Tag Archives: Newspapers

Sponsored links: Who should pay who?

Of its annual revenue, Google earns $38 billion from the sale of “sponsored links” alone. It seems Google has successfully convinced advertisers that the links they provide are of value to their businesses as a form of advertising. That is until recently.

Many European newspapers and magazines are pushing for legislation to change how Google, as well as other search engines and newsgathering sites, earn revenue.  They believe Google and its counterparts should pay them instead as their newspapers and magazines provide the material these sites generate revenue from.

Reversing the monetary flow seems imminent. A German bill is already being reviewed by Parliament and would allow publishers to charge search engines and news curating sites a fee to display parts of their articles with links to the paper or magazine.  In France, President François Hollande is aggressively pushing for similar legislation unless a solution is found by the end of the year to compensate the publishers for their content. Italy is also starting to look into similar action.

Google is adamant that these types of laws go against the free flow of information on the Internet and would destroy their existence.  They have countered with threatening to exclude these sites from search results.  This is no empty threat either as in France alone 30 to 40 percent of news sites traffic comes from Google.  Publishers are already struggling to increase revenue, which is why they are trying to reverse the current monetary flow with Google.

It seems both sides are dependent on these dollars being placed in their favor. Is there a solution to benefit both sides? Would a pay wall help or hurt the papers and magazines?  I think the most important part is that this will affect users.  Either search results will be missing pertinent information, or site vistors may be forced to make up for missed revenue by subscribing.  The ever-growing idea of free information on the Web is at stake.

Invisible ink: Print form of newspapers continue to fade

As we all know the decline of readership in newspaper has been discussed for years, especially since the economy tanked and the mobile space has grown. “According to an eMarketer study of U.S. adult media habits, the average time spent reading newspaper has decreased by 12 minutes from 2008 to 2011.”

More: http://www.frankwbaker.com/mediause.htm & http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2011/12/12/pass-the-remote-and-the-tablet-media-study-detects-boost-in-tv-mobile-use/)

“The University of Southern California’s Annenberg Center for the Digital Future predicts within five years, only four major daily papers will continue in print form.” The four survivors forecasted to remain are The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and USA Today. The New York Times and Wall Street Journal require a paid subscription to access their online content; while USA Today and Washington Post still allow readers to browse their site for news updates with no subscription. USA Today is projected to have paid subscriptions some time in 2012.

“The Washington Post has weathered its financial storms better than most dailies: Its Kaplan educational subsidiary has remained largely profitable, helping to stabilize the paper’s finances. Coupled with major cutbacks — the Post has closed all but two of its regional suburban bureaus and almost halved its reporter corps — this has sufficed to stem the loss of revenue.”

As consumers branch away from newspaper and use television, mobile sites or the internet to get the latest news story instead of waiting until tomorrow morning, the national/local newspapers are suffering. The cost of paper is increasing and the subscriptions are decreasing. Television is still the main outlet for consumers to get the most up to date news.

“A recent Rasmussen poll found that a clear majority of Americans – 59% — plan on getting most of their political information from their television sets this year. That number represents the combined total for cable and broadcast sources. The breakdown of the 59% is 37% cable, 22% broadcast. The internet is second with 21%. Newspaper and radio trailed, with neither able to break into double digits, pulling responses of 9% and 7% respectively. 18% now get political updates over a phone or other mobile device, with 18-29-year-olds twice more likely to do so than the 65+ crowd.”