[mankyd]

> The point is they want that traffic coming directly to them.

Very insightful and true. The problem is that they can't find a strategy to make this happen and are capitulating due to their lack of ability.

That is to say, _if_ they could find a way to make aggregator customers instead into their customers, they wouldn't be backing down. What they're discovering, however, is that, even if they weaken Google, they don't strengthen themselves in the process. Readers simply turn to other sources.

This implies that readers perhaps don't value Axel Springer's content over other news sources. Or, at least, they don't value it over the value of aggregators.