Asia-Pacific Google (and Facebook) Threatens to Remove Its Service From Australia

[Husky_Khan]

War is over...

Facebook 'refriends' Australia after changes to media laws

Facebook will restore Australian news pages, ending an unprecedented week-long blackout after wringing concessions from the government over a proposed law that will require tech giants to pay traditional media companies for their content.

www.reuters.com

It looks like after a week of conflict, both sides have declared victory, though apparently in a more accurate sense, Facebook actually won because Australia seemed to relent more on changing its intended media laws.

Australia will offer four amendments, which include a change to the proposed mandatory arbitration mechanism used when the tech giants cannot reach a deal with publishers over fair payment for displaying news content.

Facebook said it was satisfied with the revisions, which will need to be implemented in legislation currently before the parliament.

“Going forward, the government has clarified we will retain the ability to decide if news appears on Facebook so that we won’t automatically be subject to a forced negotiation,” Facebook Vice President of Global News Partnerships Campbell Brown said in a statement online.

 

[ShadowArxxy]

Considering that the original deal was pretty much, "You are mandated to publish our news, to pay us whatever we demand for it, and any disagreement will be settled by mandatory arbitration favoring us", Australia's position was ridiculously biased in the first place. As much as I hate to cheer at Facebook winning. . .

 

[Husky_Khan]

With some amendments, it seems like Australia's Law, the News Media Bargaining Code, has passed.

As explained by the BBC:

The news code encourages tech giants and news organisations to negotiate payment deals between themselves, and commits Facebook and Google to invest tens of millions of dollars in local digital content.

If negotiations fail, an independent arbitrator can set the price they pay domestic media - something analysts say benefits the news groups.

The government argues this prescribes a "fairer" negotiation process between the parties, as it gives news organisations more leverage.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) - a market regulator - says publishers have had little negotiating power until now because they are so reliant on tech monopolies like Google and Facebook.

It follows an investigation by the commission into the tech firms' online advertising dominance, which showed that in 2018 for every A$100 (£56; €65) spent by Australian advertisers, A$49 went to Google and A$24 to Facebook.

The code also forces tech platforms to give notice to news publishers of changes to their algorithms, which decides which stories are being displayed.

The amended law also now requires the government to consider a platform's existing contributions to journalism - such as commercial deals with publishers - before applying the code to them.

This means Facebook and Google could escape the arbitration process entirely.

The government also has to give a platform a month's notice if it is considering applying the code.

Facebook and Google news law passed in Australia

The world-first law is passed after robust negotiations between the government, Facebook and Google.

www.bbc.com

 

[Husky_Khan]

Google issues a blog post attacking Microsoft for "naked corporate opportunism."

We respect Microsoft’s success and we compete hard with them in cloud computing, search, productivity apps, video conferencing, email and many other areas. Unfortunately, as competition in these areas intensifies, they are reverting to their familiar playbook of attacking rivals and lobbying for regulations that benefit their own interests. They are now making self-serving claims and are even willing to break the way the open web works in an effort to undercut a rival. And their claims about our business and how we work with news publishers are just plain wrong.

This latest attack marks a return to Microsoft’s longtime practices. And it’s no coincidence that Microsoft’s newfound interest in attacking us comes on the heels of the SolarWinds attack and at a moment when they’ve allowed tens of thousands of their customers — including government agencies in the U.S., NATO allies, banks, nonprofits, telecommunications providers, public utilities, police, fire and rescue units, hospitals and, presumably, news organizations — to be actively hacked via major Microsoft vulnerabilities.

Weird to see Google stepping up to defend the US and NATO now when they themselves don't want to work with the U.S. and NATO allies. But nice to see the era of 'Scroogled' may come back now.

Google slams Microsoft for ‘naked corporate opportunism’

Google on Friday slammed Microsoft in a blog post, accusing the rival company of backing proposals for tech giants to pay news publishers for content for self-serving purposes. “We also believ…

thehill.com

 

[PsihoKekec]

Talk about pot calling kettle black.

 

[Cherico]

Google issues a blog post attacking Microsoft for "naked corporate opportunism."



Weird to see Google stepping up to defend the US and NATO now when they themselves don't want to work with the U.S. and NATO allies. But nice to see the era of 'Scroogled' may come back now.

Google slams Microsoft for ‘naked corporate opportunism’

Google on Friday slammed Microsoft in a blog post, accusing the rival company of backing proposals for tech giants to pay news publishers for content for self-serving purposes. “We also believ…

thehill.com

google after how they have behaved for years can go fuck themselves they have zero moral authority and need to accept that they are a company not a government.