The Google News EPpy Controversy

By: Carl Sullivan If you aren't a close follower of the online news milieu, you might have missed the mini-brouhaha in Atlanta last week over Google News receiving one of three coveted finalist slots in the EPpy Award category for "Best Internet News Service With More Than 1 Million Monthly Visitors." Operating without human editors, Google's automated news aggregation site found itself in esteemed company, with the other nominees being FT.com from London's Financial Times, and washingtonpost.com.

Before the winner was announced, MarketWatch.com President and CEO Larry Kramer received loud applause when he blasted the nomination before the star-studded (at least in terms of the Web journalism world) awards luncheon at the Hyatt Regency. As the much-deserved recipient of this year's EPpy for outstanding individual achievement, Kramer gave an inspiring speech about the future of our business -- and a "shame on you" chastisement to award sponsors E&P and Mediaweek for including Google News in a competition that for nine years has honored the best news and information sites.

While admiring Google's technological know-how, Kramer and others in the audience felt strongly that the EPpys should reward the hard work of human journalists, not the programming skills of Silicon Valley. Kramer noted how frustrating it is to see a story that MarketWatch broke days earlier show up on Google News with an "8 minutes ago" stamp -- just because some other news organization finally got around to covering the news. Other editors object to the mix of "legitimate" news sources with press release wires and the like.

Moments later, to an audible sigh of relief, the EPpy was awarded to The Washington Post's human editors. (Presumably the programmers and Web producers at the Post can take some small credit for the victory.)

But the Google nomination raises some intriguing issues for the online news biz. In the weeks after the finalists were first announced in April, there was scattered cyber-mumbling on industry listservs and blogs. The controversy reminded me of the annual scuttlebutt around Oscar and Tony nominees and the "egregiously overlooked," as Julie Andrews once famously remarked about a production she starred in.

In particular, the Google controversy (I'll spare us all the "Googlegate" label) brings to mind the speculation that the computer-animated character Gollum from the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy was a potential contender for a supporting actor nomination. It didn't happen, but some critics argued that it would have been deserved. While Gollum was comprised of pixels on computer screens, his movements were based on the work of a talented human actor, Andy Serkis.

I was also reminded of the "Star Trek: Next Generation" episode were the Enterprise unexpectedly gives birth to a new life form, possibly endangering the ship's human inhabitants. Capt. Picard decides to let this electronic creature grow to fruition, even though he doesn't know its ultimate intent. He reasons that since the new life form is a composite of the Enterprise computer and all of the crew's collective experiences, it must be as honorable as the men and women who built said computer.

While these anecdotes aren't exactly analogous to Google News, I do see some parallels. In a small way, Google too is a testament to man's ingenuity. Behind this sophisticated Web site is a team of hardworking people who have devised what they feel is a better way of consuming news. Apparently many consumers agree. Like all man-made creations, it has its flaws. But overall, it has improved the lives of many Web surfers, journalists among them.

I also recall the objections of many online newspaper editors several years ago when aggregators such as AOL and Yahoo were included in top news site rankings (by audience size) in E&P. I don't hear those complaints today. These aggregators may not be creating original news, but this is a distinction lost on most consumers. For that matter, a lot of the EPpy nominees and winners are largely repurposing the journalism of their print and broadcast parents. They are superb efforts, no doubt, but if we awarded original content only, we'd have a lot less laurels to hand out.

So is the negative reaction to Google's nomination just sour grapes? More of the grumpy complaining we expect from journalism cultures? Fear of a future where robots take our jobs? I'll let you decide, but here's some background for your deliberation.

Like most awards competitions, including the Pulitzer Prizes, you have to enter to win. Google entered their news product, along with 19 other companies in the 1 million-plus visitor category. Nominees are rarely rejected outright, although this has occurred when entries are obviously miscategorized. Otherwise, it's historically been left to the judges to decide whether a nominee is worthy or appropriate for its given category.

Admittedly, the rules for eligibility are a bit loosely defined. Judges are seeking "best of breed" for each category -- comparing Web sites by editorial quality, ease of use, design, etc. This was a lot easier when the EPpys were restricted to newspaper Web sites, as they were until last year. In 2003, the contest was opened for the first time to allow all "media-affiliated Web sites," including newspapers, broadcasters, and online-only operations, to enter the various competitions -- for best news service, best sports, best entertainment, etc. There are also specific categories for best overall newspaper, TV and radio sites -- considered the most prestigious EPpy Awards.

Clearly, we are in a different world now, and the rules for eligibility will be reviewed by our able contest administrator, Len Muscarella, before next year's competition. I'm not saying that Google News would be barred from entering the news category again, but that is a possibility. One frequent suggestion was to create a new award for the likes of Google News. "I think the idea of having an Internet Service or News Aggregator category has value," said Jonathan Dube, managing producer for MSNBC.com and editor of CyberJournalist.net.

While Google News wasn't rejected by the award sponsors, none of our judges raised questions about their nomination at any point during the three-month-long judging process. And it was these independent judges, not E&P or Mediaweek, who made Google News a finalist. I wasn't even aware that Google had entered the competition until the finalists were named in April.

These judges aren't exactly new-media slouches. They include, of all people, Larry Kramer! (I confirmed that Larry didn't vote in the Google category.) The distinguished panel includes top online news executives, editors, journalists, consultants and academics. For confidentiality reasons, I can't tell you which judges voted specifically in any of the categories, but to give you an inkling of the caliber of judges, consider just a few of this year's panel: John W. Cary of the Chicago Sun-Times, Kelly Dyer of News OK, Bill Grant of washingtonpost.com, Teresa Hanafin of The Boston Globe, Chris Jennewein of The Union-Tribune Publishing Co., Gary Kebbel of AOL, Lem Lloyd of Knight Ridder Digital, Ray Wadia of CNN, and Tim Windsor of The Sun in Baltimore. The point here is that the judges are a thoughtful group of online experts, and whoever voted in the news category clearly thought Google News was a compelling entry. Wouldn't you like to know who was on that jury? (A complete list of judges and background information on the contest can be found at EPpyAwards.com.)

Perhaps the real question is not why Google News was nominated, but why traditional media companies didn't build their own versions of algorithmic news aggregators. And why cooperative efforts that could have eventually resulted in Google News-like services, such as the newspaper industry's ill-fated New Century Network, weren't able to succeed.

Now there's something to get angry about.