Chris Hopper’s Post

Google has started blocking news articles for some people in California, the company announced on Friday. Stories from California-based news organizations will not be available for an unspecified number of state residents who use Google to search the web, in a show of its might as Google attempts to quash a proposal it has been fighting for years. It is an approach Google has deployed before in the face of laws forcing the company to pay for journalism. Critics of the tech giant's hardball tactics have compared it to blackmail. In California, the pending law in question would force tech companies like Google and Meta to pay publishers for news content. Supporters say it would offer a lifeline to California's news organizations, which have long been shedding jobs. But Google has been resisting the bill, arguing that being subject to what it calls "a link tax" for connecting California residents with news articles is "unworkable." Google and Meta have developed something of a playbook in response to efforts requiring the tech giant to financially support the ailing news industry. A spokesperson for Meta did not reply to questions about whether it too would begin restricting California news. Previously, Meta had promised to do so. Under the California measure, Google and Meta would have to pay news outlets when the companies sell advertising against news articles. Backers of the bill say it would infuse California's news industry with much-needed support in a moment in which publishers have seen subscriptions and advertising revenue precipitously decline. At least 70% of digital advertising revenue has been collected by Google and Meta, according to Insider Intelligence. The Department of Justice has sued Google over its grip on digital advertising, with federal officials alleging it amassed such power by violating U.S. competition laws. In California, advocates of the bill say Silicon Valley has a responsibility to pay news publishers for the astronomical profits it has reaped from serving people news articles. Big Tech companies have not been the only ones critical of the push. Other skeptics said if a fee for displaying links were applied to the rest of internet, it would break "the open web" by making information less accessible. In a post on X, formerly Twitter, Christina Warren, an outspoken advocate for software engineers, called payments for hyperlinks "obscene," since they are "antithetical to the open web and everything it stands for." Nonetheless, advocates of the bill, which was also introduced last year but did not gain traction, are hoping it advances and reaches Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has not yet weighed in the legislation. ✍️ Bobby Allyn | NPR 📸 Don Ryan/AP

"During the pandemic, some publications found that suspending their paywall had an effect they had not anticipated: It increased subscriptions. The Seattle Times, the paper of record in a city that was an early epicenter of coronavirus, put all of its COVID-related content outside the paywall and then saw, according to its senior vice president of marketing, Kati Erwert, “a very significant increase in digital subscriptions”—two to three times its previous daily averages. The Philadelphia Inquirer put its COVID content outside its paywall in the spring of 2020 as a public service. And then, according to the paper’s director of special projects, Evan Benn, it saw a “higher than usual number of digital subscription sign-ups.” The Tampa Bay Times, The Denver Post, and The St. Paul Pioneer Press, in Minnesota, all experienced similar increases, as did papers operated by the Tribune Publishing Company, including the Chicago Tribune and the Hartford Courant. The new subscribers were readers who appreciated the content and the reporting and wanted to support the paper’s efforts, and to make the coverage free for others to read, too. Good journalism isn’t cheap, but outlets can find creative ways to pay for their reporting on the election. They can enlist foundations or other sponsors to underwrite their work. They can turn to readers who are willing to subscribe, renew their subscriptions, or make added donations to subsidize important coverage during a crucial election. And they can take advantage of the broader audience that unpaywalled stories can reach, using it to generate more advertising revenue—and even more civic-minded subscribers." https://lnkd.in/gkEGjgq8

Help A Reporter is shutting down! This was the gold standard for getting backlinks from the highest authority publishers. I used it to get backlinks from the New York Times, USA Today, CNN, all of these websites. Journalists are writing a story, they need experts, you submit your expert opinion and then they include you and link to your site. It did a rebrand recently but it didn't work out, they're shutting down entirely. Here is what is so cool. Peter Shankman is the guy who founded Help A Reporter Out. He exited the company in 2012. A few years later, he founded a competitor to it, a direct competitor to it; it does the exact same thing. The top publishers use it. It's entirely free. The reason it's so cool is because they ban anyone who pitches journalists unrelated stuff. Or if somebody uses AI text, they're banned. Permanent ban. Banned for life. “If you pitch a reporter off topic even once, you're gone. No exceptions.” If you're chosen by a journalist, you get top SEO backlinks, you can put these logos on your website, you can flex on LinkedIn to say, “Look how cool I am, I appeared in all these top publications.” Source of Sources, I'm super impressed with this thing. #seotips #linkbuilding #digitalmarketing #backlinks

It's a miracle that the free Internet lasted as long as it did. It's been nearly 30 years of mostly unfettered, free content access to everything from magazine articles and newspapers to videos and recipes. The steady devolution of the online advertising business made free online content an economic equation that no one could solve. If you need further evidence that your free internet is evaporating like snow on an early spring day, look at CNN.com. The popular online news platform, an arm of the still popular cable news network, is putting up a paywall. It won't block you from seeing all CNN.com posts but will limit the number you can see for free. It's unclear if that will be a few a day or a dozen per month. However, once you hit the limit, CNN.com will prompt you to subscribe for $3.99 a month or $29.99 a year. That's not a lot, and for all-you-can-eat access, some might consider it a bargain. Even so, it'll be an adjustment, especially for those who've been accessing the site since it launched "on the World Wide Web" in August of 1995. #internet #subscriptions #web

🔕 Google will begin removing links to California news websites. 🔕 If you rely on Google News or Google Alerts to stay informed, then it may be time to look elsewhere... Managr could be a good alternative. It curates news from thousands of top outlets and provides interactive summaries that keep you up to speed on the latest news. Managr also tracks social media posts from X and Instagram. You can get started for free by going to app.managr.ai/register Stay informed, stay ahead, and don't miss out of California news. 🐻 #PR #News #Google #California

🔕 Google is on the verge of discontinuing links to California news websites. If you rely on Google Alerts, this might feel like your morning coffee has been snatched away. But fear not, ManagrAI has you covered! ManagrAI curates news from thousands of outlets and social media posts. It's designed to keep you in the loop, minus the unnecessary noise. But ManagrAI doesn't just deliver news, it helps you comprehend it with interactive summaries. Begin your news journey for free at app.managr.ai/register. Stay informed, stay ahead, and never miss a beat on California news!

“Let’s wait until after the election to run this.” That was a New York Times editor, burying a story about riots in Kenosha. He was afraid the report could hurt Joe Biden. It’s bias like that which led Bari Weiss to leave the Times and start her own site, The Free Press. In a frank conversation at the All-In Summit, Weiss explains how the media became left-wing advocates and what she’s doing to get back to facts. Mainstream media used to make its money from advertising. Big advertisers like Procter & Gamble spent a fortune on ads. Even more poured in from the classifieds. Today, advertising has moved online. The classifieds are dead, replaced by Craigslist. This cost the media a fortune in revenue. Papers like the Times and The Washington Post found a new model: charge readers. Both have major subscription businesses. But when you rely on subscriptions, you have an incentive to tell readers what they want to hear. And for papers like the Times, the readers want to hear a left-wing message. If you run anything that challenges that worldview, people will cancel their subscriptions. It’s a viable economic model. But it’s not a viable model for finding facts. How Bari Weiss is changing media and more at the link below... #news #nyt https://lnkd.in/edfxabVb

News publishers urge antitrust action over Google's third-party content policy: News Media Alliance seeks DOJ and FTC intervention against Google's site reputation abuse policy affecting publisher revenues. #News #Journalism #Antitrust #Google #Publishers

Google began blocking access to California news outlets for some users in the state, according to an announcement from the tech giant on Friday. And it’s all because Google is upset about proposed legislation that would force the company to pay some publishers for their content, something it’s calling a “link tax.” No Google AI Search, I Don’t Need to Learn About the “Benefits of Slavery” Known as the California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA), the bill has passed California’s lower house, known as the Assembly, but still needs to be taken up by the state Senate and signed by Governor Gavin Newsom to become law. Newsom hasn’t come out with an opinion on the legislation yet. “If passed, CJPA may result in significant changes to the services we can offer Californians and the traffic we can provide to California publishers,” Google said on Friday. “By helping people find news stories, we help publishers of all sizes grow their audiences at no cost to them.” And while it’s certainly true that Google helps people find news stories, the problem is that much of the advertising money has gone to Big Tech platforms like Google and Facebook rather than the publishers who create the news content. That’s what this bill is trying to remedy in some way, by forcing Google to pay publishers. Google has made similar threats after identical proposals were made in countries like Australia, India, and Canada in recent years. In just about every case, Google has proposed turning off Google services like Search in the entire country but ultimately followed the law in each jurisdiction without too much disruption. Meta’s Facebook has faced similar hurdles in other countries that want the company to pay for aggregating local news content, but while Google has acquiesced, Facebook has opted to pivot in an entirely new direction. That direction includes dropping news services altogether while insisting Facebook users don’t actually care about news. Google acknowledged on Friday the battles it has waged in other countries, without mentioning it has paid out millions to publishers. As we’ve shared when other countries have considered similar proposals, the uncapped financial exposure created by CJPA would be unworkable. If enacted, CJPA in its current form would create a level of business uncertainty that no company could accept. To prepare for possible CJPA implications, we are beginning a short-term test for a small percentage of California users. The testing process involves removing links to California news websites, potentially covered by CJPA, to measure the impact of the legislation on our product experience. Until there’s clarity on California’s regulatory environment, we’re also pausing further investments in the California news ecosystem, including new partnerships through Google News Showcase, our product and licensing program for news organizations, and planned expansions of the

The news industry has been facing disruption at an unprecedented rate. To put this into perspective, a recent Pew Research Center Study found that daily newspaper circulation—counting both digital subscriptions and print—has continued to decline, dropping to just under 21 million in 2022. This is an 8% decrease from the previous year and a staggering 32% drop compared to five years ago when circulation was over 30 million. Additionally, more than 7,900 journalism jobs were cut in 2023 across UK, US, and Canadian media outlets, according to Press Gazette. Even today, ABC News and ABC-owned stations laid off 75 employees from its news divisions. While outliers like The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal have found success in transitioning from print to digital, media outlets are now competing fiercely for subscriber dollars. However, one key challenge is that consumers increasingly want to hear directly from company leaders on major news trends, rather than through a paywalled article. At MikeWorldWide, we’ve observed a growing trend: executives are spending more time on LinkedIn to communicate news, company updates, and industry trends directly to stakeholders. It’s why leaders who are leaning into short-form video or audio content on LinkedIn are performing so well, as this type of content often connects more authentically—and in many ways more effectively—than a paywalled story. Consumers want to hear the exact language used by these leaders. This doesn’t diminish the value of news stories—they still provide essential context and help connect the dots for readers—but executives themselves are becoming a more prominent source of news and insights. Leaders like Jamie Dimon of JPMorgan and Satya Nadella of Microsoft have millions of followers on LinkedIn because stakeholders and consumers alike want direct access to their thoughts. LinkedIn's trending news feature also amplifies their commentary, making it easier than ever for audiences to gather leadership perspectives on critical issues. https://lnkd.in/exRUu2FJ Sara Fischer - Axios