Media News - Wednesday, January 20, 2010

Nearly half of Google News users just read headlines: report

Nearly half of the users of Google News skim the headlines at the news aggregator site without clicking through to newspaper websites, according to a survey released on Tuesday. The findings by Outsell Inc. appear likely to provide further ammunition to publishers such as News Corp.'s Rupert Murdoch who have criticized Google and other aggregators for linking to stories without sharing ad revenue. Google, responding to the criticism in the past from media tycoon Murdoch and others, has said it drives "about 100,000 clicks every minute" to media websites, generating ad revenue for the news outlets. Outsell analyst Ken Doctor said in a statement that "among the aggregators, Google's effect on the newspaper industry is particularly striking. "Though Google is driving some traffic to newspapers, it's also taking a significant share away," Doctor said. "A full 44 percent of visitors to Google News scan headlines without accessing newspapers' individual sites." Thirty percent of those surveyed said they do not use Google to find news stories, preferring to use other search services or to go directly to news publisher sites. Twelve percent said they use Google to get to a news site and then use the search function on that site to find other stories. Fourteen percent said they go back to Google to find other newspaper stories. (AFP)

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