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Online Content Cannot Remain Free
gamer4Life writes "Publishers from Europe are complaining that Internet search engines are making money off their copyright-protected material. 'This is unlikely to be sustainable for publishers in the longer term.', says Francisco Pinto Balsemao, head of the European Publishers Council. These comments are despite the fact that Google does not place ads on their news service. 'Search engines do not reproduce content. They help users find content by pointing to where it exists on the Web.', says Google spokesman, Steve Langdon. This comes after a French news service sued Google for at least $17.5 million."
I don't think the European Publishers Council is only referring to Google News, but the whole idea of people start relying on search engines to get their news feed. And sometimes, you will be able to find a news that is free on one site, and by subscription on another (eg NYTimes vs CNN).
And what about cached news articles that could have already been removed from the news site and turned into a pay-per-view article?
I guess there is only so much money to go around in the economy, if Google is making a huge profit, someone else is getting less.
These comments are despite the fact that Google does not place ads on their news service
But when I searched for "DeLay", there are few "news" links at the very top of the result page, and a sponsored link by www.nytimes.com.
Virtual Betting on Facebook for non-geeks.
'This is unlikely to be sustainable for publishers in the longer term.', says Francisco Pinto Balsemao, head of the European Publishers Council.
The panicking and running around with hands in the air, shouting "the sky is falling"?
I can begin to tell how many authors I've ripped off by reading their entire tomes on-line, snippet by snippet in Google search results.
I haven't.
On the contrary, like Langdon alludes, I hear or see something, pop a few words into Google to do a search, next thing you know my bookshelf, real oak(!), is jamb packed with books.
What do they really want, poverty and security through obscurity?
the new zork times book review shall not quote, nor say bad words about my book, in cold oatmeal or i shall sue
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
Any industry tied to a technology lends itself to obsolecence. Why should printing be different?
If brevity is the soul of wit, then how does one explain Twitter?
Google to European publishers: "OK, if you guys don't want your content indexed, we won't index it. And we'll remove it from our database while we're at it."
European publishers, a month later: "Why have visits to our sites dropped by 80% since Google stopped stealing uor content?!"
"Publishers from Europe are complaining that Internet search engines are making money off their copyright-protected material. 'This is unlikely to be sustainable for publishers in the longer term.', says Francisco Pinto Balsemao, head of the European Publishers Council."
What a whiny little biatch. *Every* news outlet with an online presence has one of two choices:
1. Do not make your content openly accessible through the HTTP protocol and charge a fee.
2. Use robots.txt, which Google honours.
Until one of those two actions are taken, Francisco, you have FREELY VOLUNTEERED to offer your content to news aggregators and anyone with a web browser. This is a choice you can make *right now*, instead of complaining like a baby.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
These comments are despite the fact that Google does not place ads on their news service
That's because the news service is "beta" forever. In fact citing Google News is actually a direct prove of the outside assertion - Google has kept it beta for years (and isn't like to ever make it a "real" service) simply because there is no true model they could legally use. They are screen scraping other people's content and the second they let it be legally defined as anything but an academic exercise (by removing the beta mark or sticking ads on it) they will get hit with a million lawsuits and Google won't have a legal leg to stand on.
Google News, along with most other Google "services", are special cases. Unlike companies that are trying to make money from their services, Google's main goal is to use them to mine personal information from millions of visitors. So it doesn't matter if their software is beta forever, as long as they can have a system that reads your personal email and indexes all keywords found against the GUID that tracks you across every Google site, they will be happy because they can sell expensive targeted advertising on the main Google search and anywhere else that won't get them into legal trouble.
If they don't want to be spidered, let them turn on the robots.txt. Sheesh! Since they can control what Google has for them in their search results, I fail to see how Google is responsible for that.
Besides, if you're selling content, don't you want people to know you have it? How are they supposed to know that they can buy it otherwise?
Just how big a DUH! does this get?
2 cents,
Queen B
HDGary secures my bank
Step 1: Web publishers in Europe sue search engines to stop them from "stealing" their content.
Step 2: Web publishers in Europe sue search engines to force them to reindex their servers after their customers can no longer find them and their competitors, who were happy to be indexed, get all the traffic.
Step 3: Web publishers in Europe sue search engines to recover for "damages" since the engines are using their intellectual property - despite the fact that the search engines are now forced to use that property by court order.
Step 4: Web publishers in Europe are lined up against the wall and shot as the internet collapses from an excess of stupidity.
Publishers have the same problem that the record companies have. They could produce far more content than the shops can deal with. The RIAA isn't about music, its about getting little bits of plastic moved through the checkouts at shops. Book publishers aren't about literature, its about moving dead trees through the checkouts at shops. There are now millions of people who have better facilities to make music than the Beetles had so there is a potential for a million times more records to be produced. The RIAA's (and the shops) business model can't cope with that and neither can the book publishers.
I listened to Stephen King talk about the modern publishing business. He is convinced it has been messed up so bad for so long that no decent new author is ever likely to get published. He uses his wife's work as an example. He thinks she is a better author than he is yet the only ones that want to publish her work are using his name to sell the book. He also mentioned that the big book stores (B&N, Boarders) who stack narrow and deep are killing the hope of many authors where the smaller book shops would stock wide but shallow and would order a copy of a book or two and if they sold, would report it to the NYT top 100. Then Wal-mart would look at the things in the top 20 that they hadn't sold and buy a million copies of each which would then mess up the top 10 stats. A decade ago the data being reported for the NYT best seller list was already not very useful and he fears that it will soon be meaningless.
If you ever get a chance to hear Stephen King speak, go listen to him. He's a very good presenter even if your not into his books.
Assertion 1: "They are screen scraping other people's content"
Assertion 2: "the second they let it be legally defined...a million lawsuits...Google won't have a legal leg to stand on"
Both assertions are, IMO, completely untrue. It is not illegal, and I don't think it's ever been illegal in any jurisdiction, to stand on a street corner and say "Hey! There's a guy selling icecream over there!" Unless you cause a riot, or yell too loud, or block the footpath.
Google News doesn't "screen scrape" any content. They list headlines from news sites. "Hey! There's a guy telling a story over there!" Not illegal. Never will be illegal.
To your second point. There are companies out there, right now, even as we type, called clipping services. They literally cut whole articles out of newspapers, magazines, journals, and compile folders of them according to criteria set by the people who pay them money.
According to you, they "don't have a legal leg to stand on" and yet they are amazingly unsued, making revenue from other people's content. If Google removed the "beta" sign tomorrow, they would still be doing far less than a standard, real-world clipping service.
It's also not illegal to watch someone buy a sports magazine at a newsstand and say "Excuse me sir. Do you mind if I ask you a question? I notice you are into sports. Would you like to buy this fine *related product here*?" Again, if you do this wrong you could be arrested for bugging people, but the act of making a recommendation based on observed public behaviour is not illegal.
"You want the Model A? Well, ma'am, I couldn't help noticing you have two kids in the store with you today. The Model B is specifically designed for families with young children." Not illegal. Never will be illegal.
But, of course, IANAL, and I am simply operating in the plain old world of "logic", not the rarified atmosphere of "the law". Now, those two environments usually intersect, but of course we all know of times when they haven't.
To: M. Amoron, owner, Jackass Publishing.
From: I. Cheatem, attorney-at-law.
Dear Sir,
Attached to my email, you will find a two-line file entitled "robots.txt". The 4-year-old who designed your website should copy it into your top-level web directory. This file is essentially an instruction to Google's web spider to direct people to your competitors rather then you.
My client Google believes in respecting these wishes. We have happily de-listed your site.
On a related note, I know some excellent bankruptcy attorneys in your country. In a couple months' time when you come to need one, I will be happy to make a recommendation.
(Up) Yours,
I. Cheatem, attorney-at-law.
To fight the war on terror, stop being afraid.
No it's not a matter free versus not free though that matters. It's the principle of arbitrage. If I want to sell my 2000 year old gold ring for its true value and you want to buy a 2000 year old ring the chances we meet are close to nil. Instead I will have to sell my ring in a more liquid market that only values the gold not the age.
Faced with this, Therefore I'm willing to pay a antiquties broker a commission for you to find me. Arbitraging in the stock market are people who look for things that are priced lower than they should be due to inadequate liquidity and buy them then find markets to sell them in. ( Often they do this with options so they don't even actually own the properties. )
In either case arbitraging creates market liqudity which increases the sales value of an item closer to it's optimal value. The seller gets more and should be glad. The reverse can also be true when the arbitrager works for the buyer.
Google is effectively creating a liquid market where none exists. It helps the seller because it connects them to the buyer (reader) of the news (and ads). And it helps the buyer avoid easily found but overpriced news. But in both cases google is adding value and extracting a commision (google ads).
So yes they are adding value and thus entitled to make money. But the seller is not worse off unless they are in the class of sellers who make their money by being easily found but cost a bundle. (e.g. payday loan shop on the corner or the bank loan officer down town.)
But it does seem like the news companies should be able to opt out if they want. Maybe someone should tell them about robots.txt
but instead they are greedy and want a cut of the broker's slice. It's not unheard of: it's Not unlike asking your real estate to give you a cut of the commission on a house that is particularly desirable for an agent to list.
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
That's an economic mistake and an important one, because it leads to bad policy. I'll explain how it's mistaken.
Value is the value of a thing to a person. Profit is the increase in value after a trade, versus before. So the seller profits by gaining money (wanted more) and losing product (wanted less). The buyer profits by losing money (wanted less) and gaining product (wanted more).
Wealth is the ability to achive personal goals. If you have more money, that's useful to you, so it's wealth. If you get something you need more, lose something you need less, then you have more wealth. Therefore profit produces personal wealth for both parties.
Some of the things you trade for, increase your efficiency. They let you achieve things you couldn't before. When other people's goals depend on your efficiency, your gain in wealth translates into a gain in societal wealth: everybody can achieve their goals a little easier. Therefore profit produces (on average) societal wealth for everyone.
Inflation and deflation reflect the usefulness of money. The limit of inflation is useless money. Infinite paper, nothing to buy, therefore infinite prices. The limit of deflation is getting everything for free. They relate to societal wealth. Wealth drops, money stays the same: inflation. Wealth rises, money stays the same: deflation. Therefore, profit is deflationary.
Given deflation, the same amount of money buys more. Therefore if anyone makes a profit, everyone makes a profit. This is the true virtue of the capitalist system, and it's the reason why Google's profits don't mean "someone else is getting less".
I think that the wording of the European publishers' complaint is telling. They don't complain about Google or others publishing their copyrighted material without their permission, which, if true, would be a valid complaint (and perhaps is true of Google cache, however convenient we may find it). What they actually complain about is the fact that other people are making money from their publications. That is not necessarily a violation of copyright and, in the general case, is not a complaint that should be acted upon.
Suppose that publisher X publishes a book on a controversial topic of wide interest. I write a response to this book which sells well and makes a lot of money. Since my book is a response to publisher X's book, the money (and fame, women, etc. :)) that I received is indeed dependent on the work of Publisher X, but Publisher X has no legal or moral claim on me. The same is true if I compile and publish a bibliography, or make money as a consultant to people who want to know what they ought to read in a certain area. My profit ultimately depends on the work of the publishers, but I don't need their permission and don't owe them a dime.
Chefs and authors of cookbooks do not require the permission of the farmers, ranchers, hunters, and fishermen without whom there would be nothing to cook or to write about, nor do they owe them compensation. These are some of the many ways in which not only culture and science but business develops on the foundation of work done by other people, yet where we do not consider that the permission of those others is required or that any compensation is owed to them.
When the publishers complain that other people are making money from their content, our response should be "so what?". In and of itself that isn't a valid basis for complaint. It just means that they haven't been the ones to seize new opportunities. Copyright holders are granted certain limited privileges pertaining to publication and that is it. Beyond that, other people are perfectly free to do whatever they want.
About this ring of yours... anything, um, special about it? Was it part of a collection, one of a set of nine perhaps, or is it one ring. It's my birthday, and I wants something... precious.
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
Looks wonderful on paper, doesn't it?
The problem is that the philosophy you have expressed only inheres in a capitalism inhabited solely by those who act in rational self-interest. Rational means considering the ramifications of one's actions. Unfortunately, both producers and consumers in their various guises have proven to be terrible at this game. We live in a society where consumers are unreasonably swayed by marketing and the oft-championed 'excellence of product' that capitalism encourages is virtually unrecognizable. Frequently - and by frequently, I mean, say, 50% of the time or more, consumers purchase things, and feel that they have been taken advantage of. In many cases, they are right.
I am constantly amazed at the fact that those who deplore social anarchy the most are often the biggest champions of financial anarchy - Capitalism. And just like social anarchy, it only lasts as long as it takes for one player to accumulate enough 'stuff' to influence others, and then we have a de facto government, or a de facto monopoly.
Thinking outside my Head
No, but listening on port 80 constitutes permission for me to make requests of your server.
I too have felt the cold finger of injustice.
alizard Linux
If I write a book, I very definitely want my stuff online and searchable.
If my book is any good, the more people who see it, the more are going to buy it. Making the book good is my problem, and to a smaller extent, that of my editors. Make the book invisible and nobody will buy it.
Isn't making money off IP content what publishing is supposed to be about? Not making content invisible or putting it on sale after locking it into a digital toilet.
BTW, the only real success I know with respect to digital-age publishing is Baen Books.
They make their backlist free and downloadable with no DRM and no brain-dead e-reader software, open in your word processsor or browser. They do the same with their current books, only you have to pay for those.
The first hit is always free is a time honored and sound marketing principle. Once you're read the first several books in a series, the buying decision on the next few is a very easy one to make, especially since the content doesn't have DRM-crapware on it that makes it harder to read where I feel like reading it. They're also cheaper since they don't have to pay print costs, just bandwidth. This isn't hypothetical, I've already bought several of their books and plan on buying 2 or 3 more as soon as I get my next article check.
The French publishers simply want government protection for an industrial-age business model, just like the crapheads at the *AA member labels and studios do... fuck 'em.
Tech Public Policy stuff