Updated August 4th:
FMK pointed out the interview in the Sunday Times with Tony O’Reilly where he wanted to do to content thieves what the record labels did to Napster.
Feargal believes Dr. Sir Tony is aiming for bloggers and for once I agree with Feargal. Loads of “out of touch with reality” quotes from Tony.
“I can see the newspaper industry getting together the same way as the recording industry got together, except in a more effective way,” said O’Reilly. “A journalist’s work is valuable, it needs to be protected.”
Links are also valuable, the more inbound links pointing to your content the more strenght it will have, the more you can leverage it and monetize it, without screwing over people. It makes me think though does Sir Tony figure he can make money from micropayments and microcontent?
Saying that it was his son Gavin who took a swipe at another form of New Media – Participative Journalism.
“I think participative journalism is a dangerous precedent for our
industry. People forget that newspapers have always been an interactive
medium, people have always been able to interact with us through the
mailbag.
Like father like son?
But back to Sir Tony, he took a dig at bloggers too when denying Newspapers were on the decline, which would reinforce what Feargal said about him gunning for bloggers stealing his content:
“It is a sunrise industry,” said O’Reilly. “Newspapers are tactile, hugely cheap, reliable, go with a cup of coffee. You can trust newspaper writers. Can you trust a blogger?” O’Reilly said that the newspaper industry would also challenge the rise of the internet as an advertising medium. A whole range of goods would not be congenial to be advertised “on a PC”, he said.
Oh my. Compare him to Murdoch. Who’ll be around in ten years time? O’Reilly and Son or Murdoch and Family?
Other Blogs on this:
FeckOff.net – Hey Tony, lay off the crack pipe
Mark on Stuff – Damien Mulley picks two bad horses.
Dick O’Brien weighs in and expands on this with some very clever analysis. Hi Dick! He also gives his thoughts on setting up EFF Ireland