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Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

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Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#101

Post by tomComb »

paxys wrote: post #34

People were predicting this would happen when Google caved and started paying "link tax" to Australia and Canada and other jurisdictions with similar laws. Now – to no surprise – every government (really every media conglomerate lobbying arm) around the world wants the free money and so more such laws are popping up.

Dunno about Australia but Google ‘won’ in Canada, where the government agreed to accept what Google had originally offered, and make it up to their corporate media buddies in the following budget.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#104

Post by pmontra »

That's reverse advertising. Instead of paying Google to display links to their sites where everybody looks (Google News) they want to be paid to be where everybody looks.

Anyway, Google News has been off in Spain for 8 years. News sites didn't disappear. It reopened in 2022 when the law was changed https://blog.google/products/news/google-news-returns-spain/

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#105

Post by LegitShady »

bloppe wrote: post #84
ikidd wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It applied to Facebook/Meta and any larger social media sites. Meta just shut it down and any direct contributions to journalism that they were making, and now the publishers are crying because their traffic has plummetted, to the surprise of precisely nobody except them. Not sure where you're getting your information.

I'm talking about the Guardian article in the grandparent comment. It's a private deal between Google and the Canadian govt.

There is no such thing as a private deal with the government that is extorting you for money to give to legacy media companies.

It's like calling armed robbery by a cop under official orders by the president a private deal. Not a thing.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#106

Post by paxys »

tomComb wrote: post #101
paxys wrote: post #34

People were predicting this would happen when Google caved and started paying "link tax" to Australia and Canada and other jurisdictions with similar laws. Now – to no surprise – every government (really every media conglomerate lobbying arm) around the world wants the free money and so more such laws are popping up.

Dunno about Australia but Google ‘won’ in Canada, where the government agreed to accept what Google had originally offered, and make it up to their corporate media buddies in the following budget.

It ended with a negotiation and Google agreeing to pay $100M+ annually to Canadian news organizations, so I wouldn't exactly call that a "win" for them.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#107

Post by datavirtue »

Manuel_D wrote: post #64
flavius29663 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Charging a fee just for linking to something is a bad idea. If you're profiting from it, it's not a bad idea.

Well, yeah it is a bad idea. Because if you tax links to your content Google will just stop linking to your content. Which is exactly what they're poised to do, as per TFA.

If you want less of something, tax it.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#108

Post by AnotherGoodName »

tomComb wrote: post #101
paxys wrote: post #34

People were predicting this would happen when Google caved and started paying "link tax" to Australia and Canada and other jurisdictions with similar laws. Now – to no surprise – every government (really every media conglomerate lobbying arm) around the world wants the free money and so more such laws are popping up.

Dunno about Australia but Google ‘won’ in Canada, where the government agreed to accept what Google had originally offered, and make it up to their corporate media buddies in the following budget.

In Australia there were concessions where the Australian gov of the time thought that having Google negotiate an agreement only with the major outlets (Rupert Murdoch) was acceptable so they don't pay every paper, just the ones that agree with the Liberal party (a right wing party) viewpoints.

The liberal party is now out of power but the labor party has no courage to stand up to Murdoch to repeal this.

It was all very clever and basically a way to fund right wing media in Australia via big tech. Blatantly corrupt as fuck and people need to be arrested for what went on to create this law but definitely clever.

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#109

Post by Aerroon »

paxys wrote: post #106
tomComb wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dunno about Australia but Google ‘won’ in Canada, where the government agreed to accept what Google had originally offered, and make it up to their corporate media buddies in the following budget.

It ended with a negotiation and Google agreeing to pay $100M+ annually to Canadian news organizations, so I wouldn't exactly call that a "win" for them.

It might be a win for Google.

>Oh, you posted this story we really didn't like. Sorry, this month's check got lost in the mail. We'll sort it out in 6-15 business days.

Businesses eventually become reliant on significant revenue streams which gives the party that provides them power over the business.

It might not even be Google doing anything nefarious, just a case of "sorry, but our business is doing poorly and we might have to shut down Google News and stop paying if this keeps up."

Re: Google threatens to cut off news after California proposes paying media outlets

#110

Post by kemayo »

freedomben wrote: post #89
blackeyeblitzar wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you’re ignoring that there is a path to getting to users/customers for many types of products like news, which are the tightly controlled platforms of giant tech companies (Google, Meta, etc), and there isn’t viability for products like news unless they play ball with these big tech companies. It’s not that they haven’t monetized effectively, but rather that there are gatekeepers in the way with no real compe…

If that's true (and I agree that it is), then charging for links is going to make it even worse and effectively cement that reality for all time. How is a startup who can't afford to pay employees, let alone publishers, supposed to come by and provide some alternative? Possibly perhaps, the big publishers (with deep pockets and lobbyists) really like this approach because despite entrenching big tech, it erects formi…

The proposed California law is written so that it basically only applies to Google and other social media giants. You need to have 50M+ monthly users, or be owned by someone with either a market cap of $550B+ or 1B+ monthly users.

The text: https://legiscan.com/CA/text/AB886/id/2832517

So, at least in theory, some nimble startup could come in and have a lasting advantage against the big existing platforms until they got big enough that they could handle dealing with the regulations.

I do have mixed feelings about the recent laws written like this. It feels like if it's important that we pay news publishers, that should apply to everyone.

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