All Things Digital

Skip to main content.

SEARCH
Digital Daily

Digital Daily by John Paczkowski

The Digital Daily FeedFollow John on Twitter

Ads in Google News? Cue Newspaper Industry Outcry in 3… 2… 1

by John Paczkowski
Posted on February 26, 2009 at 9:13 AM PT

Print Post to Twitter

When [Google CEO] Eric Schmidt says he worries about the newspaper industry, it’s crocodile tears.

– Brian Tierney, chief executive of Philadelphia Media Holdings, which own The Philadelphia Inquirer and The Philadelphia Daily News

Leave it to Google to find a bit of meat on the revenue-starved bones of the newspaper industry. On Wednesday, the company extended its AdWords program to Google News, serving up text ads alongside news searches in much the same way it does regular Google searches. Search for news about, say, mesothelioma, and you’ll be shown the broad spectrum of ads touting mesothelioma legal services (click on image below).

googlenews_ads

Google (GOOG) announced the move in a post to its official blog:

In recent months we’ve been experimenting with a variety of different formats, like overlay ads on embedded videos from partners like the AP. We’ve always said that we’d unveil these changes when we could offer a good experience for our users, publishers and advertisers alike, and we’ll continue to look at ways to deliver ads that are relevant for users and good for publishers, too.”

The addition of AdWords to Google News was inevitable as the economy continues to weaken and Google looks to expand its revenue streams. But so too may be the outcry over the move. In 2006, the World Association of Newspapers demanded that Google News stop indexing its member sites on the grounds that Google was profiting from the use of their copyright material. Agence France-Presse sued Google for the same thing in 2005. At the time, Google News carried no advertisements and hence, no obvious revenue stream. What will they, and other members of the fast-deteriorating newspaper industry say now that it does? As Searchblog’s John Battelle quips, “This one will kick up some dust.”

Print Post to Twitter Comments Tagged: Digital Daily, Google, John Paczkowski, advertising, media, , , , , | permalink
We’ve launched a new commenting tool, Disqus. For the full story on all of its functionality, click here. To begin commenting right away, you can log in below using Facebook Connect or Disqus—you can also log in using an existing AllThingsD account. Learn more about how Disqus collects and uses information in connection with the comments tool.
  • Sam Harrison
    google is an ad company under the guise of search

    anyone not clear on that?

    ask yahoo, microsoft, and certainly the newspaper companies

    google is an ad company

    that's its only mission: serve ads as many places as possible

    no matter what google says or its pr machine

    google exists to sell ads

    repeat after me, google is an ad company...
  • Theodore Stevens
    Notice the HUGE typo in the screenshot?

    "Former Minnesota LEGISLATURE Dies of Mesothelioma"

    What a bunch of morons. Google needs to kick out asbestos lawyer news sites.
  • Regarding Google's apparently altruistic advice to Newspaper Execs, in my opinion actually means 'you need me to supply you with Google ads within your format in order to survive!'

    This reminds me of Vito Corleone assuring all the bosses he wouldn't be the one to break the peace before Michael then wipes them all out during the christening of his Godson.

    As a 'customer', I still yearn for decent content and though I would like my 'news and sophisticated opinions' delivered to me in a much more portable way, I hope you don't take your pants down any further.

    In my humble view you need to start selling your products as an elegant 'service' instead. Don't ruin the brand by allowing get rich ads on your business pages from any third party and by all means charge me a 'membership' for being allowed the benefit of commenting, downloading articles to readers, email etc. and then send me a nice monthly mag to cheer me up too. Maybe you could turn the tables and filter the noise from Twitter etc. too and just give me the best ones and comment with your experience over the top of the amateur sea of opinion. I'd pay more for all that than I currently do over the counter.

    BUT asking me to 'subscribe' for just your news won't do it I'm afraid.... it needs to be a lot more sexy, and then you've got me!

    Lastly, when you are in the depths of despair, just remember, if I own a wall and invite everyone and anyone to come and write graffiti on it, then what have I actually got? Initially I may have an interesting collage that everyone wants to look at, but at the end of the day, when people have moved on back to quality content, in reality I just have a messy wall. Who’d want to advertise next to that?

    For more about this which I wrote some time ago in the debate ... http://tinyurl.com/dn7rmg
blog comments powered by Disqus

Latest Digital Daily Posts

Digital Daily Archives »

Latest Digital Daily Videos

More Videos »

View All Jobs | Post a Job Job Listings

A sponsored service from SimplyHired

Digital Daily Posts by Date

Digital Daily Posts by Category

Digital Daily Posts by Tag

AAPL acquisition Amazon Android antitrust applications AT&T carrier customers data Dell earnings handset IBM Intel iPhone iPod iTunes Jerry Yang lawsuit Mac market Motorola network online operating system Oracle Palm PC platform Pre price revenue sales share shares smartphone Sprint Steve Ballmer Steve Jobs Verizon Web Windows wireless YouTube

More Digital Daily Tags »

About John

John Paczkowski has been poking fun at the tech industry and the personalities that drive it since 1997. From 1999 to 2007, he wrote the award-winning tech news Web log Good Morning Silicon Valley for the San Jose Mercury News, Silicon Valley's daily newspaper. Read more »

Ethics Statement

Here is a statement of my ethics and coverage policies. It is more than most of you want to know, but, in the age of suspicion of the media, I am laying it all out.

Read more »

alt.misc

Older at alt.misc »