Google ditches plan to buy newspaper

Google CEO Eric Schmidt confirmed speculation that his company had been considering the possibility of acquiring a newspaper but quickly added the company has since decided against the idea because potential acquisition targets are either too expensive or have too many liabilities.

Schmidt said Google was "trying to avoid crossing the line" between technology and content and was instead working with struggling publishers to make their websites "work better" for online advertising, the Financial Times reported Wednesday.

Schmidt also dismissed what he called "clever ideas" suggested about sheltering newspapers in not-for-profit structures through the Google.org foundation. "They are unlikely to happen without some massive, massive set of corporate bankruptcies," Schmidt told the Financial Times.

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Two reports earlier this month - by Fortune and The Washington Post - suggested Google has been talking to both The New York Times and the Post about possible areas of collaboration, or even investment. Schmidt's statements to the Financial Times suggest it was more the former than the latter.

Of course, given the contentious history between Google and traditional news outlets, which have never liked the idea of the search giant making money off their content without paying for it, the idea of Google buying a paper had some scratching their heads. Then again, Google does have a keen interest in the health of the news business when it comes to generating online content.

Original article: Google's Schmidt nixes idea of buying newspaper from CNET News.com