Is Google really gate-keeping?

When we were talking about that Google is acting "psuedo-gatekeeping" today in class, an idea came to me. "How scary! Even though I don't want my taste of news be decided by computers, I'm still too lazy to look for news outside Google news!" True, Google is not really setting a gate and block information, but the impact is similar in terms of what users receive eventually.

So I'm getting curious about how great the impact is. If we can pick some stories from a news organization, and see how much Google news contributes in terms of traffic when the story is on Google news, versus when it's not on Google news. I think Google news has turned the competition between news organizations more bloody. If your story doesn't beat all other similar stories, the story will lose most of the traffic from Google news. (If we can track how many users do go to news stories other than the one Google picked, that will be even more interesting because we can really see the difference.)

Anyways, getting stories onto Google news will be important if the revenue comes from traffic. (KXAN has been trying to get its news onto Google news, but ... And Statesman is always there!)

Will Google pay Journalists, too?

For some reason, I think a lot of people try to copy the model of music industry to news industry. True, there are some similarities.
1. Long time ago, people could only paid for it.
2. Not too long ago, people learned how to receive it for free, legally or illegally.
3. Both industries want users, or somebody else, pay for them, and are working on this direction.

The key point might be, it was illegal to download mp3 for free, and it is illegal now. (Most of the case.) But news articles, video, photos are now legally free online. (And you don't even need to search for it, they are just everywhere.)

There for, from downloading illegally to legally, users' utility rised. As long as the price matches the marginal utility, people might pay.

Then how can we add some value to online news, so that users will pay?

Better way of selection and organization? Google does it well, at least a great number of users think so, but Google doesn't care if it gets paid from users.

I'm still think the mp3 downloading example in China. Will Google pay news organizations, too? (Then Sung Woo's topic will be popular!)

Too many newspaper too little profit

For some reason, reading these two articles reminds me of a story about China's economic. This is going to be an awkward analogy, but maybe the revenue of online news is just like China's economic: growing rapidly, but from a very low point.

Will the idea of subscription work? For laptop or PC, I don't think so. Just think of how tedious it will be when you need to login to read any news story that you're interested in. Even though the cookies can be stored in your computer, you still need to login again and again when you switch computer. For example, when you want to use the computer in CMA lobby to check today's news just real quick. Besides, will you really store every login? That's something going to cost you money. Can you really trust everyone who might use your computer?

But for mobile device, I think that's possible. Because the hardware itself can be used as a identification. Actually this is already happening in Japan. Japanese can be said as heavy cellphone users, generally. They can buy almost whatever you can think of with their cellphone. And, most important of all, their system has be so sophisticated that websites can be designed that only certificated cellphone can browse. (In fact this brings a lot of negative effect, say, Internet bullying among teenagers.) Base on this technical reason, I think charging for content on mobile device will work.

However, charging users for content might work on books, music, movie, but I really doubt if that will work on news. I hate to say that, but there are just too many substitute. As long as there is one, even if only one, news organization offers their content for free, users have 100% reason to switch to free content.

Of course you can argue that if one offers news story with higher quality, people will still buy. The problem is, how many people appreciate and will pay for a "better" story? Given the quantity, and the amount they are willing to pay, can the revenue cover the cost of producing better stories?

I think arguing "we have better content" is relatively weak. If the content comes along with better service, then that might be more attractive. This is totally based on personally experience. I'm subscriber of KKBOX, a music content provider. I paid 20 dollars for half year, and I can listen to all the music on their site. I can also download the music, but the downloaded file can only be played in their software.

I've been using this service for 3 years. The reason I started buying it is because their interface saves my effort of organizing files in my computer. If I download private music, I need to create different folders and organize them in a way that I can remember. (Usually I couldn't find them right after I downloaded them.) But if I use this software, I can just do search. And I know a lot of users subscribe base on similar reason. Their content is fine, but we won't subscribe if that's only content.

So what service can newspaper offer? Search function that can help college student finish their final project? Adjust the length of different story base on users taste? I can't really think of many. But I do think news stories should be provided along with better service.

Time to panic? No, it's time to be creative.

For readers outside our class, this is the articles we’re reading this week.,
Maybe it's time to panic
30 Years Till Online Represent 50% of Total Newspaper Revenues

I read the first one, ”maybe it is time to panic.” It’s really long, but I LOVE it! The quote is so awesome, “What can we do that people are willing to spend something to get, even if it’s just time?”

I have a friend who is a crazy fan of Nintendo video games. He once told me that when economic people first began to predict the consumer behavior of entertainment consumption, they made a mistake. They assumed that a household would spend a fix amount of budget on entertainment like watching movies, travel, or buy toys for kids. It turns out that people don’t really spend certain amount every month. Instead, people only begin to think about buying something when they’re attracted. For example, how much does a wii console cost? 250 dollars. That’s not cheap at all. Under the model of setting certain amount of budget over entertainment, only very few household would buy a wii console. However, it’s overwhelmingly successful, because people will buy went it’s thrilling enough. On the other hand, nobody would spend even one cent on a terrible movie, even if he still have money in his wallet. I think news industry nowadays face the same destiny, people either read it, or don’t read it at all.

I know it’s a awkward analogy comparing games to news. But we need to take the young people who use iphone, ipod, pda, or laptop to retrieve news information. Besides reading news stories, what do you think she is doing? I tell you what, she is using gtalk to chat with her friend, checking her email on gmail, a browser shows that somebody just added her on facebook, and there is a small tiny browser hidden below called “NY times.”

This is the way people now retrieve information. We turn on our laptop, check email, face book, and our RSS read. If there are some news titles that we’re interested in, we might open the window. Otherwise, we turn off the laptop, or just linger on facebook.

It’s not as a lot of media thought, that people will put their website on “My Favorite,” and check every day. No way, everybody just bookmark your website and forget it. They will google your company name next time when they think of your newspaper.

The fact is, everything online is trying to get as much attention as possible. Our competitor is not the other news organization, but all the websites online. The amount of audience is unlimited, but their time is. If one spends one more minutes on facebook, he/she is going to spend one minute less on your news story. News stories need to be attractive enough to compete with other online application. It’s hard, but I guess Journalism is never a easy industry.

I hate to say that, but I guess it’s time for media to think about how to please their customer, aka the audience. For a very long time, journalists never thought about pleasing the reader, and took the readers’ appreciation for granted.

The expense may not be the accuracy of news stories, but the length, the size of pictures, or the effort spent on copy-editing. The core value of Journalism can be kept, but the form needs to be changed.

I’m not happy with the fact at all. I jump into this industry because I want to write in-depth news, investigative report, and feature writing. (Well, I’m a good writer in my first language, if you believe.) Now web has pushed everything toward faster, shorter, and easier. Lengthy stories are just too expensive.

Well, I guess as long as we can find creative business model for news industry these costly stories can still run somewhere. But before that, we need to stop complaining, panicking, and be creative.