From the “sticks and stones can break my bones and words can never hurt me” dept. Leading media executives took a combative tone against Google and internet companies, suggesting that Big Media increasingly considers new players like Google to be enemies in the forest. In a recurring theme, media owners have a complete misunderstanding of Google and web search.
The Googles of the world, they are the Custer of the modern world. We are the Sioux nation,” Time Warner Inc. Chief Executive Richard Parsons said, referring to the Civil War American general George Custer who was defeated by Native Americans in a battle dubbed “Custer’s Last Stand”.
In an embarrasing misquote, Custer lost the battle, but the Sioux lost the war. AOL, reeling from an SEC lawsuit, owns a huge amount of content but this didn’t save it from becoming an irrelevant dinosaur of dialup internet. Now, Google owns 5% of AOL and Richard Parsons can’t seem to grasp that TW could easily share the same fate.
The sooner these media megaliths start partnering with Google the better off they will be.
