Links for tag 'news limited'

Some of the older rich folk, like Aussie-American Mr. Rupert Murdoch, have only kept up with the internet age by buying anything they can get their hands on. Some investments have succeeded while others have failed.

But the bottom line has been that the Murdoch types have not been the innovators of the internet age, but have tried wherever possible to line themselves up as the beneficiaries.

Old man Rupert has now thrown up a curly! He is hinting that he will consider charging people for reading his online news!

Traditional Australian media companies are at it again; attacking web innovators Google for their latest bold step in unifying a search category. The search category this time is 'real estate listings'.

Recently, Google Australia announced real estate listings are now able to be searched via the revolutionary Google Maps.

Fairfax, owners of real estate listing website Domain, and News Limited, owners of RealEstate.com.au, are threatening to pull out their significant advertising dollars from Google if they become a competitor.

Rupert Murdoch has made his billions by being a shrewd operator. I thought shrewdness was replaced with insanity when he began talking about 'taking on Google' for stealing content from his newspapers, and stating that he will charge for online content.

Well... Murdoch is definitely still shrewd.

He has started talks with Microsoft about his war with Google. Microsoft has forever been trying to take search engine market share from Google, and has made a little headway with the release of its improved search engine 'Bing'.

While it has not been said what Murdoch and Microsoft are talking about, if they cut some sort of deal where Murdoch's newspapers will only be searchable via Bing, that would be an interesting blow for Google.

Interesting because I would like to see how Google will react.

Although insanity has not replaced his shrewdness, it does not mean Murdoch is not insane...

He seems a bit petulant about the fact that he lacks a certain tool - in this case the talent of 'innovation' - and instead of employing or embracing such tools, he seems intent to keep selling his old, archaic tool in 'newspapers'.

He feels newspapers are sooooo valuable, that people will pay to view them online. Does Murdoch realise how 'news'ed up one can be on the web without what is offered by his empire? Does he realise how divided online news market share is?

Anyway, newspapers that choose to charge for exclusive feature content have my support - monetise what you can.

But newspapers who want to charge for news? They have no support and I predict the beginning of their end!

My most recent blog, titled 'Google must tread carefully as Microsoft and Murdoch start talks', covered an interesting development by shrewd media mogul Rupert Murdoch in the battle for 'free news to the web'.

Murdoch, who calls Google's loose publishing of news 'stealing', met with search market share-aspirants Microsoft in what was seen as a threat to Google that if it doesn't stop providing free content, News Limited will block Google in favour of Microsoft and its search engine, Bing.

Google has seemingly buckled.

Google's program 'First Click Free' was designed a while back for publishers of paid content (e.g. Wall Street Journal owned by Murdoch) to show one page for free. Any subsequent clicks should lead to a need for users to 'subscribe' to the publisher's website.

This program did have a loophole, where the free version of this content was usually searchable and viewable via Google News.

Google now says: "Previously, each click from a user would be treated as free. Now, we've updated the program so that publishers can limit users to no more than five pages per day without registering or subscribing."

This concession, while small, could win some fans among publishers.

Please click here for a Reuters video covering this topic.

Traditional media tycoon Rupert Murdoch and his company News Limited's attacks against every giant in the 'new media' are becoming too obviously cringing to let pass.

I've written before about the Australian-born American Murdoch taking on Google for publishing 'his news'. This time his target is VOIP giant Skype - the company that provides free voice calling to millions worldwide.

He is picking on its name, stating the use of the letters 'Sky' from 'Skype' is a breach of copyright against one of his media brands 'BSkyB'.