Alternative view via Marketshare HitslinkSearch Engine share October 2009 click for large version
News Corp. Weighs an Exclusive Alliance With Bing
By TIM ARANGO and ASHLEE VANCE – November 24, 2009 – New York Times
This is not how business has been done on the World Wide Web.
Microsoft has been in early discussions with the News Corporation, the media conglomerate controlled by Rupert Murdoch, about a pact to pay the News Corporation to remove links to its news content from Google’s search engine and display them exclusively on Bing, from Microsoft, according to a person briefed on the matter who spoke anonymously because of the confidential negotiations.
If such an arrangement came to pass, it would be a watershed moment in the history of the Internet, and set off a fierce debate over the future of content online.
The Web’s explosive growth has been driven, in part, by the open playing field it represents for consumers and businesses. These discussions could encourage major technology and media companies to start picking sides — essentially applying the cable TV model to the Web.
A deal on a large scale would create a new set of barriers for users to navigate and would represent an enormous risk for the News Corporation or any news site. More than 65 percent of all search inquiries in the United States are made on Google, and removing links from there would lead to a big drop in traffic. Bing handles 9.9 percent of domestic searches, according to comScore.
Steven A. Ballmer, the chief executive of Microsoft, said in a recent interview that Google handled about six times as many search queries as Microsoft, and that Google’s search ads generated more revenue per click. But Microsoft executives have been clear about their intentions to pursue bold measures to disrupt Google’s dominant position in the search market.
A broad deal with media companies would be Microsoft’s most drastic measure to date — one in which it would be running a high-stakes experiment against Google, which also has deep pockets.
Rupert Murdoch obviously doesn’t get it, but, perhaps the Murdochian ethos is: “I don’t need to get it.” The basic feature of the ongoing story is that Murdoch believes his content is proprietary, the intertubes ‘be damned.’ Ironically, Murdoch’s News Corp engineers right wing, and, culturally provocative content.
There isn’t a clear statement of a libertarian media philosophy that I know of, but, liberal net neutrality crashes into free market assumptions when it is assumed content and distribution shall partner so as to divide the spoils by implementing gates and gate-keeping.
Among the implicit problems is that it may be very hard to grow your market. The market may be able to be fenced-in. But, then what, Rhupert?
