In its original context, that looks like a statement by Rob Levine about Jarvis’ position on barriers to entry. That statement seems to suggest that Jarvis doesn’t think that barriers to entry are a good idea for journalists.

Am I reading it wrong?

If I’m reading it correctly, I’m pretty sure that Jarvis disagrees with that statement about his position, that he likes some barriers to entry for journalists, and provided an example.

The part that we’re talking about sure looks like Levine’s position. I’ll quote “you seem to disdain barriers to entry as somehow old-fashioned.”

No matter what the book says, what its authors believe, or the relationship of those beliefs to Jarvis’ beliefs, that’s a statement of Levine’s evaluation of Jarvis’ position/beliefs.

I’ve provided an example of a barrier to entry that I believe that Jarvis supports and encourages. Does Levine think that it’s not a barrier to entry and/or that Jarvis doesn’t support or encourage it? If not, doesn’t that counter-example show that Levine’s characterization of Jarvis’ position is wrong?

Of course, Levine may believe that there’s something wrong with the barriers to entry that Jarvis supports, but that’s a long way from Jarvis not supporting barriers to entry.

> They would encourage companies to wall off their businesses _in terms of compatibility_, not paywalls.

What does that mean? (As I’ll point out, the example doesn’t support the argument.)

> For example, they would have supported Apple’s initial decision to lock consumers into an iTunes-iPod ecosystem that allowed Apple to uphold what are among the highest margins in the consumer electronics business for its iPod.

iTunes has (had?) a paywall. So does Amazon (with Kindle). It’s the place were stuff doesn’t cross unless money changes hands. There’s no technical reason for that restriction or its location – it’s a biz decision.

Note that Jarvis doesn’t say that paywalls for journalism are bad. He says that they fail in most cases because readers won’t cross them, because they’ll do without and/or because they have other alternatives.

They would encourage companies to wall off their businesses _in terms of compatibility_, not paywalls. For example, they would have supported Apple’s initial decision to lock consumers into an iTunes-iPod ecosystem that allowed Apple to uphold what are among the highest margins in the consumer electronics business for its iPod. They would encourage Amazon to do the same with Kindle. (This may be bad for consumers, but it was certainly good for Apple and it will probably help Amazon as well; it has certainly done wonders for Nintendo and Sony’s Playstation division.) Jeff usually champions Google’s point of view that proprietary _anything_ is bad. Google promotes this because it has the scale to do so – that’s why acting like Google can often be foolish.

That’s not how I read Jarvis. I think that he’s saying that journalists should do things that journalists do best. That’s a barrier to entry.

Jarvis does say that journalists should not rely on barriers that keep them from making money. For example, a paywall is not a barrier to entry, it’s a barrier to use, a tollgate. A toll gate collects money, but it’s also an impediment to use. If the reader isn’t willing to pay both costs, the tolltaker won’t collect the first.

I’m talking about an ordinary search engine, no pay wall to use, that has exclusive/privileged access to various news sources and shares revenue from its results page with those sources. In other words, it is exactly what many of the news folks are demanding from Google, arguing that their content drives Google’s revenues.

It’s pretty easy to set up such a thing. If they’re correct, doing so will give them tons of money and they won’t have to negotiate or share with Google.

I hardly think you would agree with the argument at the heart of “The Curse of the Mogul,” Jeff. The book does suggest that the media business has performed poorly, but mostly because media companies focused on acquisitions – many of which involved the kind of companies you like to champion (MySpace is one example; StudiVZ would be another). The authors also suggest that media companies needs to focus on businesses with significant barriers to entry; you seem to disdain barriers to entry as somehow old-fashioned.

No – we always have the option of doing without them. For most of us, that’s good enough.

Another problem is that they know each other. They don’t trust the others because they know what they’ll do. They know that the first paper to break ranks will make more money than it will make by standing firm.

However, it would still be a good thing for them to try. Heck, it would be good for them to set up a search engine with exclusive access to their content, so that they can discover the value of the search result page advertisements that they covet.

http://www.buzzmachine.com/archives/2005_03_15.html

is full of links to something called “photo masenger”, mixed in with your own text…

Very true. But there is another part to this. To get the growth in areas they are interested in, Google often has to step outside its business area to help things along. That’s why we see Google doing things like developing Android and Python and funding numerous open source efforts (and looking like a software company, except that they give the software away for free — well most of it) or installing fibre (and looking like a telco).

Google Books can be viewed in at least three ways:
i. Google trying to control content and getting outside its core business area (a mis step).
2. Google wanting to index books so that they can run ads alongside, but unfortunately nobody is doing anything to hurry this along so they stepped in to do it (the Andorid business model). That they had to get pummelled a bit in costs and have to take control, at least for a while, is just the cost of doing business.
3. A huge benevolent act.

To come up with a new business requires that you add value. It is pointless trying to out-Google Google in search because:
* There is no point for people to go visit 5 tiny search engines when they can do one Google search.
* It is pretty much impossible to build a search system the size of Google to be able to compete.

F’rinstance: Everyone else sold MP3-based music players with no DRM. Apple made an iPod that could play DRM-free music – but, instead, they turned around and partnered with every major music label to provide a locked-down but fully-stocked catalog. Gah! Where’s my free music?

In retrospect, it was pretty damned smart. Guess what they could do just as soon as “pent-up consumer demand profit” became greater than “become best buds with the RIAA profit”? Remove all the DRM.

They did it again with the iPhone App store. Every other smartphone allowed independent development, but Apple told us we’d get nothing but WebKit-based apps, and we’d like it. Meanwhile, that let them ship the first iPhone without worrying about the public API – and create visible, vocal demand from the development community. By the following year, programmers everywhere were screaming: “Please! Let us write programs for your platform!” And what do you know… the App Store appeared, and Apple gets a cut.

I don’t know if it was truly planned this way, but it does seem to be a pattern, doesn’t it? Most companies either court the rebellious-hacker base with an open API (early TiVo, some Google, Twitter), hoping to Be The Platform, or build a fortress (late TiVo, Facebook), hoping to Be The Gatekeeper. Apple seems to have a knack for being the gatekeeper as long as it possibly can – and then amazing us with the new power of the platform.