And you wonder why the Seattle Times is dying?
Google is getting rich packaging content owned by magazines and newspapers and not paying for it. At some point, Google should have to pay.
Yeah, that’s right, Frank… it’s all Google’s fault. Your paper’s declining fortunes have nothing to do with your own managment decisions and your inability to adequately respond to a changing marketplace. So let’s get Congress to pass a law forcing Google to prop up your business by paying a royalty for the privilege of driving you traffic. And while you’re at it, you better charge me a royalty too, since we parasitic bloggers do nothing but freeload off your content.
The fact is, Google isn’t getting rich linking to content, it’s getting rich selling ads. And as long as the Times keeps pointing fingers instead of focusing on creating a more compelling product, they’ll continue to lose readers and advertisers.
Why is that the only people complaining about losing their fortunes are the ones with old money, like the Blethens or the CEOs of the financial and auto industries? I don’t hear Bill Gates or Steve Jobs complaining that much. Perhaps it’s a sort of financial-genetic entropy, where those who were born with it and never had to work for it, just became accustomed to it and considered it their natural, unchangeable, everlasting state. And when change comes as it inevitably does, presto! Those who don’t evolve, die out.
Whatever you feel about Darwin’s Theory of Evolution, it is most certainly accurate in the world of business.
Old-money fortunes more commonly die out through dilution as heirs breed like rabbits until there’s so many descendants they each get a silver dollar when the old man goes under.
Believe me, that’s why rabbits never inherit anything and have to work their way up from nothing like I did.
It would be interesting to see what would happen if Google shut out the Seattle Times. If they dropped them completed from the link listing. They sent no traffic from them. They didn’t show up if you searched for the times. Would that make them happy?
@4: so if you google the Seattle times – nothing would show up except chirping birds?
Isn’t that how it is now when you read the Times?
I mean chirping crickets….birds would be way too newsworthy.
I could give royal turd for Blethen BUT I am concerned that we have not as yet fun d a way to create online media that compete as well for attention as the
dinosautraditional media.One of the best things about the 2008 revolution is that Dean-Obama have found a way around the rich folks owning a campaign. BUT Huff/Slate/Kos/HA/Drudge etc are still or rumor shops for junkies etc are still little more than rumor shops.
I think Blethen may be part right in that serious reporting requires support and the only useful model for that has been the advert. dollar paid to newspapers and TV.
As a photographer, I am very disturbed by the dreadful LACK of photojournalism in Iraq! Yeh, I hear a lot of excuses but I suspect the bottom line is a lack of the $$$ that were enough, in a past era, to pay Robert Capa and his ilk and to support Life and other media that showed the work of the great social photographers. Other than the snaps from Abu Grave, there has been virtually NO important photography from this war!
I have to be amazed at the utter stupidity of this statement from Blethen. It’s one of those times when you have to wonder if:
(a) Blethen just doesn’t understand the Google business structure; or
(b) Blethen is pretending that he doesn’t understand it, because the misunderstanding he communicates is what he wants other people to believe.
I guess he would think that I owed him a royalty if in a conversation I said: “Gee, I think there was an article about that in yesterday’s Seattle Times – maybe you should go read it”. That’s essentially what Google does.
I’m trying to figure out what Blethen is proposing. Google to pay a royalty for links to the Times? Naw, that would never happen. For Google to quick sending them links? Nope, that would be suicide for their online edition.
Oh, I think I have it. He wants to shut Google (and other search engines) down entirely. He wants to force people to go to the Seattle Times website and do their search from there. That way, businesses have to pay more for less, by paying the Times for their advertising rather than Google. He wants to be the doorway through which everyone has to go, the screen through which he can filter opinions. In other words, he want’s the prestige and power which comes from having a near-monopoly on news distribution and advertising which newspapers held before radio, TV, and the internet.
Of course, most of the Seattle Times news content isn’t their own anyway. It’s AP wire service copy (for which they admittedly pay a fee), press releases from companies and politicians which are only slightly modified before finding their way into print, and a LITTLE local news. There is the rare investigative report, which is greatly appreciated, but it’s more the exception than the rule. The rest is advertising, syndicated columnists, cartoons, and features.
Hint to Blethen: Webmasters know that original and valuable content on websites brings back visitors and makes money on the ads which are poste dthere. Invest more in original reporting, and the cash will follow, whether it’s through the website or the printed edition.
So, with just about every industry, state, and municipality heading to the government to ask for a bailout to save their particular piece of the pie, is Blethen going to try to push for legislation to put Google out of business by making them pay royalties to every organization they link to? Maybe he would try to sell it as a “save your local newspaper from bankruptcy” bailout.
just another case of classic rent seeking, if you ask me………@9, Blethen ask for a bailout? The question isn’t if, it’s when.
SeattleJew @ 7: Remember that most newspapers were little more than rumor mills until well into the 20th century. It might start out that way, but with time and growth independent web sites can get to the point where they not only pay for themselves, but also start to pay for a reporting and writing staff.
As for advertising dollars, I think we are on the cusp of seeing a general and long-term decline in “general” advertising dollars. Newspapers, magazines, radio & TV (as well as the ad agencies themselves) have prospered enormously over the years based upon vague assurances that generic advertising and “image” advertising had value. They had little way to test this thesis, as there was no direct way to link specific advertising campaigns to actual sales.
With the internet, however, there are lots of ways to track advertising to sales. You can track link-throughs, see conversion rates (links to sales), and often see the specific ad which originated the sale. Ineffective advertising can be quickly cut, and campaigns tested and tweaked within a matter of weeks or even days.
So what a lot of businesses are finding from their internet advertising is that a lot of general or “image” advertising which they “assumed” was effective isn’t really effective at all, and other advertising which is specifically taylored to someone searching for a specific want or need was suprisingly effective.
As a consequence, I am expecting that generic or image advertising will dissapear, and with it a lot of the revenue upon which newspapers rely. Why pay huge somes of money for something when you can’t really measure the impact? Is anyone actually looking at that full-page add in section A? If so, are they stopping to read it? If they do, will that ever actually result in a sale, either near-term or long-term? Is the profit from the sales cost-effective in terms of the cost of the advertising?
One of the things which newspapers COULD do which would increase their online revenues is to put more useful text links in their articles, some of which can send the reader to an advertiser. Right now most newspapers shun this because it is perceived like “product placement” in movies – something which somehow damages the credibility of the author. But compared with going down the drain, it seems a reasonable step. And since newspaper archives can be kept online indefinately (or at least, as long as the newspaper is willing to allocate space for it), those types of links could have a lot of value to advertisers – unlike the “dead tree” editions, where their expensive advertising is being used to paper-train puppies within a few hours of being delivered to the door.
Roger Rabbit said:
“Believe me, that’s why rabbits never inherit anything and have to work their way up from nothing like I did”
You’re making the assumption that you’re something now. You aren’t.
Some years ago, I noticed that the cost of actually printing and distributing a newspaper was considerably more than the price of the paper.
Newspapers actually made their money by selling ads, and I note that the Seattle Times website carries advertising. I presume that they, like many other sites, use the amount of online traffic to encourage advertisers to buy those ads, and justify the costs of the ads.
Perhaps Google should charge the Seattle Times for providing readers to its online site.
Seattle Jew, there’s an exhibition of independent Iraq war photo-journalists in Seattle until the sixth of December. Here’s the link:
http://www.seattleweekly.com/e.....aq-522567/
If the Seattle Times hadn’t been cancelled 10 years ago at this household, I might have read that editorial. Next they’ll try to stop Craig’s list for it’s part in dessimating their classifyied revenue.
Lefties: All newspapers are down due to online advertising. Butt since Goldy hates Blethen he sees RED with anything Frank says. Goldy has nothing against the New York or LA Slimes and their bogus reporting.
Hey, Pudz is back! Is your spirit still broken? Have you put that exploded head of yours back together? Are you still just a shell of the man you used to be? Oh lordy, I bet it really sucks to be you. Heh
Hey Pudz, are you still in denial over your little, um, problem?
http://www.republicanoffenders.com/Pedophiles.html
Stupid Solution Steve:
Head ain’t exploded; not a shell of a man; spirit still high and that’s not my problem.
Goat Sex is yours
Speaking of declining fortunes, Goldy, if there was ever a sign of the dire straits of our economy it’s the fact that Ford and condos are now reduced to advertising on HA in what can only be described as a desperate search for customers. I mean, and let’s be honest, HA is probably near the bottom of the list of “audiences” where you’d expect to find someone either willing or able to purchase a gasoline sucking, carbon-sprewing, two ton tub of metal.
You and the Times probably have more in common than you might realize . . . and that’s that you’re both scrapping for the same scarce dollars.
So is the daily fishwrap going to go after Coke (Dasani) and Pepsi (Aquafina), which package a product they can get more-or-less for free and sell it to rubes like you and me?
If I were some guy with a web site and a bunch of ads (similar to, say, the Seattle /Times/) I’d be ecstatic that Google was sending readers my direction.
1
There’s an old, old story about an American who was visiting a British friend. Naturally the British friend took the American to his club, where he introduced him to all his old money friends.
All except one, that is. There was a fellow in the back corner of the club who just sat at his chair, drinking something very expensive, not talking to anyone, not being approached by anyone but the staff.
“What about that fellow?” the American asked, nodding in the solitary gentleman’s direction.
The Brit immediately turned so that the solitary fellow couldn’t hear or see what he was saying. “Him? Oh, that’s old Clavesham. Sad about him, but really, I’m afraid no one can be seen with him any more.”
“Really?” the American asked. “What did he do that was so bad?”
The Brit looked around, and in a conspiratorial tone, confided: “Clavesham dipped into his capital.“
What do the two have to do with eachotheR?
Lookie here, another reason why newspapers are losing “influence”
“But I was standing at the teletype when the first flash came in that a suspected Marxist, Lee Harvey Oswald, was being held in connection with the shooting. Times Publisher Nelson Poynter was standing nearby when I announced that.
His face fell.
“Oh, no,” he said. “I was hoping it would be a right-winger.” ”
When was Kennedy shot? Today in 1963. Libtard MSM bias then…
Just the fact ma’am just the facts. – Joe Friday
NY Slimes Libtard Thomas Friedman was on the Colbert Report. He wants t be China for a day. Ummm Thomas, maybe to your commie buds (we called it long time ago) that works but to Puddy – NO THANKS.
STEPHEN COLBERT: Now you have a concept called, you talk about “China for a day.” What is China for a day?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: Well, China for a day is a fantasy, basically. What if we had a government here that could actually make decisions? Okay? That could actually come together, Democrats and Republicans, and make a long-term plan and pursue it?
STEPHEN COLBERT: Are you saying the Chinese do that?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: Yeah, sometimes they do.
STEPHEN COLBERT: But that is a totalitarian regime.
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: Mm-hmm, and it is a measure of the frustration a lot of people in the green movement have, certainly me —
STEPHEN COLBERT: So you say that for one day we should have a totalitarian government where some ‘benign person at the top’ [He makes quotation-mark fingers] says this is what we do?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: No. Basically what I’m saying is if only our government could get its act together and launch a green revolution with the same persistence, focus, stick-to-it-iveness and direction that China does through authoritarian means. If we could only do that through democratic means –
STEPHEN COLBERT: We already have a green revolution because I separate my plastics and I eat Kashi cereal so, what more are we supposed to do, Thomas Friedman?
THOMAS FRIEDMAN: What more, what more is there?
STEPHEN COLBERT: Thank you so much for joining us.
Did you leftists celebrate the death of Jim Jones of Jonestown earlier this week?
Remember Jim Jones was a leftist and he had his followers drink the kool-aid. Just like most HASSers here. Why would he want their cash taken to the Soviet Union?
Jim Jones:”For many years we have let our sympathies be quite publicly known that the United States government is not our mother but the Soviet Union was our spiritual mother land.”
Jim Jones:”I decided how can I demonstrate my Marxism. The thought was infiltrate the church.”
He was a communist/socialist – friend of leftists.
Jones and Oswald? Hmm, you somehow left out Charlie Manson and Richard Speck. I’m sure you think they represent the liberal mindset as well. Christ, Pudz, did you stay up all night to come up with this stuff? Sad to see you lose it, Pudz. So sad.
GBS: WaPost figgered without Palin McCain would have lost by more. McCain is not conservative. That’s why he was a media dahhhhling until he won the nomination.
You are smarter than this GBS!
Stupid Solution Steve.
I like history. I just find facts and post them. You on the other hand are too stupid to comprehend facts.
Go back and see who Jim Jones hung out with in CA.
Jerry Moonbeam Brown were pals
Willie The Hat Brown were pals
George Moscone Mayor of SF placed him on the SF Housing Board
Harvey Milk loved him
@28 “I just find facts and post them.”
Yeah, me too! I like to post links to news stories about Republicans being busted for pedophilia and other perversions. That really bothers you for some reason. It seems to get you all worked up into a lather. Why is that? Do those news stories of Republican peophiles strike a little too close to home?
Hey, Pudz, I responded to your Lostinaseaofblue sockpuppet over on the Hoover thread. You might want to pop over there and defend yourself.
@28 “I like history.”
Me too! How about you educating us on the history of Nazi collaboration with the Republican party in the 1930’s. That’d surely educate us poor slobs on the left. You’ll use names like Sidney Brooks, William Dudley Parry, Edwin Emerson, Ray P. Chase, Edward Nicholson, Irenee du Pont, Willaim Rhodes Davis, Joachim Heslet and Stephen Day. Fill us in on the details. Teach us some history, Pudz!
Geez, Pudz, don’t you find the history of Nazi collaboration with the Republican party during the decade leading up to WWII to be interesting? Why’s that? I thought you liked history.
Hmm, Pudz always runs away when the tables turn on him. Or perhaps his head exploded again. Gawd, I hope he’s not taking out his frustrations on that poor, hapless goat of his. Hasn’t that poor critter suffered enough, Pudz?
C’mon, Pudz, teach us some history. I want you to tell us the story of Sidney Brooks.
Geez, you’re not ashamed of your party’s collaboration with Nazis, are you? Is that why you’ve left? It’s your party’s history, Pudz! Take a few moments and tell us all about it. Teach us.
Here’s the latest Republican busted for pedophilia, Pudz. This pudz wanted to have sex with a 11 year-old girl. Sigh! There’s so many Republicans busted for pedophilia these days, Pudz. Hundreds! Does this shame you? Of course not.
http://www.lakeplacidnews.com/.....l?nav=5005
Has anyone ever noticed how remarkably unsophisticated the advertising divisions of these metro dailies are? It’s almost as if they have no professional/educational background in modern marketing and product promotion.
I have an uncle who worked his way up within the ranks of a local major daily to become the advertising director before he retired some years ago. I can tell you the division that he built over his decade and a half depended entirely upon an old-school model of personal relationships created and maintained by advertising “account executives” (what a phony title for a sales rep) with, by today’s standards, very little market data or metrics to justify rates and appeal to specific accounts.
Accounts were sold based largely upon faith and the personal appeal of the sales rep, with almost nothing to back it up. But when you were the only game in town, that was enough. These folks were completely unprepared for the challenge that lay ahead of them from the hyper-demographic sophistication of modern data network marketing. They’ve been playing catch up ever since. And way to much of that catch up has been played by the very same plaid-suited “account executives” who put them behind the eight ball in the first place.
You’re a damned coward, Pudz.
Stupid Solution Steve: I was at church moron
Church? For five hours? That must of been a hell of a sermon, Pudz. Whatever. Did God forgive you for lying about Democrats even as you support America-hating Republican pedos and pervs? Or perhaps the God Republicans pray to smiles on that kind of shit.
Stupid Solution Steve:
Lying about the Donkey? I bring the truths!
I believe everyone is responsible for their own actions, like you and your goats!
Stupid Solution Steve:
You should enjoy a whole day at church.
@41 “you and your goats”
Christ, Pudz, you couldn’t stop projecting if your life depended on it.
So what do you think about this latest Republican pedophile? Did you follow the link I posted? If I’m not mistaken, he’s the kind of Republican you admire most of all. Why is that, Pudz? Why do you support Republican pedophiles and pervs for public office? Talk to me about it. Spill your guts out. Maybe I can help you sort out your misguided notions of what’s right and what’s wrong. C’mon, Pudz, open up and let me help you.
@42 I enjoy church very much, thank you. I was baptised Lutheran (and attended LDS as a Jack Morman, my Mom was originally from Beaver(!), Utah, where I’ve summered) but have attended mostly Catholic mass for many years. How about you? Hmm, you didn’t actually say that you’re a Christian. You’re not a devil worshiper, are you, or one of those Wiccans maybe?
Speaking of long church services….
I was at a Samoan church service a few years back. Started Sunday night at 6:00 p.m. There was about an hour of singing, then announcements, then testimony, then about 8:00 p.m. the main speaker came to the podium. She was a traveling evangelist, and spoke until about 10:00 p.m. Then there were praise reports and prayer requests.
Finally about 10:30 p.m. the pastor assigned one of the deacons to pray for the prayer requests. Obviously, he was giving each prayer request the full attention he thought it deserved. I couldn’t tell, because he was praying in Samoan.
I had my head bowed and my eyes closed, until suddenly I heard the pastor’s voice booming out: “I DIDN’T HEAR ANYBODY SAY AMEN YET!!!!!”.
We all looked up, to see a handfull of young men come slinking back into the church from the back door, looking mighty embarrased and guilty. The deacon finished with the prayer sometime well after 11:00 p.m., and after the service was dismissed we were invited to go out to dinner with the pastor, his family, and the evangelist.
It was actually a very good service, and I enjoyed it. But I doubt I could do that EVERY sunday night, and still make it to work on time on Monday morning.