Answer Guy Central

If you’re one of those “The Internet and Information Should Be Free” people, you probably don’t much care for the Wall Street Journal. The House that Rupert Murdoch Re-Built is one of the few places on the Internet where content has been pay-only since day one and has managed to thrive that way.

I admire Mr. Murdoch’s resolve, and his ability to make money where most others have failed, even if I believe he’s way off the mark in the way he goes about things.

But I more admire the management of The New York Times, who have signaled that when they start charging for access to their content sometime next year that they’ll not be roping off articles from their newspaper against bloggers and other outside links.

Personally, I’m relieved. There are quite a few links on the Answer Guy Central web site that point to articles from the New York Times, and I was worried that we’d have to either live with a lot of bad information here or go back and re-do lots of our content. Neither was looking like fun, and knowing that our existing content will be safe is a load off my mind.

And I’m happy to see that in Mr. Murdoch’s world the idea that “news is news” has trumped competitive silliness; the link I gave you above explaining the decision that The Times has made is to a story from the Wall Street Journal . . . or at least a blog by one of its reporters.

But the questions about information being “free” and what that means in the Internet era remain unanswered. Information IS free; what isn’t free is the way information gets arranged. So for example, when you hear that disclaimer about “unauthorized use of the pictures, descriptions and accounts of this game without the express written consent of . . .” on just about any broadcast sporting event, you’re perfectly safe describing what you saw. What’s protected is the actual broadcast, not the events being broadcast.

The only possible justification for wanting to lock down your information-based web site comes from a belief that what you provide is so unique that it deserves to be paid for. The New York Times is being very smart; their stories aren’t unique and so linking to them should be allowed. What’s unique—if anything—is the arrangement as the New York Times.

Sometimes business change is knowing what not to change. Good job, New York Times.

Newspapers and others in the media have all but killed themselves—and their businesses—trying to figure out how to manage business change in the era of the Internet. It’s a huge problem getting people to pay for something they can lay their hands on for free, and most outlets have given away access to their content in the name of building on-line followings.

News Corporation, run with an iron fist by Rupert Murdoch, has been the most successful in getting paid for their content. While many of their properties (Fox Television and The New York Post, to name two) are available free in one form or another, Murdoch’s crown jewel, The Wall Street Journal, has steadfastly remained a pay-to-read publication, even on line. And Mr. Murdoch has made more than a bit of noise about how he’s going to find ways to keep separating us from our money if we want to read his stuff. Back in November he said that Amazon’s Kindle would be his weapon.

He lied.

Rupert Murdoch is putting his eggs in the Apple iPad basket.When the iPad becomes available in the next couple of weeks, one of the things you’ll be able to do with it is buy a subscription to WSJ, at a cost of $17.99 per month. This is either a great deal, a terrible one, or one that’s just plain unconscionable.

It’s a great deal compared to the print version, since having the Wall Street Journal delivered costs $349 annually, or a bit over $29 per month. It’s a terrible deal compared to reading it on the Internet (hmm . . . like, through the browser built into the iPad?), which costs less than $10 per month. The part that deserves attention, though, is the unconscionable issue.

Why do I have to pay you more to read something I’ve already subscribed to on another platform?

I can accept that if I subscribe to the print version I need to pay extra for the online version, because at some level you’re spending extra money to make it available to me that way (OK, that’s a stretch, but I’m trying to see all sides). And if you’re a print subscriber to WSJ, the on-line price does get discounted a bit.

So what’s the rationale for charging more to read it specifically on an iPad?

Once again, because News Corp has spent money creating an iPad application, there is a cost that needs to be recouped. Of course, that’s a fixed cost, so charging subscribers every month seems a little off. And if there’s some extra value delivered in the iPad application that isn’t available in the regular on-line version of WSJ, then maybe (maybe) there’s a rationale there. But if that extra value is “you get to see exactly the same thing on your big beautiful iPad screen that you would see in the print version” (umm . . . including all the advertisements), then there’s no value-add.

Then there’s the scary part of  technology: remember what I said about being able to bypass this matter altogether and just read the on-line version of WSJ through the iPad browser? It would be simple for WSJ to block that ability, since they see browser you are using when you visit their web site. “Using an iPad? No reading the regular on-line version of WSJ you’ve already paid for!”

Business Change is for everyone. Media companies, newspapers, and the like need to get paid. But Rupert, setting limits on your subscribers instead of giving them options just isn’t the way to go.

Let’s hope Mr. Murdoch, News Corp, and WSJ figure that out.

Or at least it could be.

So remember Rupert Murdoch’s insistence that Google pay him for access to News Corp’s on-line content? Remember the rumor that Murdoch’s News Corp would do a deal with Microsoft Bing to have only that search engine “see” his stuff? Here comes the next bomb. And while it looks like pretty much nothing at the moment, get ready for the explosion.

Working with The New York Times and The Washington Post, Google is now testing Living Stories. At the moment there’s really nothing there to get excited about, and honestly I’m not sure of the number of people who will ever care about a string of stories about one topic (unless that topic is Tiger Wood’s extramarital activities, of course). But Google Living Stories matters, because it points to real collaboration between Google and the newspapers that both need Google to keep them alive and hate Google for making their content ubiquitous.

And that’s the business change lesson of the day: sometimes baby steps add up to something, and having Google and two of his chief competitors talking and working together will force Mr. Murdoch’s hand. The movement itself is the reward here, and search engines, newspapers, and consumers will all win.

What are you doing to change your business?

Did you enjoy your weekend?  How much time did you spend speculating on what really happened at Tiger Woods’ house?

Is Mrs. Woods all upset about Tiger’s supposed extra-marital activities, and did she smash out the back window of his SUV in a rage, or was she rescuing him after he hit that fire hydrant? I DON’T CARE.

But I do care about this: the reporting on this issue was all over the map. Some of it was well put together, others a mess hurried to press with an eye toward speed at the expense of accuracy or thought. And the delineating line wasn’t traditional press versus blog; inconsistency and inaccuracy were everywhere.

This is happening repeatedly, and if you don’t figure out how to integrate that reality into the way you manage business change you’re going to get in trouble. We’re seeing it in the way Rupert Murdoch‘s might-or-might-not-be-happening negotiations with Microsoft and Bing are going; will deals between media outlets and search engines control what you see and where, moving forward? Almost certainly, but stay tuned for how.

People pay us for business advice, and I’d like to think they get their money’s worth and then some. Well here’s a simple one I’ve been tossing about for years. In analyzing your choices, ALWAYS remember this:

Good, Fast, Cheap; Pick Any Two

Rupert Murdoch has been sounding pretty stupid for the last year or so, talking ad nauseum about how the Internet can be overcome and we can all be forced to pay for the content we consume.

Uh-oh. I think he might be right.

The lord of Newscorp is looking at Amazon’s Kindle book reader and thinking he finally has the business change model to get back the revenue that his print outlets have been losing, and even add new revenue for broadcast. Here’s how it will work: As we all start using “devices” (Kindle, advanced mobile phones, whatever), we also learn to add content to them. It’s true; I have more media streaming into my Droid then I ever read simply because “there’s an app for that”.

Well, what if the apps that show content required subscriptions? And what if the folks who create that content simply stop putting their content on-line in places where search engines like Google can find them? Bang. Newspapers get subscribed to again, and even previously-free TV outlets can create viewership revenue.

I was beginning to think that Mr. Murdoch was a dinosaur. I’ve changed my mind. And you’re about to change the way you use the internet. Get your strategy together, now.

By the way: the part of the interview where he talks about this topic starts at about 1:50 of the video.