeting ownership of exclusive news before it passes into the realm of fair use, comment and analysis. Video and photographs are tangible assets, but beyond that, most journalistic material is ephemeral. The asset that mass media "owns" is the expectation that it can assemble enough of you into an audience to attract advertisers. Not exactly bedrock.

Brand? Newspaper marketing people tend to say that their brands are valuable. I don't think most regular people agree. Not after the cutbacks in staffing and quality over the past decade.

And so, again, what assets do newspapers own? Their archives? Well, now you're getting warmer. But because they're organized as libraries of text documents, the value of those archives is limited because of the cost involved in extracting the information they contain. It's like an energy company that owns a bunch of shale. Yes, there's oil in there, but there's no profit in drilling it. Yet.

The future value of journalism -- what I contend will be the next successful evolutionary step in media development -- will be in creating information products based on thoughtful structures. That doesn't mean the end of narrative, or the end of the live report from the field, but it does mean that journalists will have to learn to view "their story" as a subset of a larger file that stores information in ways that machines can search for interesting patterns.

I call this The Informatics Model, and I think it sounds a lot more complex than it really is.

This is really a fantastic idea, but I am sure it will make the dinosaurs of newspaper conglomerations cranky. But here is how it would work:

http://xark.typepad.com/my_weblog/2009/05/the-lack-of-vision-thing-well-heres-a-vision-for-you.html

A reporter would put together a story, but then enter in their computer "data points". In the example, it was a fire, so he would enter grid information for where that fire was, he would enter the names from the story into a database, etc. So how does this help the newspaper:

Traditionally, news organizations viewed this kind of metadata coding as a library (or, in newsroom jargon, "morgue") function. Its value? Improved reporting quality on future stories, without a quantifiable payoff. Consequently, such improvements were ignored, if not actively resented. Why bother improving your information structure if there's no payoff for the effort?

But in my 2010 example, the structure of this information is the news organization's primary product. Yes, the story is "given away" both in print and online (a misnomer: the news industry has ALWAYS given away news -- it's a loss-leader that supports our core business: renting your attention to advertisers). But the semi-structured data set that comprises the totality of the news organization's reporting has intrinsic commercial value to any person or entity that benefits from relevant, useful information.

Who might pay for access to a data set that includes the fire information included in my example? Well, insurance companies, for starters, but perhaps also attorneys, the Red Cross, real estate agencies, marketing companies, private detectives, specific vendors, etc.

And as a newspaper editor with access to that resource, could I build and curate a data tool that my readers might be willing to pay to use? Sure thing: I could create a mashup of public safety, educational, real estate and political information that could give dynamic "quality of life" grades to towns, neighborhoods and individual streets. And so on.

That is just one example. He is only scratching the surface. Imagine if these kinds of databases were offered on bills in Congress, and hearings as well. This is the kind of detailed, easily searchable information, that businesses as well as citzen's groups would pay for, as it is extremely detailed and can be manipulated for patterns.

Meanwhile, I have heard of a simple proposal that makes excellent sense to help local reporting now. Beef up NPR and PBS to serve local markets. Some NPR stations already do this, but even ones that don't at least have local headlines. Expand on that. Instead of making up some new government structure, just give NPR/PBS earmarked local funding, and then of course do private fundraising in those local areas. I would definitely donate to that.

[beachmom]

9. Murdoch is pitting Google vs. Bing, thinking this will save newspaper industry.

http://tinyurl.com/yzg368o

He is working on a deal where Bing pays News Corp. to de-link from Google Search, and is exclusively on a Bing Search. This is again a boneheaded idea. From TechCrunch (linked to from above link):

Bing can’t buy all the news, it can only buy certain brands. If Bing can somehow become the only place you can find news results and working links to the Wall Street Journal and other top papers such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the LA Times, for instance, that would be a big reason to switch for a lot of folks. But it’s not clear how much Bing would have to pay the news companies of the world for them to give up all the traffic Google sends them in return for a fraction of that traffic and some cash.

...

In order to actually make a dent in Google’s market share, Bing would have to pay such exorbitant sums to so many different news companies that it would be difficult to recoup its investment. Bing certainly get some marketing buzz out of any such move, but that’s about it.

The big problem with a search engine trying to buy market share by buying parts of the news is that information spreads so quickly these days, exclusives last about 30 seconds. That information will end up on a site that is indexed by Google. Or the same news will be broken by someone else on the Web before the WSJ.com even gets to it.

Exclusive indexing goes against the Web’s inherent openness. Companies that try to curtail that openness don’t last long on the Web.

I'm all for competition which Bing represents to Google. But the internet does not work like TV or a newspaper, where exclusivity really does work. In the end, this would be a short term tactic that would long term fail.


Oh, and one more thing: I follow the WSJ on Twitter, so I don't use Google to get WSJ news. If I am searching a topic I would just not receive any WSJ links, which would mean Murdoch would not get my business. How is this a plus for him?