[LINK] Murdoch to block Google

[Kim Holburn]

Cory Doctorow was wrote a rather funny and scathing blog on the subject:

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

And here's the meat:
> Update: So here's what I think it going on. Murdoch has no intention  
> of shutting down search-engine traffic to his sites, but he's still  
> having lurid fantasies inspired by the momentary insanity that  
> caused Google to pay him for the exclusive right to index MySpace  
> (thus momentarily rendering MySpace a visionary business-move  
> instead of a ten-minutes-behind-the-curve cash-dump).
>
> So what he's hoping is that a second-tier search engine like Bing or  
> Ask (or, better yet, some search tool you've never heard of that  
> just got $50MM in venture capital) will give him half a year's  
> operating budget in exchange for a competitive advantage over Google.
>
> He may, in fact, get a taker. And it will be a disaster. A search  
> engine whose sole competitive advantage is "We have Rupert Murdoch's  
> pages!" will not attract any substantial traffic. The search engine  
> will either go bust or fail to renew the deal.
>



On 2009/Nov/09, at 9:57 PM, Jan Whitaker wrote:

>
>
> Murdoch could block Google searches entirely
>
>
> http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/nov/09/murdoch-google
>
> <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/rupert-murdoch>Rupert
> Murdoch says he will remove stories from Google's
> search index as a way to encourage people to pay for content online.
>
> In an interview with Sky News Australia, the
> mogul said that newspapers in his media empire –
> including
> <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/sun>the Sun,
> <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/thetimes>the
> Times and the
> <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/wallstreetjournal>Wall
> Street Journal – would consider blocking Google
> entirely once they had enacted plans to charge
> people for reading their stories on the web.
>
> In recent months, Murdoch his lieutenants have
> stepped up their war of words with Google,
> accusing it of "kleptomania" and acting as a
> "parasite" for including News Corp content in its
> <http://news.google.com>Google News pages. But
> asked why News Corp executives had not chosen to
> simply remove their websites entirely from
> Google's search indexes – a simple technical
> operation – Murdoch said just such a move was on the cards.
>
> "I think we will, but that's when we start
> charging," he said. "We have it already with the
> Wall Street Journal. We have a wall, but it's not
> right to the ceiling. You can get, usually, the
> first paragraph from any story - but if you're
> not a paying subscriber to WSJ.com all you get is
> a paragraph and a subscription form."
>
> The 78-year-old mogul's assertion, however, is
> not actually correct: users who click through to
> screened WSJ.com articles from Google searches
> are usually offered the full text of the story
> without any subscription block. It is only users
> who find their way to the story through the Wall
> Street Journal's website who are told they must
> subscribe before they can read further.
>
> Murdoch added that he did not agree with the idea
> that
> <http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/searchengines>search
> engines fell under "fair use" rules - an argument
> many aggregator websites use as part of their
> legal justification for reproducing excerpts of news stories online.
>
> "There's a doctrine called fair use, which we
> believe to be challenged in the courts and would
> bar it altogether... but we'll take that slowly."
> [snip a lot more of the story]
>
>
> Google's reaction:
>
> <http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/nov/09/rupert-murdoch- 
> google>Charles
> Arthur: Murdoch's threat unlikely to worry Google
>
> [end of it:  ]
> Google, meanwhile, will remain unmoved. "Google
> delivers more than a billion consumer visits to
> newspaper websites each month. These visits offer
> the publishers a business opportunity, the chance
> to hook a reader with compelling content, to make
> money with advertisements or to offer online
> subscriptions," wrote
> <http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2009/07/working-with-news-publishers.html 
> >Google
> senior business product manager Josh Cohen in a
> blog post in July. "The truth is that news
> publishers, like all other content owners, are in
> complete control when it comes not only to what
> content they make available on the web, but also
> who can access it and at what price." For
> Murdoch, the price, it seems, is not right.
>
> The Guardian's collection of articles on the
> subject: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/charging-for-content
>
>
> Jan
>
>
> Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
> jwhit at janwhitaker.com
> blog: http://janwhitaker.com/jansblog/
> business: http://www.janwhitaker.com
>
> Our truest response to the irrationality of the
> world is to paint or sing or write, for only in such response do we  
> find truth.
> ~Madeline L'Engle, writer
>
> _ __________________ _
>
>
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-- 
Kim Holburn
IT Network & Security Consultant
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