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> Google last week launched a platform in Australia offering news it has paid for, striking its own content deals with publishers in a drive to show the propose

> Google last week launched a platform in Australia offering news it has paid for, striking its own content deals with publishers in a drive to show the proposed legislation is unnecessary. Doesn't that exactly demonstrate that the legistlation is necessary? Would Google had struck such deals without the threat of the legistlation?

josephg 6y ago
Exactly. And I absolutely do not want the future in which tech platforms also ineptly destroy, recreate then gain an unstoppable monopoly on journalism.
wombatmobile 6y ago
> Doesn't that exactly demonstrate that the legistlation is necessary? It seems to be a response to the government's threat to legislate, albeit a ham-fisted one. Responding to a threat doesn't mean the threat is valid, or that the response is of any use to anybody. The difficulty with any analysis of the impact of Google and Facebook on news in Australia is that news has never been funded directly. It was traditionally paid for by advertising revenue which was obtained from advertising products that were co-delivered, interspersed among news products. Google's advertising model superseded Murdoch's traditional advertising model, but Murdoch's core advertising businesses were not killed by Google alone. They lost out to direct internet competitors: Seek took the classified advertising revenue for jobs Domain took the classified advertising revenue for property eBay, Gumtree, Facebook and Google took the display advertising revenue If the government's concern is that journalism has suffered, the evidence it can point to is that 50% less people are employed in journalism compared to 20 years ago. The most sensible remedy for that problem is not to transfer wealth from Google and Facebook to Murdoch's entertainment corporations, but rather to fund grassroots journalism through programs that directly result in the production of news by journalists, in ways that preserve editorial independence.
- hypertele-Xii 6y ago
  > Responding to a threat doesn't mean the threat is valid Quite fundamentally disagree there. Responding to a threat definitely validates it. If it's not a valid threat, there's no need to respond.
  - shakna 6y ago
    Cats attack laser pointers. People flail when they encounter a spider's web. They are responding to a perceived threat, in which there is no threat at all. Responding to a threat is not a validation that there is a threat.
    - hypertele-Xii 6y ago
      Did you know there exist spiders in our world that can kill you if they bite you? Sensible reaction. I don't think cats are threatened by laser pointers.
      - shakna 6y ago
        > Did you know there exist spiders in our world that can kill you if they bite you? Sensible reaction. I'm Australian, so yes, I am very aware there are spiders that can kill you. However, that doesn't suddenly make every spiderweb a threat. The reaction may have a reason behind it - but it does not mean that there is any threat present. Lets try putting it another way. Children are often frightened of the dark. This makes sense, as they cannot know what is in the dark, and the dark _may_ hold a threat. This response on behalf of the child in no way says that there _is_ a threat. In all likelihood, there is none. Responding to something as if there is a threat doesn't suddenly turn something benign into a threat.
  - wombatmobile 6y ago
    > Responding to a threat definitely validates it. I'm not sure what you mean by "valid threat". If you mean the capability of the threat to cause damage if carried through, that's something we don't find out until the party that made the threat tries to carry it out. If you mean the grounds on which the threat was made, such as here, the Australian governments claim that Google owes Murdoch money, then that's not something that is "validated" by a response. A response to a spurious threat, or an illegitimate threat can be prudent whether the threat is real, imagined, justified, or totally bogus. In this case, will the Australian government actually impose a tax on Google's practice of linking to content which is allowed by the sites own robots.txt? That seemed pretty audacious to me when I first heard about it, particularly since I don't buy the case that Google owes Murdoch money. But maybe they will try, if they think they can get away with it at the ballot box. I don't know how to predict that outcome. At first I thought it would backfire on the government, but Google's ham-fisted bluff to exit Australia might end up backfiring on Google, if Google even carries out that counter threat, which is by no means certain. We'll see.
rstuart4133 6y ago
> Would Google had struck such deals without the threat of the legistlation? They did in France. And they did it for a fairly obvious reason: indexing French news is worth something to them. If the option on the table was "index Australian news and pay, or don't index", they would pay because indexing Australian news is worth something. The problem is there are lots of newspapers out there, all selling the same news. They all fight tooth and nail to get the top rank in every search, which presents Google with a turkey shoot. The price consequently drops to zero. That would happen regardless of whether Google is a monopoly or only had 5% of the market. It should tell you something. All this hand wringing about Google abusing it's market power is rubbish. The problem isn't Google's market power. It's the fact there are 20 different newspapers all selling the same story. The French solved not by bashing Google. They solved it by forcing all the newspapers into a room, effectively creating a monopoly for French news. Google could no longer play one off against the other, and a price greater than 0 was agreed upon.

josephg 6y ago

Exactly. And I absolutely do not want the future in which tech platforms also ineptly destroy, recreate then gain an unstoppable monopoly on journalism.

wombatmobile 6y ago

> Doesn't that exactly demonstrate that the legistlation is necessary? It seems to be a response to the government's threat to legislate, albeit a ham-fisted one. Responding to a threat doesn't mean the threat is valid, or that the response is of any use to anybody. The difficulty with any analysis of the impact of Google and Facebook on news in Australia is that news has never been funded directly. It was traditionally paid for by advertising revenue which was obtained from advertising products that were co-delivered, interspersed among news products. Google's advertising model superseded Murdoch's traditional advertising model, but Murdoch's core advertising businesses were not killed by Google alone. They lost out to direct internet competitors: Seek took the classified advertising revenue for jobs Domain took the classified advertising revenue for property eBay, Gumtree, Facebook and Google took the display advertising revenue If the government's concern is that journalism has suffered, the evidence it can point to is that 50% less people are employed in journalism compared to 20 years ago. The most sensible remedy for that problem is not to transfer wealth from Google and Facebook to Murdoch's entertainment corporations, but rather to fund grassroots journalism through programs that directly result in the production of news by journalists, in ways that preserve editorial independence.

hypertele-Xii 6y ago
> Responding to a threat doesn't mean the threat is valid Quite fundamentally disagree there. Responding to a threat definitely validates it. If it's not a valid threat, there's no need to respond.
- shakna 6y ago
  Cats attack laser pointers. People flail when they encounter a spider's web. They are responding to a perceived threat, in which there is no threat at all. Responding to a threat is not a validation that there is a threat.
  - hypertele-Xii 6y ago
    Did you know there exist spiders in our world that can kill you if they bite you? Sensible reaction. I don't think cats are threatened by laser pointers.
    - shakna 6y ago
      > Did you know there exist spiders in our world that can kill you if they bite you? Sensible reaction. I'm Australian, so yes, I am very aware there are spiders that can kill you. However, that doesn't suddenly make every spiderweb a threat. The reaction may have a reason behind it - but it does not mean that there is any threat present. Lets try putting it another way. Children are often frightened of the dark. This makes sense, as they cannot know what is in the dark, and the dark _may_ hold a threat. This response on behalf of the child in no way says that there _is_ a threat. In all likelihood, there is none. Responding to something as if there is a threat doesn't suddenly turn something benign into a threat.
- wombatmobile 6y ago
  > Responding to a threat definitely validates it. I'm not sure what you mean by "valid threat". If you mean the capability of the threat to cause damage if carried through, that's something we don't find out until the party that made the threat tries to carry it out. If you mean the grounds on which the threat was made, such as here, the Australian governments claim that Google owes Murdoch money, then that's not something that is "validated" by a response. A response to a spurious threat, or an illegitimate threat can be prudent whether the threat is real, imagined, justified, or totally bogus. In this case, will the Australian government actually impose a tax on Google's practice of linking to content which is allowed by the sites own robots.txt? That seemed pretty audacious to me when I first heard about it, particularly since I don't buy the case that Google owes Murdoch money. But maybe they will try, if they think they can get away with it at the ballot box. I don't know how to predict that outcome. At first I thought it would backfire on the government, but Google's ham-fisted bluff to exit Australia might end up backfiring on Google, if Google even carries out that counter threat, which is by no means certain. We'll see.

rstuart4133 6y ago

> Would Google had struck such deals without the threat of the legistlation? They did in France. And they did it for a fairly obvious reason: indexing French news is worth something to them. If the option on the table was "index Australian news and pay, or don't index", they would pay because indexing Australian news is worth something. The problem is there are lots of newspapers out there, all selling the same news. They all fight tooth and nail to get the top rank in every search, which presents Google with a turkey shoot. The price consequently drops to zero. That would happen regardless of whether Google is a monopoly or only had 5% of the market. It should tell you something. All this hand wringing about Google abusing it's market power is rubbish. The problem isn't Google's market power. It's the fact there are 20 different newspapers all selling the same story. The French solved not by bashing Google. They solved it by forcing all the newspapers into a room, effectively creating a monopoly for French news. Google could no longer play one off against the other, and a price greater than 0 was agreed upon.