back to article Times calls time on NewsNow links

Times Online has taken action to prevent headline aggregation site NewsNow from linking to its stories. Rupert Murdoch has long insisted he will end free access to any News International content, and this could be the first step. Executives at the firm are desperately trying to find a way to charge for content which readers …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. John Gray

    News to me, guv!

    "In fact NewsNow claims to be second only to Google in terms of UK audience for news aggregators with two million monthly visitors."

    So how come I have never heard of it?

  2. Jolyon

    New Snow

    Same old prints.

  3. Jeremy 2

    robots.txt and fair use

    robots.txt is voluntary, not enforced (unless they're also blocking access by IP or user agent) so if they are so sure they have a case for fair use, why don't they keep on going and have it out when/if NI take them to court?

    Maybe then we could have a final ruling on whether or not linking without consent is OK and end this stupid squabbling.

  4. Smthers
    Unhappy

    Pathetic

    I've been using NewsNow for years now, and have introduced a good number of people to their excellent service.

    The decision by News International is absolutely pathetic. Having said that I doubt the users of NewsNow will ever notice since it must link to hundreds of others news and blog websites.

    I also see that Rupert Murdoch <spits> has also been complaining about the BBC News website - claiming it has an unfair advantage being funded by the licence payer. Maybe he should block access to Times Online for all bar Times Online / Sky TV subscribers?

    I object to lining his pockets as it is (via Sky TV) and certainly will not be sending any more of my hard earned in his direction!

  5. Ketlan
    Thumb Down

    Murdoch is an ass

    I use News Now every day as an essential campaigning tool but I can't say I'll be too fussed about losing access to content from Murdoch's rags.

    The whole concept of charging for the already-limited amount of news that is presently internet-available is ludicrous, in my opinion, and to begin charging for it at this late stage, after it has been free for some years, is a rip-off.

  6. heyrick Silver badge

    So what?

    NewsNow - obey the robots.txt, remove any reference to Murdoch Press. Make sure you blacklist all of the other publications under the umbrella.

    I'm sure the quality of the content provided will rise as a result of this.

    It's like the music/movie moguls. They just don't get it. News is out there for free. If we don't read articles from The Times, then we'll go someplace else. WE don't lose out, THEY do.

  7. Tony Paulazzo

    ...full of sound and fury, signifying nothing

    >whether or not linking without consent is OK and end this stupid squabbling.<

    I thought the basic design construct of the internet was linking so that atomic bombs wouldn't destroy the ability to send messages to another part of the country (some old random memory resurfacing), working much like the brain, that if damaged would reroute ms' along different synapses.

    Linking was the raison d'etre of the original 'net (fishing net). Making money off the internet was a happy surprise the porn industry discovered (a unique global market), it wasn't designed for that, but once mainstream saw it, they wanted a piece of the action.

    Hey, mainstream. If you don't want linking then get the hell off my internet.

    Thank you. (hey, we need an icon for free thought)

    1. Jonathan Richards 1

      Basic design of the Internet

      > I thought the basic design construct of the internet was linking so that atomic bombs wouldn't destroy the ability to send messages to another part of the country

      Umm... not really. The Internet is based on dynamic *routing* of packets of information, and the Open Shortest Path First algorithm. That's what makes it tolerant of faults and of links being broken. The World-Wide Web is a comparative late-comer to the Internet, it's a mistake to think that they're one and the same thing.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Grenade

    Linking is one thing...

    ...nicking contentent is another. I don't think the dirty digger knows the difference.

    However newspapers have always worked by stealing content. If the early editions of the competition break a story you can be sure that an editor will be running the story as soon as he can, and he simply won't have time to do any proper research so he'll just get a hack to do a quick rewrite of the story and stick in a couple of quotes obtained quickly by phone to try to prove the content is original. This has been proved more than one when factual innacuracies (yes, I'm being diplomatic) printed by the first paper to break the story have reappeared in other papers.

    Murdoch's papers are as guilty of this behaviour as any others so he's being hypocritical (as well as being a cunt).

This topic is closed for new posts.