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Let's stop trying to pick a side here... Maybe it's more of a symbiotic relationship. Google gets a useful news page, the news media get links to their articles

Let's stop trying to pick a side here... Maybe it's more of a symbiotic relationship. Google gets a useful news page, the news media get links to their articles. I honestly could care less about either of them. I think they should just fight it out on their own and keep our legal system and tax payers time and money out of it.

unclebucknasty 3y ago
>Let's stop trying to pick a side here... Maybe it's more of a symbiotic relationship. There's definitely some symbiosis here, but it's ultimately Google that's dependent on the news (and other) sites' content, which it gets for free. That is, the news sites (and other content providers) could exist without Google. But, Google could not exist without their content. At least that's my observation. So, I wasn't picking a side as much as earnestly asking how OP concluded that its the news sites wanting something free from Google versus the other way around.
- whycome 3y ago
  Those sites rely on sites like Facebook and Google linking to their content to lead readers in. With the ban on Canada their public campaign has made that obvious.
  - unclebucknasty 3y ago
    >Those sites rely on sites like Facebook and Google linking to their content to lead readers in Of course, that's the way it is. But, is it a good thing that they've intermediated all of the world's content? It's easy to argue that the problem is exactly that a relative handful of sites have a monopoly on traffic and, what's more, they've gained that monopoly for free.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- jjackson5324 3y ago
  > At least that's my observation 30 seconds of serious thought would tell you that your observation is wrong. Again, a news organization can just change their robots.txt to block google from indexing their site. They don't do that because that would instantly kill all their search traffic... and most likely kill their business. If CNN changed their robots.txt to stop being indexed by Google, Google would literally lose 0 users. > I wasn't picking a side as much as earnestly asking how OP concluded that its the news sites wanting something free from Google versus the other way around. It's been explained to you several times. Instead you're more interested in acting self-righteous (it's honestly pretty cringeworthy).
  - unclebucknasty 3y ago
    >30 seconds of serious thought would tell you that your observation is wrong. Or, maybe I just have a different opinion. >news organization can just change their robots.txt to block google from indexing their site You don't seem to have thought beyond this superficial robots.txt "solution". Yes, we all know that option is available. But, as I've self-righteously offered for consideration, Google is one of a few sites that essentially monopolizes traffic generation, so they've positioned themselves to make it untenable for sites to block Google's crawling (and free monetization) of their content. Cory Doctorow has (another) recent Twitter thread on how tech monopolies have grown virtually unchecked and now abuse the ecosystems in which they operate, increasingly clawing back more value for themselves at the expense of others. IMO this fits the pattern. Look it up. You might find it interesting. Or not. >They don't do that because that would instantly kill all their search traffic...and most likely kill their business. And there you've just stated exactly the problem I'm referencing, with apparently zero awareness of how someone could find it problematic. I mean, you just said "they could solve the problem by blocking Google via robots.txt, but that would kill their business". So, not exactly a solution then, right? It's baffling that you can say this but still angrily scream that "It's robots.txt! Case closed!" >It's been explained to you several times. Instead you're more interested in acting self-righteous (it's honestly pretty cringeworthy). You clearly don't hear yourself. Calm down. EDIT: out of curiosity, I just took a quick look at your recent comments to others. One of the first to pop up was this: >What are you even talking about? That's not how SEO works in the slightest....? Lol am I still reading HN or is this Reddit? Yeah, no self-righteous cringe there.
lupire 3y ago
Do you feel the same way about keeping the legal system out of it when someone defrauds or steals from you?

unclebucknasty 3y ago

>Let's stop trying to pick a side here... Maybe it's more of a symbiotic relationship. There's definitely some symbiosis here, but it's ultimately Google that's dependent on the news (and other) sites' content, which it gets for free. That is, the news sites (and other content providers) could exist without Google. But, Google could not exist without their content. At least that's my observation. So, I wasn't picking a side as much as earnestly asking how OP concluded that its the news sites wanting something free from Google versus the other way around.

whycome 3y ago
Those sites rely on sites like Facebook and Google linking to their content to lead readers in. With the ban on Canada their public campaign has made that obvious.
- unclebucknasty 3y ago
  >Those sites rely on sites like Facebook and Google linking to their content to lead readers in Of course, that's the way it is. But, is it a good thing that they've intermediated all of the world's content? It's easy to argue that the problem is exactly that a relative handful of sites have a monopoly on traffic and, what's more, they've gained that monopoly for free.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
jjackson5324 3y ago
> At least that's my observation 30 seconds of serious thought would tell you that your observation is wrong. Again, a news organization can just change their robots.txt to block google from indexing their site. They don't do that because that would instantly kill all their search traffic... and most likely kill their business. If CNN changed their robots.txt to stop being indexed by Google, Google would literally lose 0 users. > I wasn't picking a side as much as earnestly asking how OP concluded that its the news sites wanting something free from Google versus the other way around. It's been explained to you several times. Instead you're more interested in acting self-righteous (it's honestly pretty cringeworthy).
- unclebucknasty 3y ago
  >30 seconds of serious thought would tell you that your observation is wrong. Or, maybe I just have a different opinion. >news organization can just change their robots.txt to block google from indexing their site You don't seem to have thought beyond this superficial robots.txt "solution". Yes, we all know that option is available. But, as I've self-righteously offered for consideration, Google is one of a few sites that essentially monopolizes traffic generation, so they've positioned themselves to make it untenable for sites to block Google's crawling (and free monetization) of their content. Cory Doctorow has (another) recent Twitter thread on how tech monopolies have grown virtually unchecked and now abuse the ecosystems in which they operate, increasingly clawing back more value for themselves at the expense of others. IMO this fits the pattern. Look it up. You might find it interesting. Or not. >They don't do that because that would instantly kill all their search traffic...and most likely kill their business. And there you've just stated exactly the problem I'm referencing, with apparently zero awareness of how someone could find it problematic. I mean, you just said "they could solve the problem by blocking Google via robots.txt, but that would kill their business". So, not exactly a solution then, right? It's baffling that you can say this but still angrily scream that "It's robots.txt! Case closed!" >It's been explained to you several times. Instead you're more interested in acting self-righteous (it's honestly pretty cringeworthy). You clearly don't hear yourself. Calm down. EDIT: out of curiosity, I just took a quick look at your recent comments to others. One of the first to pop up was this: >What are you even talking about? That's not how SEO works in the slightest....? Lol am I still reading HN or is this Reddit? Yeah, no self-righteous cringe there.

lupire 3y ago

Do you feel the same way about keeping the legal system out of it when someone defrauds or steals from you?