Comments on: Murdoch has friends in fight against Google, says M&G’s Ncube

By: Alan Hammond

Alan Hammond — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 10:06:27 +0000

I used to have a lot of respect for Trevor Ncube – until I read this article. What a lot of nonsense. If you don’t want to be in Google, take yourself out! If you don’t want to give away articles for free then charge people to read the M&G online! Stop whinging and run your business! And how can you say that Google is a monopoly and then in the next breath say that you use Bing? And there’s also Yahoo. The problem is that Google is better than the rest of them and it gives people what they want.
This is going to be an interesting business proposal coming from newspapers. At every business school in the world they would tell you to give your consumers what they want. But newspaper publishers think that they can turn that on its head by giving people exactly what they don’t want! Good luck to you!

By: Simon

Simon — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 09:12:00 +0000

I have the utmost respect for Trevor Ncube – but I was surprised at his standpoint on Google. Frankly, I find it shortsighted.

Online content has the ability to forge engagement with consumers and presents exciting new ways of creating revenue. The information economy operates in such a way that paid content is intrinsically limited. That isn’t to say that paid content doesn’t work – just that it gets ‘routed around’. Free content will win every time.

Google is not the enemy and never has been. Quite the opposite – Google has done online publishers the biggest favour they have ever received. Which makes it infuriating that they don’t realise it.

If anyone should be charging anyone else here it should be Google. Ncube and Rupert have the smarts to make this all work for them. But they’re approaching it from the arse-end.

By: nevo

nevo — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 20:35:11 +0000

the issue at hand is changing media usage patterns more than “free”. If somebody using google went to a newspaper and clicked on a hundred stories and 10 ads, none of the publishers would be complaining. as they would be monetising the visit massively. unfortunately, they are not.. they find a story, maybe read another and then move on. compared to selling a newspaper full of ads that people may (or may not) read – thats not an attractive business model.

M&G of all publishers is probably the safest as it actually has unique content. most newspaper publishers just rehash feeds.

By: Peter

Peter — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 20:24:44 +0000

I hear the sounds of people digging their own graves. So silly, so unnecessary, Lemmings rushing to build barriers to prevent viewers accessing pages on which advertisers would be / are willing to advertise. My, oh my, oh my!

My opinion of the M&G just dropped, a LOT.

By: Gordon Parkin

Gordon Parkin — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 13:42:02 +0000

Why, why, why? Surely Trevor and Rupert must realise that Advertisers buy space based on audience reach and segmentation. The more barriers to entry there are for the reader the less likely the uptake. Cost is a major factor in today’s economic climate, as is perceived value. Let’s put it this way; if I can search on Google for the latest news from all round the world, why would I want to subscribe to a single newspaper with one view of the news? Online news sites need to think ‘clever’ with potential advertisers to ADD VALUE and UTILITY to the site that makes viewing the content more rewarding. If profiling was used properly then these news sites could offer a more personalised news view and relevant advertising offers, rather than offer “Big promises”, tailor “Intimate Gratitude”.
What News Corp is proposing amounts to pure unadulterated profiteering with no tangible value to the reader. It cost significantly less to run a syndicated web news site than it does to run a print press media so Mr. Murdoch can’t claim that his pay wall is because he can’t afford to run the site.
But look, if News Corp and M&G want to become things of the past then let them go ahead with their ‘pay wall’. In the words of retired USA General Shinsenki: “If you don’t like change you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”

By: um

um — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 10:12:31 +0000

eTV is free. They manage to pay reporters and crew. The idea that nothing is free is stupid, somethings just have different business models and revenue streams.

By: Vincent Maher

Vincent Maher — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 04:18:04 +0000

ROFLMAO – robots.txt

By: Greg

Greg — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 23:07:01 +0000

I’m all for paid content, but everyone needs to decide on a way forward together. I’d love to pay say a reasonable fee of R100/month to never see another ad and be able to see all the content on the internet without restriction. I understand creating content is expensive, and that there have to be two sides to the internet – one for cheap/free crap created by amateur bloggers and suchlike, and one for quality content that needs funds to create, investigate and distill.

By: Caminsk

Caminsk — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 16:15:53 +0000

I can’t wait for Murdoch to start charging us to read his biased information. At the long road he would be doing all of us a big favor. Also, newspaper were important because they monopolized on mass printing, the widespread of internet will put an end to mass publishing so anyone can really publish anything. Why would you need a journalist when you can reach the sources yourself?

On the other hand , I agree that content could be costly and many people are willing to pay to read a newspaper online, but the only constant is change and as the flow of information turns into something so widespread why would anyone want to pay for information anyway? and to tell the general public that maintaining an online newspaper is as costly as maintaining a paper based newspaper is a big lie.

By: Andre

Andre — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 14:50:25 +0000

I don’t think Trevor Ncube or Rupert Murdoch. I am not surprised that Murdoch does not get it, but I am surprised at Trevor. Google is not a newspaper. It gets content from websites, content that the newspapers put online, and now they are cross at Google.

Google brings people to the websites at no cost to the newspapers. People who want to read articles of interest. As soon as they put up pay walls, people will go and look somewhere else for content. I will, for example, not go and search for news on a website that is blocking certain content. I want a free and open Internet. I will never pay for news content online, there are just too many other sources of news.