Yes, news sites are facing a crisis, but aggregators aren't the problem

19 July 2009 | 15:47 - By Stefano Boscutti

Bill Grueskin, Dean of Academic Affairs at Columbia University Journalism School, explains why newspapers should stop blaming aggregators for their problems.

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During the past few weeks, America witnessed a growing movement to rein in, extract money from, or stop altogether the aggregators who are accused of eroding news sites' revenues by quoting from or linking to traditional (and expensive) content. Murdoch (in all his wisdom) is leading the charge to, well, charge for content on his many online news sites. Aside from the ridiculousness of thinking you can put the genie back in the bottle let alone make people pay for it, going backwards is no way to head into the future.  Unless you've got your head up your, well -- you don't want to know.  Grueskin argues it’s easy to get caught up in debates over linking and copyright while missing the bigger issue.  Online revenue that's falling through the floor faster than hell.

http://paidcontent.org/article/419-yes-news-sites-are-facing-a-crisis-but-aggregators-arent-the-problem/

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About this Blog

New New Media looks at how our mediascape is exploding to bits. How the latest technology and the internet are changing the way we live, work and play. How the latest media is shaping us all.

Stefano Boscutti is an executive creative director and strategist. He's like a better looking version of Todd Sampson. He also has an abiding faith that stories and wordplay (and not powerpoint presentations) will change the world.

 
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