Facebook threatening Google News?

Facebook: No.1 new portal?

Poor Google News - if it's not Rupert Murdoch trying to remove stories from his News Corps affiliates from their search index to prevent people viewing them for free, it's the news that Facebook has now tripled their proportion of traffic to US news sites, whilst Google News' has stayed the same.

It would appear that social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook are increasing becoming the primary portal for people to come to US news sites, overthrowing Google News which had been the main source for years.

The data compiled by Hitwise shows that over the past year, the the proportion of traffic that Facebook sends to US media sites has tripled from around 1.2 percent to 3.52 percent, while that sent by Google News has remained roughly static, at around 1.4 percent.

Will Murdoch now target Facebook?

This raises an interesting question over the debate on charged content. Rupert Murdoch has frequently cited Google News as a site that "leeches" on his publications' content and is one of the most vocal, as well as powerful, forces driving the idea that online news websites should charge for the content provided.

Typically, news sites and blogs rely on advertising money to stay up and running. but Facebook with its 400 million users is now a major threat to both Google and Murdoch's News Corps.

Heather Hopkins, North America analyst for Hitwise said in a blog post, "Facebook could be a major disruptor to the News and Media category. And with the Wall Street Journal already publishing content to Facebook, perhaps the social network can avoid the run-ins that Google has suffered recently with Rupert Murdoch. We will continue to watch this space."

As shall we, especially considering how Murdoch appears to be on the warpath.

In the UK, the Murdoch-owned titles, such as The New York Post and The Wall Street Journal have gone as far as blocking access to their sites from Newsnow, who is a much smaller news aggregator. Google has stood firm, with Eric Schmidt, chief executive of Google, even saying that publishers should be grateful as the likes of Google News sends them that it sends them about 4 billion links per year (in Murdoch's own Wall Street Journal no less).

However Murdoch seems determined to make people pay for his content... the only question, is will they do so when they can get the news for free from other sources.

Relevant articles:

Is Google appeasing Murdoch? | Murdoch to block Google? | Facebook seized by group

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