Google and publishers should ‘work together to fulfill the promise of journalism’ company’s CEO says

December 4, 2009

Frustrated newspaper executives are blaming Google for their dwindling revenues, but the facts suggest otherwise, the company’s chairman and CEO Eric Schmidt argues in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece. Schmidt calls Google News a great source of promotion that sends online news publishers a billion clicks a month for free.

The claim that Google makes big profits on the backs of newspapers misrepresents reality, Schmidt says. Addressing the copyright question, he says Google only shows a headline and a couple of lines from each story, and that if readers want to continue they have to click through to the newspaper’s Web site (except for stories that Google hosts through a licensing agreement with news services).

But he concedes that a crisis for newsgathering is not limited to the newspaper industry, and that the flow of accurate information, diverse views and proper analysis is critical for a functioning democracy. He says Google wants to help publishers build bigger audiences and make more money, writing that “we all have to work together to fulfill the promise of journalism in the digital age.”

Google is testing a service called Fast Flip, with the theory that if online articles are easier to read, people will read more of them. News partners would receive the majority of the revenue generated by ads shown beside the stories, Schmidt says. — Greg Beaubien
 

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