Alexandra Bruell, for The Wall Street Journal:
The publisher has sent generative-AI startup Perplexity a “cease and desist” notice demanding that the firm stop accessing and using its content, according to a copy of the letter reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
I have little interest in defending either side here, but I do have to wonder what the strategy for the New York Times is. According to Perplexity, the NYT had half the growth from 22-23 as the year prior. At the same time profits are growing for them. So fewer people being milked for more money coupled with cost cutting.
Here’s my thought: I am not sure The New York Times is a must read in any sense for me in 2024.
Ten years ago, I could have told you half a dozen stories I read on the NYT in the past few days. Today, I could not tell you what the website looks like. The primary reasons:
- I don’t find the content compelling enough to need to pay, when I can get the same information from Apple News without worrying about much.
- Each time I do find my way to NYT, I get hit with a paywall and cannot read.
Now, I fully understand that I too run a paywall, but I am not a news organization. It always baffles me that if I want to see the latest coverage of breaking news, these outlets will hit me with a paywall. There’s other ways to get that information, so all that does is turn people away and make them pissed off at your brand. Which tells me that perhaps the NYT believes that if they only paywall their opinions, the value proposition isn’t high enough to justify people wanting to pay.
I only use Perplexity and Kagi to find information on the web. The NYT rarely comes up as a source with them — I am not certain why (because Perplexity for sure still sources NYT). So at least in my online world, NYT is sliding quickly into irrelevance, and not being in Perplexity seems like a move that would hasten that slide for others as well. Search is moving in a summarized content direction — not the other way around.
Perhaps this is a negotiating tactic by the NYT, perhaps not. The bigger question is whether or not it’s too late for them to remain relevant in another 5 years.