Media: Is GateHouse getting ripped off?
Blogs are constantly being accused of getting all their content from mainstream media. Unless the blogger is doing original reporting, there’s some truth to that. Pundit-style bloggers do get most of their information from media reports. Some of ‘em even cut and paste parts of the articles they use as source material. I’m one of them.
But that’s OK. It’s called “fair use.” If people are going to comment on news, they have to be able to tell people what they are commenting on. So, the law allows me to reprint paragraphs from Journal Star articles. I don’t reprint ALL of the article. And I don’t replicate links to all their stuff, and a rarely link to headlines without comment.
This practice helps news sites bring in new readers.
But GateHouse Media — corporate owner of the Journal Star — is facing competition from a bigger “Big Media” company, the Boston Globe. And the bigger company is threatening to use the smaller company’s own words against it:
According to reports, Boston.com plans to launch a line of town-specific sites that will cull content from sources like Boston Daily favorites the Cambridge Chronicle and the Allston-Brighton TAB, which are owned by GateHouse Media.
It’s one thing to occasionally link to a particular news outlet’s stuff. It’s another thing to scrape its site, place the content on a hyperlocal Website, sell ads and pass it off as your own.
But I wouldn’t place bets that GateHouse is gonna take sit back and take it. Look for GateHouse to protect its local information franchise.
If this is what the Boston Globe is going to do, it’s much different than what Google News is doing, which is spidering news organizations and providing the results of searches.
November 12th, 2008 at 9:05 am
How much is Gatehouse worth again?
Ooh its up to $0.085 a share.
http://www.pinksheets.com/pink/quote/quote.jsp?symbol=GHSE#getQuote
Yeah I know you are making a point about intellectual property rights but the real world value of Gatehouse’s intellectual property seems greatly diminished. If you hold something of diminished value, its hard to press a case to defend it.
November 12th, 2008 at 8:43 pm
So, you think intellectual property rights don’t apply if the owner isn’t making enough profit?
November 13th, 2008 at 12:21 am
I’d just like to point out Billy’s prescience with his spot-on critique of heard on the street. Again this week they produce an utterly banal column despite the fact that we’re coming off the most historic election in at least the last 30 years. Rumors about Schock’s staff? Darin LaHood’s plans? Anyone itching to take on Gordon in two years–or Schock? Schock’s first DC decisions? Ray LaHood’s plans? Nothing. We do get 100 words on MSNBC’s mistake of calling Schock a state senator rather than a state assembly, along with an explanation as to WHY this was egregious–a state senator is more powerful than a state assembly member so it made him look to be bigger than he really is, you see.
Except he is now a U.S. Congressman and no one gives a rat’s ass about a slip of the tongue made on election night by a minor cable channel. This is reporting?
Why don’t they just take 5 of billy’s pieces, spell check them, and call it a column?
November 13th, 2008 at 12:31 pm
“If you hold something of diminished value, its hard to press a case to defend it.”
If that’s the case, Mahkno has NO way to defend his opinion.
November 13th, 2008 at 1:38 pm
JK profit and valuation are two different things. The stock price represents the valuation of their entire enterprise. The desks, the computers, the printing presses, and most importantly the intellectual property. Subtract those hard assets like the presses, the computers, etc and you can get an idea where the the value of the intellectual property is. Total the shares, apply the current market value and you know how much Gatehouse is worth at a given time.
Intellectual property has a valuation. That is why we have a legal distinction of intellectual property in the first place. If it has little to no value, is it worth protecting? Would you save it or throw it in the trash?
November 13th, 2008 at 2:56 pm
You are both wrong. Stock prices reflect how the market feels about a company. I don’t think Gatehouse is completely 100 percent publicaly owned therefore, there is a huge chunk not represented by the stock prices.
November 13th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
anon, You’re wrong to an extent as well. It depends on what you mean by “completely 100 percent publicly owned”. Gatehouse is a publicly traded company so ALL shares of the company can be available for purchase. Now all available shares me not be issued by the company but the total number os shares allowed multiplied by the price of an individual share is roughly how much one would need to pay to purchase the company. So, while Mahkno didn’t explain it in great enough detail his point about stick price is correct.
November 14th, 2008 at 8:21 am
A company can invest in itself, buying up their own stock (or just not sell all the shares it creates in the first place). Most companies do not have 100% of their shares held by private entities. Companies will retain shares as a means of controlling the share price. That doesn’t change their status as a publicly traded company.
Stock price does reflect the market, true. It reflects those willing to sell and the price others are willing to pay. Presumably not everyone who owns Gatehouse shares would be willing to sell at $.08 a share, nor could you force them to sell at that price. When they would sell and what they would sell at is utter speculation and not something you can take to the bank or the courtroom.
You may think your house is worth a million dollars but if the market, based on comparable home sales, says otherwise, you are not getting that big fat home equity loan. Only real sales count in the stock market and real estate.
November 17th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
Gatehouse getting ripped off? The garbage in their papers isn’t worth stealing.