Monaco Media Forum: Springer CEO Clashes With Huffington

Posted by: Jack Ewing on November 12, 2009

Mathias Döpfner, CEO of German publisher Axel Springer, and Arianna Huffington, co-founder of the Huffington Post politics and news blog site, made sure the Monaco Media Forum isn’t just a digital media lovefest. Döpfner, whose empire includes Bild, Europe’s largest newspaper, debated with Huffington whether journalism published online should be free. The discussion before a media industry audience at a seaside Monaco hotel on Nov. 12 quickly got loud.

Döpfner pleaded for stronger intellectual property rules, sarcastically portraying the current state of online journalism as “stupid old-school guys who are investing in quality content…and new-school guys who are stealing it.”

That statement annoyed Huffington. “ ‘Stealing’ is not a word you should be allowed to use. We are meticulous about copyrights.” Döpfner quickly added that he hadn’t meant to imply that the Huffington Post was among the offenders.

Döpfner’s point was that news and analysis by professional journalists, as opposed to the mostly unpaid bloggers on Huffington Post, is threatened by web sites which gather content from traditional publishers, generating advertising revenue while doing little original research. “If you want to sell beer for free, fine. But don’t take our beer and sell it to someone else,” Döpfner said.

He expressed optimism that consumers can be weaned from the expectation that news content on the Web is free. “For hundreds of years people have been paying for things they are interested in.” Huffington replied that the idea that publishers can change consumer habits is “incredibly hubristic.”

“The ship has sailed, consumer habits have changed,” she said.

Döpfner chided Huffington about her use of unpaid bloggers. “If all our journalists were working for free, that would be great,” he said. “You can handle the negotiations.”