Google Will Star In New Dow Jones News Model

An anonymous reader writes "Dow Jones is getting set to launch a new aggregator, akin to Google News, which will charge Web users for access to high-quality journalism. 'The Journal is one of the many newspapers you might buy in one place and with one payment [...] Watch for it,' said Dow Jones CEO Les Hinton. However, rather than posing a threat to Google News, Andrew Keen, author and entrepreneur, says the aggregator will use Google as a critical partner. The only people who should be worried about this new model, says Keen, 'are all those lucky consumers who, over the last 15 years, have been getting their news for free.'"

Comments

Sounds friendly...

[tnk1]

Hey, all you people getting value for free, you'd better watch out! You have to pay us now... for what you already get for free! Take that!

This guy must have been top of his class in Business School. I will follow his career with much interest.

Re:Sounds friendly...

[bheer]

I find this extremely ironic because today a columnist from _Reuters_ broke the big news story about the Goldman Sachs arrest. And Reuters has a very informative web site. While NY and Chicago papers (who should have broken the story because it happened in their cities) were snoozing.

Controlling the aggregator won't making papers profitable. Delivering a service people _want to pay for_ (like Flickr, or WSJ, or the Economist) will make them profitable. And so far, local papers (even in bigger cities like Boston) are just not doing that.

Re:Sounds friendly...

[zonky]

Because news collection just doesn't work like this at all.

This book is well worth a read on how news is collected, and becomes news. It's quite depressing reading.

To be fair to the WSJ

[Greg_D]

They not only started charging for their content, but stuck with it long after other companies had moved to horifically low paying internet ads. The result is that people who subscribe to the WSJ online expect to pay for content, whereas people who use other news sites expect to get their news for free.

Re:To be fair to the WSJ

[hansoloaf]

I think you need to consider the audience that the WJS sells to. Business people do not mind paying for business-oriented content. Look at The Economist, FT, etc for examples along with WSJ.

Meanwhile for general news, NY Times tried the walled garden and it failed.

Re:To be fair to the WSJ

[geekgirlandrea]

Deducting it as a business expense is only free to a self-employed end user if said user is paying a 100% marginal tax rate. This is unlikely to be the case.

Good pitch

[njfuzzy]

Great marketing-- The only people who lose out are the consumers! That'll show the bastards!

I have an idea

[Palestrina]

Maybe the public should start charging for making the news? Those damn newsies having been leeching off the deeds and misdeeds of the ordinary public from the beginning. Why should they get our stories for free? If it wasn't for us, the news would just be bad fiction printed on cheap paper. We should go on strike. No one do anything newsworthy for a week. That'll teach 'em!

high-quality journalism

[harmonise]

which will charge Web users for access to high-quality journalism.

Does high-quality journalism even exist anymore?

So let me get this straight...

[Itchyeyes]

Hinton is saying that the only people who shouldn't be happy with his new business plan are the very people he needs to voluntarily pay for his service? Somebody didn't think this through.

Really...

[Areyoukiddingme]

...which will charge Web users for access to high-quality journalism.

So... they'll do quality fact checking back to prime sources, not Wikipedia?
And... they'll report conflicts of interest not only among their subjects but with their corporate overlord?
And... they'll report which moneyed interests stand to gain, every time?
And... they'll never ever ever accept paid publicity or promotional materials and report them as news?
And... they'll stop reporting what Britney Spears is doing?
And... they'll never invent another word like Brangelina again?
And... they'll carefully write political copy using neutral, non-loaded words and phrases, without bias?

Color me skeptical...

I would laugh, but it's too farkin' pathetic. "High-quality". Right...

Re:Really...

[Gizzmonic]

Your knee-jerk cynicism changes nothing. As bad as the press is, a world without them would be even worse. Instead of celebrity-driven news like CNN, you'd have Stan the Basement Blogger picking apart a press release from Apple ad nauseum. And there is no guarantee of bloggers' neutrality, either. Good journalism costs money-yet doing good journalism doesn't often make money, and often can hinder an organization's ability to make money. The US needs a BBC.

The Missing Link

[SuperKendall]

Dow Jones is getting set to launch a new aggregator, akin to Google News, which will charge Web users for access to high-quality journalism.

Great idea.

The only problem is a complete lack of high quality journalism today.

Since they plan to aggregate instead of provide something new, the idea is dead before it began.

Re:Why should I pay when there are alternatives?

[larry bagina]

The WSJ does provide compelling, unique content. Maybe not for you, but for a lot of people. In the print world, they're the #2 newspaper. (Number 1 is USA Today, largely due to hotel deals)