GOOGLE NOT IN MARKET FOR A NEWSPAPER.

Search-engine giant Google Inc. is still not interested in crossing the divide between being a technology company and a content provider, an interview with the company's chief executive, Eric Schmidt, revealed last week.

But apparently the Mountain View, Calif.-based company has flirted with the notion of buying a newspaper or housing it under its non-profit arm, Google.org.

Schmidt, whose interview with the Financial Times of London was posted on the newspaper's web site on Wednesday, said that Google is working with publishers to make their web sites "work better" rather than buying a publication. He said that while the company had considered acquisitions, it believed targets were too expensive or carried excessive liabilities.

He refused to comment directly on whether Google was offered the 20-percent stake in The New York Times Co. that is currently owned by Harbinger Capital Partners.

The Google executive told the FT interviewer that he believes that charging for newspaper content on-line is "unlikely to work, although people will certainly try it and they're welcome to do so." Schmidt said that consumers prefer an advertising supported model. He did say, though, that he believed that "certain, specialized content" might work in a paid-subscription model.

"But for the average news that everybody gets today, they would prefer an advertising-supported model," said Schmidt.

Schmidt said that Google is working with the Washington Post -- as well as other, unnamed potential newspaper partners ("we typically don't do exclusives," said Schmidt, "because everybody benefits from innovation") -- in creating "on-line news versions that somehow address the immediate needs of people and for which advertising works better."

Schmidt said that "without commenting on specific products, the newspaper I read on-line should remember what I read. It should allow me to go deeper into the stories."

He said that it was those kinds of features that Google was discussing with the Post and others.

While many in traditional print excoriate Google for draining potential advertising dollars from newspapers, apparently New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller sees the search company as a "frenemy" (an entity that is both a partner and a competitor). The editor, whose comments from his semi-annual staff meeting were published by the web site Observer.com on Tuesday, was quoted as saying, "Google News generally runs a headline, maybe a first line of a story from the Times and a link. On balance, they're driving a lot of traffic to us. I don't think most of what Google does in that regard could be described as parasitism or piracy."

Print Get the Mag Weekly Updates