Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Is Google Killing Off Newspapers?
Many newspaper companies believe Google is helping contribute to the decline in traditional print viewership, which remains the principal source of income for these companies. They acknowledge that while Google helps drive traffic to the site, the search engine overall is unfairly profiting off these visits through ad-based revenue. Is Google accelerating the decline of these media companies or are the media companies' failed attempts to adapt to the new business climate killing them?
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my bad... http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/08/is-yahoo-a-better-friend-to-newspapers-than-google/
ReplyDeleteI think so. I personally use CNN.com, and NYTimes.com for my news. I do believe that older generations prefer the newspaper. My dad reads the paper everyday. I think our generation will use less and less paper in general, influencing the killing off of newspapers.
ReplyDeleteI don't think Google is responsible per say, but they certainly contribute. The shame about print media is that it can't keep up with the instant news revolution of a CNN or CNBC, so it is being attacked from the television angle. Additionally, there are many sites on the internet that report eyewitness accounts of events moments after they happen. This is only further compounded by the rise of blogs. Why pay to read what a reporter has to say when I can find someone online who shares my views, or better yet create one and share my own thoughts. But herein lies the problem. Many if not all of these elements spent their time critiquing and pontificating on what the traditional media outlets report, but once they are gone, who will go find the facts necessary to create a story. Who will go research statistics or interview representatives or cover sports? Not Google. And certainly not me, sitting in my comfy chair blogging away. Everyone seems to be doing their best to kill the newspaper, but destroy the food and the population soon dies away too
ReplyDeleteI agree with what has been said because I don't know if google is at fault for the rapid decline in print news media. The instant-ness of the internet is crazy, there's no point of reading day old news when you can have up to the minute news. Its the technology age that is causing the world to turn to computers for news instead of the traditional print sources. But, Google allows a direct link to the actual article instead of forcing the user to navigate through the online news site, in this sense google is making more off of their advertisements instead of the news site. So as much as they don't cause the media transfer they are benefitting immensely.
ReplyDeleteOf course google is contributing to the downfall of print media, but the real killer is capitalism. The newspaper companies that are unable to change fast enough with the times will fall, and I believe that's a good thing. Competition is what makes countries thrive, and without it, the economy stagnates (the Soviet Union anyone?). In any case, things aren't as bad as many believe it to be for newspapers. Wired.com has a good article about this, where they mention that for many newspapers, "Revenue from advertising is more than making up for a slow decline in circulation and a rise in newsprint prices that has eaten into profits.". I believe the real reason things have been blown out of proportion is because of the journalists ability to complain to a large audience.
ReplyDeletePsh. Newspapers are dead. If you are referring to the concept of "Google" as representative of the internet culture...then yes, it has killed the newspaper. Done. Game over.
ReplyDeleteAnd don't get me wrong, I don't solely believe this is only because the internet is "more convenient" or "it uses less paper" or "quicker." I am more concerned and frankly believe that the newspaper is dead because traditional media in general is dead. The game has been reset. I can pick up a camera, a broadband connection, and a keyboard and make my own news. Everyone can contribute. We are living in one big wikified world and as stated before, the way we consume media/news has vastly changed but not only that....the source that we consume news has changed as well. Bye bye CNN, hello Felicia Day, Brookers, etc, etc.