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Murdoch To Explore Blocking Google Searches

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the why-is-no-one-calling-for-his-head dept.

In another move sure to continue the certain doom looming over classic publications, Rupert Murdoch has elaborated on the direction he would take in an effort to monetize the content that his websites deliver by attempting to block much of Google's ability to scan and index his news sites. "Murdoch believes that search engines cannot legally use headlines and paragraphs of news stories as search results. 'There's a doctrine called "fair use," which we believe to be challenged in the courts and would bar it altogether,' Mr Murdoch told the TV channel. 'But we'll take that slowly.'"

8 of 549 comments (clear)

  1. Robots.txt by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Am I genius?

    1. Re:Robots.txt by al0ha · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The problem with techies, they need to learn to think like a businessman. We control the information, get it together techies!

      Maybe the answer is robots.txt; but that is not what you tell a billionaire if he asks you.

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  2. Good. by aztektum · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The faster Rupert puts himself out of business, the better off everyone will be.

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  3. I don't think I get it... by Monkeedude1212 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    He wants to make more money by making his headlines not available to the top search engine?

    1. Re:I don't think I get it... by tomhudson · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I don't see why google just doesn't stop indexing their stuff for a while, and waiting for them to scream about how they're no longer in the serch results.

      Then tell Murdoch "How much are you going to pay to be back in?"

      Then, no matter how much he offers, say, "Not enough."

      When he says "Well, how much would it cost?" reply "In your dreams, fatboy!"

  4. Freeze him out by icebike · · Score: 5, Insightful

    If I were Google, I'd just cut all his sites off for a month and let them see how far their click-revenue falls off.

    No google news, No search results, nothing.

    The guy asked for it, so give it to him.

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  5. This is NOT baffling! by absurdist · · Score: 5, Insightful

    From the Summary: "'There's a doctrine called "fair use," which we believe to be challenged in the courts and would bar it altogether,' Mr Murdoch told the TV channel. 'But we'll take that slowly.'" Fair use is the target here. They don't want anyone to ever be able to use any current culture without payment and approval.

  6. Re:This is just baffling! by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It has to be political.. there has to be something going on behind the scenes here. He's not that stupid a person.. and there's no way that someone hasn't explained to him what a robots.txt file is by now..

    Of course. Merdoch (or his minons) know this. There are probably two things going on: A lame attempt to convince the public that he is being ripped off, and also he is almost certainly in discussions with Google about having Google pay for the content that Google clearly profits from. Neither will work out. And until web content of these "publications" provide a lot more value to the consumer, pay-for-access is a dead idea as well.
    Of course there are certain publications, like the WSJ that can pull it off, but most can not, and certainly not local newspapers.

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