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'Pulse News Reader' for iPad Pulled From App Store After New York Times Complaint
- Thread starter VirtualRain
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That IS why they are losing money. Someone else is making money off of NYT's content and image. Selling a reader is one thing, but packaging it and featuring an entity like NYT, yet NYT not getting any revenue. You don't get paid for your content unless you control its use.
The real reason for the losses is that no one wants to pay for the works of anyone else these days. If we can find a way to get it for free, we will. But that doesn't pay the writers and researchers of the stories for their content. The NYT App generates money through its adds. This reader, featuring their image and material sends nothing back to those content creators. Zero.
Everyone truly seems to think they are entitled to free or excessively cheap; music, books, video entertainment and media. While we all stand in line for a $5.00 cup of Starbucks. All you have to do is read reviews on the App store. Many excellent games and other Apps that are selling for $5.00 or less get one star reviews because "this would be 5 stars if you sold it for $0.99. Even though it provides hours of entertainment. Yet we pay $10.00 for a 90 minute movie. Society today simply feels and acts entitled to the very things they would never give away if they had created the content themselves.
Google does make money through ads. I think if content providers would follow Steve Jobs' advice "price low and go for volume" people would still care about people like NY Times. That's my opinion. Same reason I hate movie people that require DRM. If they would get with the times things would be so much easier and they would make money.
Pulse is definitely one of my most favorite apps, and I've been very much looking forward to an update soon. I don't care about NYT and will drop their feed any day. Heck, I will now. I hope the developer won't quit because of this. Shame on you NYT.
And that's how RSS is supposed to work. And that's why the Times would like this app to display the RSS feed instead of what they're actually doing.
Why don't they just make it so you have to login to your NYTimes account to get the content? The info online is free, but they could also make it so you login to your subscription account like you do with TimesReader on the computer (which they definitely need to come out with for iPad and iPhone).
I have a love/hate relationship with the New York Times, but I have no idea what you're talking about when you say too many scandals and plagiarism. I can recall two incidents in the last decade, and neither are recent.
Also, if you don't like a particular section of the paper, one coping strategy you might try is not reading that section.
What everyone is missing here is the important point (feel free to read past this and flame it if you want, but unfortunately I agree with NYT on this one)
You are paying for an app that has a preloaded setup for NYT and Pulse probably doesn't have an agreement with NYT to do this. RSS readers can be paid apps but if no agreement is made with the provider of the RSS then you can't preload in the code (if that's the case here) the providers address. You should (what they should have done IMHO) is allowed the users to enter the NYT's rss feed address. THAT wouldn't have sparked any complaints at all and makes anyone's arguments on RSS reader apps and search engines moot.
Essentially they are making their app a paid publication with content that isn't theirs rather than making a paid publication with empty content (or content that has agreements in place) and allowing the user to enter the feeds they wish to see in it.
Pulse just needs to modify their coding to remove the NYT and any other publisher that doesn't have an agreement in place (since it's paid, free probably wouldn't have sparked the request for removal) and then let the user enter them back in if they want. But if they display more than the RSS feed alone and show parts or bits of the page (by simply outputting the http cache) then that is NOT an RSS reader and is also not good.
Simple fix and should have shipped that way.
Goes to show that just because you graduate from a college/university no matter which ones doesn't necessarily mean your smart
They should have known better.
You are paying for an app that has a preloaded setup for NYT and Pulse probably doesn't have an agreement with NYT to do this. RSS readers can be paid apps but if no agreement is made with the provider of the RSS then you can't preload in the code (if that's the case here) the providers address. You should (what they should have done IMHO) is allowed the users to enter the NYT's rss feed address. THAT wouldn't have sparked any complaints at all and makes anyone's arguments on RSS reader apps and search engines moot.
Essentially they are making their app a paid publication with content that isn't theirs rather than making a paid publication with empty content (or content that has agreements in place) and allowing the user to enter the feeds they wish to see in it.
Pulse just needs to modify their coding to remove the NYT and any other publisher that doesn't have an agreement in place (since it's paid, free probably wouldn't have sparked the request for removal) and then let the user enter them back in if they want. But if they display more than the RSS feed alone and show parts or bits of the page (by simply outputting the http cache) then that is NOT an RSS reader and is also not good.
Simple fix and should have shipped that way.
Goes to show that just because you graduate from a college/university no matter which ones doesn't necessarily mean your smart
They should have known better.So either:
1. all RSS readers need to be free to comply with NYT's policy
-or-
2. NYT pulls its RSS feed
I agree that one *interpretation* is that the developers of Pulse are selling access to free content owned by NYT, but anybody with a grain of common sense knows that the content is separate from the application.
Should NYT win this, that would set a very bad precedent, as any RSS reader developer would be hooped in a lawsuit.
Because they're required to.
As part of the way IP works, if NYT complains, Apple must unlist.
If Pluse News reader developers notify Apple, then they can re-lsit.
It's a completely ****ed up system, allowing allegations of wrongdoing to disrupt the little-guys' business, but it's the law.
As part of the way IP works, if NYT complains, Apple must unlist.
If Pluse News reader developers notify Apple, then they can re-lsit.
It's a completely ****ed up system, allowing allegations of wrongdoing to disrupt the little-guys' business, but it's the law.
Before I chime in any further, I guess I should understand how Pulse works a bit more. Are they more than just a visually-attractive RSS reader? Do they not link directly to the corresponding NYT articles? If not, and they bypass the normal, expected behavior of RSS feeds, then they are in hot water.
There simply is no argument here. Pulse does absolutely nothing wrong in allowing NYT feeds to be displayed in their app. And if the NYT honestly thinks Pulse has been profiteering off NYT's inclusion as a pre-loaded feed, they have a very high opinion of themselves.
They're suggesting that people buy the app because it's got NYT stuff displayed in the screenshots. That's not why people buy the app - they buy it for the nice layout. If the NYT feed wasn't preloaded, people would load it themselves if they wanted it, thereby ending up in exactly the same place. I daresay a lot of people immediately remove the NYT from the app anyway - I know I would, I have no interest in their stories or photos.
And if they go down this route, why haven't they ever taken down NetNewsWire or Reeder or ByLine or any of the many, many other RSS apps that have been charging?
And don't they get that the price covers the app development? And that no less copies of that app would get sold if NYT wasn't featured in the screenshots?
This whole thing is total BS.
They're suggesting that people buy the app because it's got NYT stuff displayed in the screenshots. That's not why people buy the app - they buy it for the nice layout. If the NYT feed wasn't preloaded, people would load it themselves if they wanted it, thereby ending up in exactly the same place. I daresay a lot of people immediately remove the NYT from the app anyway - I know I would, I have no interest in their stories or photos.
And if they go down this route, why haven't they ever taken down NetNewsWire or Reeder or ByLine or any of the many, many other RSS apps that have been charging?
And don't they get that the price covers the app development? And that no less copies of that app would get sold if NYT wasn't featured in the screenshots?
This whole thing is total BS.
Nice, myopic comment.
This application didn't get all it's ducks in a row. Who in their right mind thinks published web sites don't have copyrighted material?
Use your head. Even this site when they write articles have them copyright protected.
The Times is enforcing their copyright. That's it.
Good grief - maybe the NY Times technical staff needs to explain what RSS is to their legal department. This is such a silly complaint. I could see it (maybe) if this were about Google Reader, since that will actively monitor page content changes on its own - but as others have mentioned, this is using the RSS feed that the Times publishes itself.
Note that, in my Google Reader comment, I still think the complainant would still be shooting himself in the foot - it's just that I could at least see the argument. This is more like "how DARE they make use of something we're providing specifically for that purpose!"
Note that, in my Google Reader comment, I still think the complainant would still be shooting himself in the foot - it's just that I could at least see the argument. This is more like "how DARE they make use of something we're providing specifically for that purpose!"
Exactly part of my point from my post above. It would be like me writing an RSS feed app with hard coded link to MacRumors RSS feed and CHARGED for it (one of the keywords here.)
You bet your arse if I did that Arn would be ALL over my arse if I did that.
I would essentially be doing the same thing Pulse is doing and that is charging people for NYT's content.
But most people here as with all online forums will only read what they want to read and not see the real point.
Huh? The very reason most of us use a feed reader is so we can avoid going to all the various sites. We get the readers because we (or at least I) like the clean, add-free interface. I wont go to the origin unless I have too. NYT gives you an App to get you to use their site and generate add revenue. This app circumvents that. And the creators are simply getting money and a higher profile by the legitimacy of the featured NYT images on the seller's store page. Same reason why you can't make and market an NBC feed to stream NBC's TV shows through your own app. They get to control their licensed image and the distribution of their content.
Remember, there is no requirement for NYT to even provide an RSS feed. They only do it and control it in ways that they judge to be beneficial to their business and revenue. Clearly, they don't see this App as beneficial, and I can see why.
+1 from Virginia.
The Old Grey Lady is just a sad shell of it's former self and the Pluse App could do just what NYT does and link to AP stories!
+1
Egon Spengler was a prophet. Print is dead. Newspapers need to die. Google NYT's circulation over the last 5 years to see the future of newspapers. Note that journalism can and should be detached from newspapers as a medium.
That said, NYT has every right to keep their content out of Pulse, or any other source. The market will decide whether their actions benefit or harm them in the long run.
Interesting
Interesting, I just downloaded the App from the App store after reading this post. What I find difficult to understand is that the publishers of Pulse are charging for their app, not the content that the app is used to access. And when they do frame the times (By the way framing is not the default) They then show the entire page, including the two ads that were on the page. I understand that the Times is worried about protecting their business model, but I think the bad press here will hurt them more.
Pulse is a great app, a stand out of what can be done with a new gadget. Honestly the times should be looking to buy it out not shut it down.
Interesting, I just downloaded the App from the App store after reading this post. What I find difficult to understand is that the publishers of Pulse are charging for their app, not the content that the app is used to access. And when they do frame the times (By the way framing is not the default) They then show the entire page, including the two ads that were on the page. I understand that the Times is worried about protecting their business model, but I think the bad press here will hurt them more.
Pulse is a great app, a stand out of what can be done with a new gadget. Honestly the times should be looking to buy it out not shut it down.
Oh please...grow up. Pulse wasn't selling content, they were selling an app with some default feeds to help people who bought the app discover content on the publishers sites. All Pulse is going to do is change the defaults and NYT will have lost an opportunity to reach many more people -- the chances of even half of the Pulse app purchasers going out of their way now to add NYT are slim to none.
It's almost as bad as the music industry saying that every single song downloaded illegally equaled one sale that they would definitely have made money on had it not be available for free.
[fake lawyer] This was my first thought as soon as I saw the title. I agree completely, Apple should only be policing the store for apps violating their copyrights, trademarks, patents, etc., not anybody else's. NYT should have contacted Pulse; Apple could have benefited from the protection of Safe Harbor, but now that they've decided they want to police the store for NYT's IP they have the police the store for everybody's IP or risk being sued, whereas if they had just instructed NYT to contact Pulse I'm sure they would be protected. [/fake lawyer]
They publish it and it's public. That's it. That's the end of their control. If they want to publish a more abbreviated version, then they can do that too.
Not sure what they did but its back in the store.
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/pulse-news-reader/id371088673?mt=8
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/pulse-news-reader/id371088673?mt=8