International Publishers = Eric Cartman
International Publishers Demand New Intellectual Property Rights Protection to Safeguard the Future of Journalism
Newspaper owners just don’t get it. They see their content indexed and linked on search engines, and they despair that they aren’t getting paid – for what for the ‘privilege’ of being linked?
The creation of news content costs money, paying reporters, photographers, press operators and delivery drivers is not free. It costs a lot – I would certainly not deny a living wage to any worker in the newspaper industry, just as I wouldn’t deny a living wage to the owner of a ‘record store’. By the way – do you have any small independent ‘record stores’ left in your town? Maybe and if they’re smart they are now selling vinyl (again).
This goes back to a point made in an earlier post – print must do what it does best, give people something they can’t get online, give people something they can’t get from anywhere other than print -produce high quality print with content that people will pay for. Give them permanence.
Most “news” is not worthy of permanence, unless it impacts you directly. I can walk down the street and see copies of yesterdays newspapers in recycle bins – yesterday; that paper was maybe ‘worth’ a dollar, today it’s garbage or a toilet for a puppy.
The declaration by the International publishers reminds me of Eric Cartman – when Eric gets frustrated with what his friends are doing he says, “Screw you guys, I’m going home.” After awhile, he comes back to play as he realizes – “Well this is the only game in town, if I walk away from them, I’m walking into isolation.”
Goggle responded to the publishers:
“Webmasters who do not wish their sites to be indexed can and do use the following two lines to deny permission:
User-agent: *
Disallow: /If a webmaster wants to stop us from crawling a specific page, he or she can do so by adding ‘<meta name=”googlebot” content=”noindex”>’ to the page. In short, if you don’t want to show up in Google search results, it doesn’t require more than one or two lines of code.”
If you don’t want to play, you don’t have to. Have fun playing with yourself at home.
The game changed and they didn’t get it. The average daily newspaper has tried to be everything to everyone – sports, recipes, politics, movie reviews, comics, horoscopes – all most likely resized smaller, and filled with more ads. The ‘Paper’ where I live recently cut their physical size and increased the size of their standard font. Many spreads are seventy five percent ads. It’s like reading a children’s book written for retirees.
Some of the statements made by the Chief Executives from both the EPC and the World Association of Newspapers are so ill informed to be laughable:
“The Internet is not our enemy but rather the future of journalism.”
What year is this? What other industries have been realigned due to disruptive technology? Breaking News: The Stone Tool Industry was finally killed off by the Bronze Age.
“We are confident that the representatives of search engines and other aggregators will join us in realizing and opening up the opportunities of the market for legitimate paid content in the Internet.”
Uhh – didn’t you all have paid sites at one point, and dropped that model when you realized people wouldn’t pay?
“Without control over our intellectual property rights, the future of quality journalism is at stake…”
Get over yourself – anyone that posts something online risks having their intellectual property appropriated. As a content creator, do I like that anyone could ‘take’ my photos or writings and do whatever? Well I’m no Cartman – copy away – if you want your stuff totally protected; never put it online, but deal with the fact that if people want your content, they will find a way to get it. Ever use Ctrl-c on you Windows machine or Splat-c on your Mac?
And, I love this one:
“There should be no parts of the Internet where laws do not apply.”
HA HA HA! Whose laws? The laws of North Korea, or the laws created by retrograde Iranian Mullahs? This is more important than Religion, Politics, and Philosophy – this is about Internet money.
With this new declaration, I’m waiting for the publishers to follow the lead of the recording industry and start suing those who download without permission.
Newspaper Lawyer: “Judge, we argue that John Doe illegally read an article on July 18, 2009 about how to get wine stains out of his carpet using club soda. We demand in the interest of quality for pay journalism to be paid $50,000 for this breach of our intellectual property.”
Use Print for Longevity – Forget the daily, focus on the local, get over the popularity of craigslist, use print for what it’s best for: Permanence.
Newspapers go ahead and be Cartman – take your ball and go home, you’ll be back later, but maybe this time you’ll have a ball that isn’t flat.
Video for Ultra Nerd Printers and Photogs – Stochasticity!
For all you imaging nerds out there – you’ll appreciate this video by the Higher Mammals via WNYC Radio. Excellent use of baguettes as graphic elements!