RSSMicrosoft's IP chief: 'Information wants to be free' is a 'disaster'
By Scott M. Fulton, III | Published November 20, 2008, 1:54 PM
Blasting Google as, if not the perpetrator, then certainly the beneficiary of the failure of the online content industry, Microsoft's chief IP attorney called upon British publishers to bring about change they can believe in.
In a clear contrast of his company's position on business models and strategies for content providers against those of Google, Microsoft's chief intellectual property attorney Thomas Rubin this morning, in a speech before the UK Association of Online Publishers transcribed by Microsoft, called on online publishers to find fair prices for their content. This instead of continuing the policy of giving content away for free, in hopes that a fair business model will eventually congeal itself into existence, around advertising or some other subsidiary platform.
"Today we are still searching for healthy symbiosis between newspapers and new technology," Rubin told the group. "And symbiosis it must be, for journalism and digital consumption are forevermore inextricably linked. As for that symbiosis, the open question is what form it will take. In biological terms, will the relationship be one of mutualism or of parasitism?"
As an example of parasitism, Rubin cited Google News, which the vice president in charge of that project, Marissa Mayer, estimated last July is responsible for $100 million in annual revenue for Google. In a speech that month, Mayer said that the same business model which exhumes monetization from places online publishers appear to have ignored, could also be applied to monetization from making users' medical records searchable.
"Clearly this can't be the future for publishing," proclaimed Rubin in response. "So how do we move forward? To start with, I agree with Arthur Sulzberger of The New York Times when he says that we should reject the 'apocalypse now, tomorrow and forever' view of new media. I believe publishers can create viable business models online that sustain the integrity of their trusted brands, maintain a free and competitive marketplace, and continue to nurture the creation of quality content."
It was a mistake for newspapers during the 1990s, Rubin contended, to adopt the model of giving away content and monetizing it through advertising -- a model which he said had been created by "Internet pundits," not businesspeople. "By the late 1990s, almost all newspapers put their valuable reporting and exclusive commentary online and allowed it to proliferate, easily accessible and free," he told the Association. "They did just as the new model professed and sold advertising to monetize the increased audience they were attracting. Well, here we are ten years later bombarded almost daily by announcements of newspaper layoffs and closures. The evidence is in, and I think we can safely say that the 'information wants to be free' approach not only does not work, actually it has been a disaster for almost all newspapers."
Despite the widespread and mounting evidence of that failure, he said, Google continues to urge content publishers to embrace the inherent freedom behind that model -- this while simultaneously espousing the virtues of finding revenue from content its publishers neglected.
Rubin then himself embraced a presently popular mantra, "Change Can Happen" -- giving full attribution to Pres.-Elect Obama -- in imploring publishers to coalesce behind what he described as more socially responsible models for content publishing. Such models would utilize technology to filter out infringing content, respect copyright, and give proper attribution to whom an idea belongs. It would also filter out false content, such as the report that United Air Lines recently filed for bankruptcy and the one stating Apple CEO Steve Jobs suffered a heart attack -- stories that had been propagated through Google News without filtering.
"The lesson here is obvious, not just to all of you in this room but to your vast audiences: Amateurs and algorithms are no substitute for reporters and editors. Time and again, readers keep telling us who they trust. In times of crisis especially, they race towards quality journalism."
Rubin went on to site Automated Content Access Protocol, a project to develop a centralized permissions storehouse for the Internet's wealth of content, as an example of a collaborative effort brought about by publishers working together for their mutual benefit, to establish a modern technological system that can support a more viable business model.
"In closing, don't let anyone tell you that the choice is between Luddite resistance to new technology and passive acquiescence to the destruction of your industry," remarked Microsoft's Rubin. "In other words, quality content is of great value and it is time to reclaim what is yours. The stakes here are high. Remember that, in a very real sense, we are all in this together as stewards of our cultural future. So let's finally turn the page on a failed model that has not worked for reporters and editors and publishers. Let's instead work together to build a model that works for newspapers and technology alike, and that sustains and enriches the free and vibrant media that our free societies require."
Every company in every field wants it's suppliers to give away their products for free. Google has convinced the suckers to do so.
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|Wow, what a revelation. Getting paid for your labor! Is this a new concept for online content? Free information is information the creators acknowledge can be distributed freely. If I have invested in an area of expertise and am making a living from it why should it be free? Why do I pay for clothes that advertise a brand? Shouldn't they be free?
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|"Why do I pay for clothes that advertise a brand? Shouldn't they be free? "
I have been cutting off the Levi tags since I was kid. In the early 60's. No it shouldn't be free. They have to pay me to use my a** for advertising. It's you people giving away a free billboard that saves them from paying.
Athletes get paid to have Nike or Addidas on their apparel.
Of course there is another way to look at it.
In a society of scarcity payment is a way to prioritize or control resources. In a society without scarcity it becomes hard to charge for what isn't scarce. Which half the reason Betanews is free. The other half is that its not professional(no sign of an editor for instance). Even in a society of plenty, such the Internet Geek culture, there still remains both quality and crap.
This site needs more quality and less crap.
Perhaps they should pay me.
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|On the point about Google, here is a company which constantly pushes a "soft and fluffy" approach to all, its the white knight and so on.. actually its not so white as it appears.
Google is trying to monopolise the net thats a fact , its the 1990 version of Microsoft.. as Monopoly
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|Rubin is suggesting that the newspaper industry should do what the music industry did. The "Big 5" met behind closed doors and agreed they would not compete with one another on price. They all agreed on a price to charge their customers (price fixing) and were on their way. Nice solution Rubin.
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|So, essentially, if Google Docs et al. remain free and open source, then Microsoft itself can't charge for its online Office fare, thus losing money and users.
Sorry Microsoft, but webware not only drastically reduces the importance of the OS, but ironically, affirms GNU/Linux for the very reasons you've always been at war with it: (1) it's free, and (2) can do what Windows never will be able to do -- harness hacker talent around the world (and from the world's biggest corporations).
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|So, has Linux taken over the desktop yet? ;-))
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|I agree with you.
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|Linux is making progress every day. As Moneysoft keeps going backward in software development. They have begun focusing more and more on making more and more and less on making a quality product. They THOUGHT they could just MAKE people use their POS Vista, they have learned it doesn't work like that.
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|Its going to happen any day now (says fanboy from 10 years ago)
Until there is no need to ever use sudo this and aptget this, it will continue to go nowhere.
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|It doesn't have to. Going to sacrifice yourself to Micro$oft to prove your "faith"?
America is the last so-called "superpower" That hasn't gotten it much to speak of..... Quality of life is higher elsewhere.
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|When was the last time you used it?
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|Depends on how you define it.
We don't have social health-care, but our healthcare is *better*. (why do you think they all come here for the serious stuff?)
We get docked on that.
More of our citizens are in "poverty", but our "poverty" levels (in terms of income) are the highest in the world. Our poor make more than yours do in terms of net benefit (welfare, medial/social support, and income).
But we get docked on that.
Funny how you guys get to wait 3 months to see a dentist. We get to go in the next day. :)
I'll take that over your "quality" life any day.
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|I don't know the ultimate answer or whether there is one. I just keep thinking about what if Einstein had copyrighted E=mc^2?
Why is it that the Internet struggles with business models, but astronomy is for everyone? Should I try selling Moon rocks?
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|Yup, and have you heard, the robust little print server that could has OpenOffice now!
So who says they lack apps?
LOL!
But hey, not so fast, after 15 years of development they almost have the Windows interface down! LOL!
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|The answer is 42
http://www.google.dk/sea...universe+and+everything
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|Hey aren't you that fellow working the register at Toys R Us the other day that said something about how no one uses Linux to me while I was looking at the those little Linux computers they were selling there? I thought it was strange what he said because if no one uses it then why do I see it on sale at Toys R Us, Target, and Walmart? Someone must use it, don't you think?
Is it hard? What's sudo, is that like the UAC thing in my Vista? I googled aptget but all I could find was something about something called synaptic and it said that it had over 10,000 software packages to download and install with one click, do we have this for my Vista? I may have to go get one of these little computers at Toys R Us, it looked pretty cool!
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|The little computer at Toys R Us looked really easy. I played with it for 15 minutes or so and I didn't see anything on it that was hard to use. What do you mean that it's almost Windows? Is it supposed to look like Vista?
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|Linux is made by people that work on what they are interested in. That covers about 90% of an operating system. The last 10% is boring, tedious and necessary which is why Linux is primarily used by Geeks. Its never finished to the needs of the washed(as opposed to the unwashed programmer on a 24 hour coding binge). The free nature of Linux makes it bloody hard to make a buck which destroys the incentive to finish the job.
I don't think MS thought they could ram Vista down peoples throats. They KNEW they could force it on the builders. They knew they had to get the thing out the door.
Its not they spent too little time on a new operating system. Its that they spent too many years between changes. Both MS and the consumers have lost track of how much trouble there was with XP. Its worse that MS lost track than the consumers as that led to mistakes. There is the possibility that MS has learned from this.
Sure hope so.
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