3 ms·

You're thinking about it wrong. 1. People have short attention spans 2. Aggregators provide easy access to summaries of news 3. People read the summary on th

You're thinking about it wrong. 1. People have short attention spans 2. Aggregators provide easy access to summaries of news 3. People read the summary on the aggregator and never visit publisher site, let alone subscribe to the publisher. 4. High quality news will cease to exist because no one pays or even looks at it's ads 5. Australian people have good reason to want high quality news to exist without the current tragedy of the commons 6. Therefore news needs to be subsidized by the government 7. What better way to subsidize than by forcing the aggregators that have sucked all the value up to pay publishers?

deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
ahepp 6y ago
How is the comment you replied to "thinking about it wrong"? It sounds like you simply disagree on the point in question (whether aggregators provide value, or leech it). And it seems like the parent comment makes a bulletproof argument, while you're simply stating "I think it's the other way" If what you're saying is true, the Australian government should have rejoiced at the departure of Facebook. The fact that they went back to the negotiating table suggests otherwise.
- colinmhayes 6y ago
  Aggregators provide value to consumers and leech it from content creators, I don't see how that is contradictory. They are overall value creators. The OP and most others in this thread are trying to think about this as a consensual business transaction when it's actually just a tax on the externality that is created by the tragedy of the commons that aggregators use.
dane-pgp 6y ago
> 3. People read the summary on the aggregator and never visit publisher site, let alone subscribe to the publisher. > 4. High quality news will cease to exist because no one pays or even looks at it's ads If everyone is happy to read just the summary, then why don't news publishers produce only summaries? That would be cheaper for them, and it would also make it unambiguous that Facebook hosting the summary on (or in) their pages would be copyright infringement. I suspect the situation is more complicated than the way you want us to think about it.
- colinmhayes 6y ago
  Many do produce only summaries. There's little value in it since your content will immediately repurposed by every other site since it's too short to be unique. You can't copyright facts after all. I think everyone can agree that such a race to the bottom isn't sustainable, eventually no one will create the original article since the summarizers just steal it for no cost.
undecisive 6y ago
The problem with human beings is we are all different. Half the people might want (and need) summary-only content. But many people do not trust the editorial spin that most news outlets put on their summaries. I agree to some extent that a subsidized news media has value (though this needs to be entirely divorced from any kind of control, because even if the government tries to be hands-off with it, if there is even the possible threat of pulling funds, the news outlets start pulling their punches and failing to hold the government to account. Governments are very bad at this, and benefit greatly from doing this badly) The way the current system works though, and I think what you are saying is, currently those summary-only people are being subsidised by those who are willing to read the full articles (and endure the adverts) This in itself provides incentives for the publishers to provide low-quality summaries (think clickbait, but many other techniques exist) to force users into their site. For those who cannot deal with the full articles (e.g. eyesight impaired, language barriers and attention deficit), this puts them at a disadvantage, and leaves them more susceptible to misinformation and half-stories. Aggregators, on the other hand, provide competition, which may be enough to ensure some baseline quality. So I agree that the route you are proposing has merit; but also there is danger in it, and unless the government is going to stipulate fees that are commercially viable for the likes of Google, the net damage outweighs the gains. Also, I've not seen anything that tells me this is what the government are doing or that it is even part of their game-plan. But then, maybe it's just not included in the summaries?

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

ahepp 6y ago

How is the comment you replied to "thinking about it wrong"? It sounds like you simply disagree on the point in question (whether aggregators provide value, or leech it). And it seems like the parent comment makes a bulletproof argument, while you're simply stating "I think it's the other way" If what you're saying is true, the Australian government should have rejoiced at the departure of Facebook. The fact that they went back to the negotiating table suggests otherwise.

colinmhayes 6y ago
Aggregators provide value to consumers and leech it from content creators, I don't see how that is contradictory. They are overall value creators. The OP and most others in this thread are trying to think about this as a consensual business transaction when it's actually just a tax on the externality that is created by the tragedy of the commons that aggregators use.

dane-pgp 6y ago

> 3. People read the summary on the aggregator and never visit publisher site, let alone subscribe to the publisher. > 4. High quality news will cease to exist because no one pays or even looks at it's ads If everyone is happy to read just the summary, then why don't news publishers produce only summaries? That would be cheaper for them, and it would also make it unambiguous that Facebook hosting the summary on (or in) their pages would be copyright infringement. I suspect the situation is more complicated than the way you want us to think about it.

colinmhayes 6y ago
Many do produce only summaries. There's little value in it since your content will immediately repurposed by every other site since it's too short to be unique. You can't copyright facts after all. I think everyone can agree that such a race to the bottom isn't sustainable, eventually no one will create the original article since the summarizers just steal it for no cost.

undecisive 6y ago

The problem with human beings is we are all different. Half the people might want (and need) summary-only content. But many people do not trust the editorial spin that most news outlets put on their summaries. I agree to some extent that a subsidized news media has value (though this needs to be entirely divorced from any kind of control, because even if the government tries to be hands-off with it, if there is even the possible threat of pulling funds, the news outlets start pulling their punches and failing to hold the government to account. Governments are very bad at this, and benefit greatly from doing this badly) The way the current system works though, and I think what you are saying is, currently those summary-only people are being subsidised by those who are willing to read the full articles (and endure the adverts) This in itself provides incentives for the publishers to provide low-quality summaries (think clickbait, but many other techniques exist) to force users into their site. For those who cannot deal with the full articles (e.g. eyesight impaired, language barriers and attention deficit), this puts them at a disadvantage, and leaves them more susceptible to misinformation and half-stories. Aggregators, on the other hand, provide competition, which may be enough to ensure some baseline quality. So I agree that the route you are proposing has merit; but also there is danger in it, and unless the government is going to stipulate fees that are commercially viable for the likes of Google, the net damage outweighs the gains. Also, I've not seen anything that tells me this is what the government are doing or that it is even part of their game-plan. But then, maybe it's just not included in the summaries?