I almost feel bad for subscription news companies (formally known as newspapers).
Talk about death by a thousand cuts…
According to The Atlantic, “Between 2000 and 2015, print newspaper advertising revenue fell from about $60 billion to about $20 billion, wiping out the gains of the previous 50 years.”
But the revenue destruction is only half the story…
The demise of print media has also served to erode society.
America’s skilled workforce of journalists has been replaced by Twitter/Facebook troglodytes. And somewhere within that perverse transition, we lost sight of the truth.
Will we ever find truth again?
Let’s start with a half-truth…
Google (GOOGL) suddenly seems keen on saving the beleaguered newspaper industry.
Weird, right? Google says that it’s reversing a decade-old policy that forces publishers to offer free web content in order to get primo search-engine listings.
But before you start nibbling on shares of The New York Times Cos. (NYSE: NYT) or Time Inc. (NYSE: TIME)…
Let’s unpack the timing of Google’s odd decision and then I’ll determine whether or not it’s worthy of an investment.
The Fake News Dilemma
With great power comes great responsibility.
And Google, as the world’s undisputed leader in web search, wields quite a bit of power.
As Louis notes above, Google has forced publishers of news content to offer readers several free articles to be included in its popular Search or News apps — even if they have a paywall.
This policy made a wealth of free information available to the world, and generated a flood of traffic for Google.
But it also led to the demise of hundreds — if not thousands — of reputable news organizations who bore the expense of producing Google’s subsidized “free news.”
So why after all these years would it reverse the policy?
