David Lazarus in the San Francisco Chronicle argues that, for newspapers to “survive in an age of free online content” they need to start charging for the use of their products online.
The argument is counter-intuitive. It is an age of free online content. That is the fact.
If newspapers start charging for their online products, they won’t survive in this age of free online content. People will simply go elsewhere.
Should newspapers sue Google or Yahoo for their content appearing on news aggregators? No, but perhaps in their concern they could collaborate with Google to count online readership. Surely another way of counting online readership for individual mastheads could be when they are read externally, in the same way RSS readership can be counted even when your site is not visited.
Also stake claim to some of the advertising click, or visit length, revenue being collected, and it becomes desirable to a media outlet that their content is seen freely by as wide an audience as possible.
Whatever else, newspapers must demonstrate that their online content has value.
“The students I teach really do believe that everything on the Internet is theirs for the taking,” Kirtley said. “Young people have been conditioned to believe that they’re entitled to this content.”
It’s time for newspapers to condition them otherwise.
No, it is time for all media outlets with online interests to demonstrate their content has value, and then to stop harping and work a bit harder at figuring out how they’re going to get advertising to pay for it - in the same way the advertising pays for their print stable.
2 comments ↓
Dave,
What if on-line newspapers took a Google-juice approach, targetting ads on their content to the topic of the content? At least then they’d be closer to the sort of advertising model Google uses with great success.
Looking at the news that the RBA has just raised rates? Get an ad from a lender with “low, low rates!”. Looking at news about Paris Lohan? Get an ad for an eating disorder program. ;) Etc.
(though, AdSense is pushing me some really weird ads on this site at the moment!)
I’ve noticed the ads here in the last few days have been completely weird, and I’m not exactly sure how they match up to my content.
There have been thoughts towards that Google-type approach on news sites, even online news video, but some of the reservation still seems to be the fallibility of computer systems.
Just as it’s inappropriate that an ad for “Crazy Craig’s Coffin Clearance” appear alongside the obituaries in the newspaper, people fear there is a higher chance of errors like that when ‘auto-ads’ are used. Although online the fear may be less to do with issues of public sensitivity and more about offending advertisers, like an ad for Virgin appearing alongside a story about Qantas.
I don’t think that fear is entirely justified. Weird ads are appearing on my site because I don’t have the time to spend undertaking quality control measures. The advertising division of a news outlet would have that time, and should invest it.
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