Having the previous week been asked to research Murdoch and the internet. I googled Rupert Murdoch and coincidentally the first thing that came up was a link to a report on the Guardians web page. The report was explaining Murdoch’s intention to charge for online news and prevent stories being linked to by sites such as Google news. Rupert Murdoch says he will remove stories from Google’s search index as a way to encourage people to pay for content online.
Biz Stone warned that Murdoch “should be looking at it as an opportunity to do something radically different and find out how to make a ton of money out of being radically open rather than some money by being ridiculously closed”. He was joined in his attack by Reid Hoffman, co-founder of networking site LinkedIn, who added: “I am sure that during the transition from horses to automobiles there were some people bemoaning the loss of horse transport.”
This was a discussion which was addressed during the lecture. We spoke about how although record companies have lost a great deal of money due to free downloads over the internet there has been an increase in the numbers of people going to see bands, musicians perform live. There has been a shift in trends and people have to re- think how they go about making their money, in this case the money comes from people attending live shows and buying merchandise. Though is it the same, when you buy a news paper such as the Times or the Guardian, what ever your preference you expect the article you read to be reliable, thought-provoking or at least interesting. The quality of the writing is a particular standard but it cost to have a professional team of reporters and journalists. If these articles are accessed free via the web rather than by people paying for news papers how do we pay for these standards? Which links us to another area of discussion is the internet killing the expert/ professional as a result of mass amateurism. Which again relates back to my opinion on art and the internet. That with such a large number of people being able to accesses, dispute and critique for themselves, then in a way all the information is eventually funneled down until your left with quality. Wikipedia is a good example of this, although some of the content has been found to be incorrect the important thing is that with such a vast number of people being able to view the site any incorrect information will surely be recognised and brought to public attention. Unlike a written encyclopedia which sits on your self Wikipedia is constantly being edited and updated. It is written in stone.
Within the lecture a question emerged wether Murdoch was over-playing how an open system leads to pollution, viruses, tracking, un- reliable information. playing on peoples fears of the internet that its ‘Big but bad’. Fear is a tool, just the other day i watched dispatches it was about the pro-Israel lobby and the speculation over their donations to the CFI (conservative friend of Israel) and the influence the israeli lobby has over Britain. Dispatches spoke about how when the guardian didnt coincide with the other newspapers including, (News of the world, the Mirror) in sympathising with Israel it was deemed anti semitic. Free speak constrained by a fear of offending.
In recent months, Murdoch his lieutenants have stepped up their war of words with Google, accusing it of “kleptomania” and acting as a “parasite” for including News Corp content in its Google News pages. But asked why News Corp executives had not chosen to simply remove their websites entirely from Google’s search indexes – a simple technical operation – Murdoch said just such a move was on the cards.
