> In my opinion the news creators should be grateful to facebook (or google etc.), bringing them interested visitors, potential customers. I'm not a fan of Au

> In my opinion the news creators should be grateful to facebook (or google etc.), bringing them interested visitors, potential customers. I'm not a fan of Australia's policy in the least. But I understand why they made it and your comment is about as misguided as Australia's policy. Yes, publishers benefit greatly from Facebook. Facebook also benefits greatly from publishers and content providers content. Facebook is the forum, the news and articles people link is a good chunk of what draws people in to Facebook. If it wasn't for outside media, people would quickly blow through the pictures of their friends and family and be off the platform. Baby pictures don't foster long debate and engagement, people look at them and move on. It's the media (aka news) which causes engagement (and debate). Engagement is where Facebook makes their money. So Facebook needs the media, the media needs Facebook, no problem right? Well not quite. The problem is, while they both "need" each other, there is a lot of competition for news, and Facebook is a monopoly. The end result is Facebook (and Google) sucks all the profit out of the room. As I mentioned initially, Australia's policy is crappy. But the current situation isn't sustainable either.