

2012: The year Irish newspapers tried to destroy the web - CountHackulus
http://www.mcgarrsolicitors.ie/2012/12/30/2012-the-year-irish-newspapers-tried-to-destroy-the-web/

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materialhero
Let them. Let them start charging for links. Let them miss out on the free SEO
and let them fall off the face of the search engines. Let them lose their
readership because nobody can find them and let them go bankrupt because no
one is looking at their ads. This is how the internet works. If they can't
figure that out, then its no ones loss but their own. A less greedy company
will be happy to have sites link back to them and will eventually take their
place.

~~~
sp332
Counterpoint: The New York Times Paywall Is Working Better Than Anyone Had
Guessed <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4970846>

~~~
don_draper
Counterpoints to your counterpoint: The New York Times is a) doing ok for now
but not great [1] b) most importantly, the NYT is an American institution that
is in a league of their own. Few newspapers have the prestige, quality and
history of the NYT.

[1] Stock price for NYT has gone down 80% in the last 10 years:
[http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ANYT&ei=g9XhUJiAJ6...](http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ANYT&ei=g9XhUJiAJ6y50QGD1gE)

~~~
k-mcgrady
Prestige and quality may help the NYT be successful in charging for content
but that doesn't mean smaller local newspapers will fail if they try the same
tactics. Warren Buffet seems to think that the paper editions of local
newspapers will not fail (especially in areas with strong community) and owns
over 20 now. It seems likely that eventually they will just charge for online
access and be successful at it.

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2012/06/22/would-
yo...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2012/06/22/would-you-bet-with-
warren-buffett-on-the-future-of-newspapers/)

~~~
pixl97
Talking about Warren Buffet

[http://www.wtop.com/164/3176295/Manassas-News-Messenger-
prin...](http://www.wtop.com/164/3176295/Manassas-News-Messenger-prints-final-
edition)

"The Manassas News & Messenger is no more. The paper printed its final edition
after 143 years of covering the news...."

"All employees lost their jobs, and 72 other jobs have been cut in the
company."

------
skhg
Good luck to them... This was already tried in belgium
[http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/07/google-versus-
bel...](http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2011/07/google-versus-belgium-who-
is-winning-nobody/) years ago

~~~
derleth
Belgium... Ireland... who's next, Andorra?

Frankly, 99.9+% of the world's population can get through their day without
learning what happens in Ireland unless and until it affects a country with a
more direct impact on their lives. The fact that country will almost certainly
have newspapers that _aren't_ actively trying to get blacklisted by search
engines is just a nice extra.

~~~
FuzzyDunlop
Ignorance may certainly be bliss but dismissing something because it
presumably didn't happen in America takes that idea a bit too far.

~~~
derleth
I of course never said anything like that, but it is a sign of how far we've
come that it gets read that way. Cast your mind back to 1983 and ask yourself
if 1983-you would have felt deprived not knowing the latest from Ireland
unless and until a non-Irish news source, like the BBC, picked up on the
story. Of course not!

~~~
rmc
_Cast your mind back to 1983 and ask yourself if 1983-you would have felt
deprived not knowing the latest from Ireland unless and until a non-Irish news
source_

Fun fact: What happened in 1983 in Ireland was relevant to India in 2012.

In 1983, Ireland passed a pro-life consitutional amendment, banning abortion
in all cases (in practice)¹. In 2012, an dentist from India living in Ireland
who was miscarrying and dying asked for a termination to save her life, she
was refused one, and eventually died².

¹:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_Amendment_of_the_Constit...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighth_Amendment_of_the_Constitution_of_Ireland)
²: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Savita_Halappanavar>

~~~
tedunangst
Yes, if you travel to another country its laws will affect you. Is your claim
that if the eighth amendment had been published in Indian newspapers in 1983
that this would not have happened?

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charonn0
Someone should get on the horn to the grandchildren of the newspaper
executives; they need to explain the tubes again.

------
smcgarr
I'm the author of this piece. If you'd like to see the letters we wrote on
behalf of Women's Aid in response to the demands for money for links you can
see them [http://www.mcgarrsolicitors.ie/2012/05/10/newspaper-
licencin...](http://www.mcgarrsolicitors.ie/2012/05/10/newspaper-licencing-
ireland/)

and

[http://www.mcgarrsolicitors.ie/2012/12/06/newspaper-
licensin...](http://www.mcgarrsolicitors.ie/2012/12/06/newspaper-licensing-
ireland-2nd-response-letter-re-demand-for-money-from-womens-aid-for-linking-
to-newspaper-websites/)

Thank you for your interest.

------
coditor
Anyone can try to get money for links. The internet alternative of course is
to eliminate all of their readership from anyone other than the local pub.

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derleth
This isn't going to last very long.

In a few months, at the outside, they (the newspapers) will have a
condescending piece of back-pedaling that implies we were all too stupid to
understand their statements, because _obviously_ they _never_ so much as
_implied_ they would charge people to link to them, and saying they did means
we just don't get it. Then they'll maintain strict silence over it and refuse
to even acknowledge questions about it.

I hate when they do that.

------
lucian303
Those who don't learn history ...

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cathyreisenwitz
Grooooss. Wonder how state-funded and regulated Irish newspapers are.

~~~
skhg
We have extremely strict libel legislation, and an independent press
ombudsman. State funding is not a factor in the finances of the major papers
who pushed for the measures mentioned in this article

