Published: March 1, 2021
Cited by: Urdu Point, WN
MOSCOW, March 1 (Sputnik), Jonathan Rowson – After months of deliberation, the Australian parliament passed legislation requiring Google and Facebook to pay for digital news content this past week, and while the search engine giant quickly concluded deals with publishers, Facebook temporarily banned access to news sites in a move that may strengthen its position in the long run, experts told Sputnik.
Lawmakers this past Thursday gave their approval to a set of final amendments covering the so-called News Media Bargaining Code, which was agreed by Treasurer Josh Frydenberg and the head of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, earlier in the week.
The agreed-upon amendments give Facebook more time to conclude deals with news outlets and signaled a temporary truce in a fierce row that saw the social media giant block access to news articles and the pages of state bodies, health departments, and emergency services.
Facebook’s decision was met with severe backlash from Australian officials, including Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who slammed the company in a post on the social media site on February 18.
“We will not be intimidated by BigTech seeking to pressure our parliament,” Morrison wrote.
The ban was eventually lifted late last week after the Australian parliament signed off on the amendments to the legislation.
Australia’s attempts to check the power of Facebook and Google have also drawn the attention of several countries, such as the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada, which are mulling new antitrust laws to tackle the dominance of the world’s internet giants.
Speakers
Anthony Burr, UK-based media expert (Burr Media).
“The Australian lawmakers must have surely been influenced by the world’s greatest media mogul, the native Australian, Rupert Murdoch. Murdoch knows a thing or two about dealing with any threats or competition and did not want to see these Tech Giants become dominant in the news content marketplace,” Burr said.
Tim Hill, the co-founder and CEO of analytics firm Social Status.
“The measure is 100% not justified. The original Digital Media Bargaining Code was an inside job between one of the Liberal Party’s biggest donors & supporters, News Corp. Murdoch’s ailing media companies wanted a way to muscle in on digital revenue because take up of their online subscriptions has been less than lukewarm,” Hill said.
Andrew Selepak, a social media professor at the University of Florida.
“The news in Australia is dominated by Rupert Murdoch who also owns media outlets and companies in the US and the UK. This proposed legislation does put the Australian government, and the people of Australia, against big tech, but it is also a battle of the billionaires between Murdoch and Mark Zuckerberg,” Selepak said.
Vlad Davidiuk, a US-based public policy expert.
“The proposed law comes in response to the new reality in which the giants of Big Tech increasingly take a disproportionately large share of online advertising revenue at the expense of media organizations. Original content created by media organizations gets free distribution on the social platforms, but the advertising revenue stays with Big Tech, making it difficult for media companies to offset costs of production,” Davidiuk said.
Jonathan Rowson 