 |
| LA Times Loses It Over Google |
 |
The Times completely lost it over this:
But Google now is doing yet another thing that's bound to get under journalists' skin. This month, it announced plans to let people and organizations comment on the stories written about them. For example, if The Times ran another exposé on conflicts of interest within the Food and Drug Administration's drug-approval process, Google News would provide a forum for the FDA and any researchers or drug manufacturers implicated in the story to respond, unedited.Good grief. People being allowed to comment on the stories that focus on their lives, organizations being permitted to respond to articles about their practices. The horror, the horror.
Robert Niles plays deconstructionist with the Times' editorial, in his commentary piece at USC Annenberg's Online Journalism Review:
Goodness, we wouldn't want the sources in our stories to have a chance to respond, would we? /sarcasm The feature implies that the stories aggregated by Google News are incomplete -- possibly because of limited space, but also possibly because of bias, neglect or ignorance. News organizations have their flaws, and the added comments on Google may demonstrate that. Finally, a point of agreement. Reader comments on online news stories give readers the opportunity to provide a needed check on reporting flaws. No journalist should ever presume that a single news article ever is complete.Niles makes a basic but important point. Any given story, no matter how well researched or sourced, may be incomplete. Good work can bear scrutiny, and bad work needs it. Too bad the Times doesn't allow comments on its stories and opinions. To paraphrase Jack Nicholson, they can't handle the truth.
Retailers Panic Over Google Site SearchGoogle News Played by Foreign Sources?Beating The Unbeatable GoogleGoogle Labeled An "Evil Goliath"Google China Trying Alternative Homepage DesignsGoogle - Soft on Privacy?Google News Slow To Reinstate UN CriticEarthquake In China Unnoticed By Google?Google Could Get Content License In ChinaGoogle Considers Networking With News Corp, NBC
Comments
L.A.Times Lost it
How dare those people we (LA Timea) smear respond in their defense! and how can evil Google give them a forum!!
The L.A. Times reaction and attitude does not surprise me given their lack of ethics
and professionalism. What can you expect from a leftist publication? Arrogance, among many other nasty traits. Did you read about the New York Times illegaly
"editing" facts in Wikipedia to further their leftist agenda?
from china ,the same discuss
from china ,the same discuss。这个周末，《洛杉矶时报》的一则评论文章再次将Google news刚刚推出的新闻评论内容推向了讨论的焦点。很凑巧，刚刚过去的一周里，我、郑昀、郑治、方军，还有IwfWcf，也进行了一场类似的讨论。我前后看了下，发现，其实我们讨论的本质是一个问题，就是如何去发现新闻聚合的价值，当然，这是我总结的，有不同意见，希望大家给我补充。
http://www.caozenghui.cn/?p=210
Is Google Stealing?
While the commenting feature may indeed be quite useful is it right for Google to use content generated and paid for by others any way it sees fit? It's one thing to generate search results (which ultimately send users to the individual sites and help Google build its search, advertising and portal business). It's quite another to use that content to create whole new products and services; services that rip off the content from others and move the center of gravity away from the content providers and undercut their content business.
While some may be excited to take down big media a notch and for the potential for new checks on the power of the media, there are broader implications and risks over the medium and long term. And questions of fairness and property and copyright as well.
Post new comment