MediaFile
Where media and technology meet
Why I believe in the link economy
The following is a guest column by Chris Ahearn, President, Media at Thomson Reuters.
“Do unto others”
It’s a simple standard my mom taught me when I was a kid – yours probably taught it too. It isn’t always easy, but in business it’s a good guiding light if you don’t want your company to be evil.
Recently there has been a rising crescendo of finger-pointing, shrieking, braying and teeth-gnashing about the future of the news. In the last couple of weeks there have been many comments on the AP’s proposals, Attributor’s proposals, Ian Shapira’s story and fair use.
After some of the AP commentary, I posted a tweet directed at Jeff Jarvis that prompted some members in the community to ask me to be more outspoken, asking me to be blatant about it, to post a public statement. For those who know me, I usually don’t need to be asked.
To start, yes the global economy is fairly grim and the cyclical aspects of our business are biting extremely hard in the face of the structural changes. But the Internet isn’t killing the news business any more than TV killed radio or radio killed the newspaper. Incumbent business leaders in news haven’t been keeping up. Many leaders continue to help push the business into the ditch by wasting “resources” (management speak for talented people) on recycling commodity news. Reader habits are changing and vertically curated views need to be meshed with horizontal read-around ones.
Blaming the new leaders or aggregators for disrupting the business of the old leaders, or saber-rattling and threatening to sue are not business strategies – they are personal therapy sessions. Go ask a music executive how well it works.
A better approach is to have a general agreement among community members to treat others’ content, business and ideas with the same respect you would want them to treat yours.
If you are doing something that you would object to if others did it to you – stop. If you don’t want search engines linking to you, insert code to ban them.
I believe in the link economy. Please feel free to link to our stories — it adds value to all producers of content. I believe you should play fair and encourage your readers to read-around to what others are producing if you use it and find it interesting.
I don’t believe you could or should charge others for simply linking to your content. Appropriate excerpting and referencing are not only acceptable, but encouraged. If someone wants to create a business on the back of others’ original content, the parties should have a business relationship that benefits both.
Let’s stop whining and start having real conversations across party lines. Let’s get online publishers, search engines, aggregators, ad networks, and self-publishers (bloggers) in a virtual room and determine how we can all get along. I don’t believe any one of us should be the self-appointed Internet police; agreeing on a code of conduct and ethics is in everyone’s bestinterests.
Our news ecosystem is evolving and learning how it can be open, diverse, inclusive and effective. With all the new tools and capabilities we should be entering a new golden age of journalism – call it journalism 3.0. Let’s identify how we can birth it and agree what is “fair use” or “fair compensation” and have a conversation about how we can work together to fuel a vibrant, productive and trusted digital news industry. Let’s identify business models that are inclusive and that create a win-win relationship for all parties.
This is not code for some hidden agenda – it is an open call for collective problem solving. Let’s do it wiki-style and edit it in the public domain. Let’s define the code of conduct and ethics we would all like to operate under.
My suggestion is we start with “do unto others” as our guiding spirit – I bet it would make all of our mothers proud.
Post your comments below (good, bad or ugly) or send me an email. You can reach me directly at chris.ahearn@thomsonreuters.com or via twitter @cjahearn.
Comments RSSPost Your Comment
- We moderate all comments and will publish everything that advances the story directly or with relevant tangential information
- We try not to publish comments that we think are offensive or appear to pass you off as another person, and we will be conservative if comments may be considered libelous.
Follow MediaFile
[...] In all the comments about paid content for newspapers, and the silly proposal by the Associated Press to charge bloggers who use as few as five words of an AP story, here’s a breath of fresh air. [...]
[...] de golpe aparecen tipos como Chris Ahearn, Presidente de Medios en Reuters que son capaces de mirar a la industria y decir (desde…: “Yo creo en la economía de los links… Yo creo que se debe jugar de forma sana y [...]
yeah, who are you with, the NWO or the people. the NWO won’t save you. i am referring specifically to the attempts by google to subdue or eliminate viral information that is “inconvenient” to the NWO.whatever is happening on this planet earth must be dealt with holistically. we are lurching towards some change-point coming very fast. steven jobs managed to bridge the past and future at apple. it’s a wide-open future and it seems the dindosaur forces have had their day.
[...] directly at chris.ahearn@thomsonreuters.com or via twitter @cjahearn.SOURCE (you can comment there) reuters.com* nice to see somebody that makes sense for a change. [...]
[...] me, the current debate about the “Link Economy” in content terms is [...]
Way to go Reuters. Thank you!
[...] directly at chris.ahearn@thomsonreuters.com or via twitter @cjahearn.SOURCE (you can comment there) reuters.com* nice to see somebody that makes sense for a change. [...]
[...] Please feel free to link to our stories: Reuters – [...]
[...] want to see a genuine bright spot, read this Aug. 4 commentary by Reuters president Chris Ahearne: Why I believe in the Link Economy. He wrote: “I believe in the link economy. Please feel free to link to our stories — it [...]
[...] Journal have starting swinging back at “parasites” like Google News, other news organizations like Reuters have embraced the “link economy” and the traffic sent along by bloggers and other aggregators. The argument seems to have swayed in [...]
Actually, any attempt by established media to enforce “rights” and charge for links to them is hilarious, and just shows how out of touch they are. Its partly American-led thinking, where a powerful but bankrupted country is doing all it can to retain power and control, and labelling that as “freedom”, as if they own the term. Much of the rest of the world is unimpressed, if not downright disgusted in some places. The internet is free, and their pathetic attempts to assume power over it will fail. They are better to get with the 21st century, and adopt a realistic approach as suggested by Chris Ahearn.You cant send an aircraft carrier into cyber space to “restore order, freedom and rights for its citizens”. Better try something else, or change your thinking.
[...] been missed by Chris Ahearn, President of Media at AP rival Thomson Reuters. This week he responded with a blog post comparing AP to the lawsuit-happy music industry, saying that the incumbents “haven’t been [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] I believe in the link economy [Reuters MediaFile] This post is extra fascinating because it was written by Chris Ahearn, President, Media of Thomson [...]
[...] been missed by Chris Ahearn, President of Media at AP rival Thomson Reuters. This week he responded with a blog post comparing AP to the lawsuit-happy music industry, saying that the incumbents “haven’t been [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s deal with [...]
[...] 4. Bloggers of the world, Reuters got our back [...]
[...] pages are the banks of the link economy, and some media companies are certain to see in Google’s latest move something akin to a masked [...]
[...] the same thing, but in any case it was and is quite useful. Among others we had an intervention by Chris Ahearn from Reuters, that I consider very important because it addresses both sides of the fence. Which is, [...]
Great to hear!Erecting walls around sacred content won’t help, but using the content as a baseline and then hooking people through services on top will help. Bundling with other products is one easy way to start, there are others.More on the theme here: http://threedimensionalpeople.com/2009/0 8/3d-contentDo keep up the blogging.Stephen
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] Chris Ahearn, Präsident für Media bei Thomson Reuters, sieht das übrigens auch so, wie er in diesem grossartigen Blogeintrag schreibt. Er schreibt unter anderem: Blaming the new leaders or aggregators [such as Google] for [...]
[...] Chris Ahearn at Reuters encourages the media to act more like a community. Stop finger-pointing! He also believes in the “link economy.” [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] has elaborated on his “alternative” in a blog post, writing that too many traditional media organizations waste manpower “recycling commodity [...]
[...] is a copyright issue. Then, Chris Ahearn, President, Media at Thomson Reuters, basically told the AP to stop whining and evolve with the link economy. In a blog post, Ahearn wrote: Blaming the new leaders or aggregators for disrupting the business [...]
Dear Writer,After reading of your article and wide responses from readers shows that,fine for discussions.What you said is true to certain extents.There should be self,transparent codes for web journalism.Always repeating the same events by all media networks.Old wine in a same bottle,only lid had been changed.There are lot of day today topics from this vast universe has not been covered by these journalists,reporters and even from world notable figures in writing fields.Here after,there will be changes in writing ,fair reporting for all benefits.Freedom of expressions to be always goal for any independent journalist.Very great profession with great clarity for enriching and upholding ethics of journalism.Thanks for giving an opportunity for sharing of my views with you through this news website.Hope to get more updates from you in twitter social website.With best wishes.,
gooooooooooood
[...] We’ve labeled the guidelines 0.9 for a reason – they are imperfect, yet we trust that the spirit and intention behind the effort will be respected and useful to build upon by others, or as Chris Ahern, President, Media at Thomson Reuters, implored, “Let’s stop whining and start having real conversations across party lines. ” [...]
excellent article. I agree with you fully that there should be a symbiotic relationship and bloggers should not leach content but instead enhance or promote it. Now if we could get all bloggers to respect content providers it may be easier to get content providers to loosen up on bloggers.
[...] universale di tutta l’editoria. Tant’è che c’è già chi ha preso le distanze. Come l’agenzia di stampa Reuter o l’Abc, che per voce del suo capo Mark Scott ha definito quello del magnate australiano “il [...]
[...] universale di tutta l’editoria. Tant’è che c’è già chi ha preso le distanze. Come l’agenzia di stampa Reuter o l’Abc, che per … Per leggere tutto articolo vai al sito ufficale Senza [...]
[...] been missed by Chris Ahearn, President of Media at AP rival Thomson Reuters. This week he responded with a blog post comparing AP to the lawsuit-happy music industry, saying that the incumbents “haven’t been [...]
[...] for Reuters, president Chris Ahearn said in August that he believes in the link economy. No threats at Google at all. Instead, he blamed news [...]
[...] pages are the banks of the link economy, and some media companies are certain to see in Google’s latest move something akin to a masked [...]
[...] of the journalism industry, including the President of Media at Thomson Reuters Chris Ahearn. He wrote a response in which he outlined his support for the so-called “link economy,” which the AP’s [...]
[...] Media” de Reuters, Chris Ahearn, publicaba una columna con un título muy claro: Why I Believe In The Link Economy. Dos párrafos me gustaría descatar del artículo que paso a traducir (libremente) a [...]