Η Google απειλεί να κλείσει τη μηχανή αναζήτησης από μια ολόκληρη ήπειρο (*) – την Αυστραλία – εάν τεθεί σε ισχύ ένας προτεινόμενος νόμος που θα αναγκάσει την company να πληρώνει τους εκδότες ειδήσεων για το περιεχόμενό τους.
“Εάν γίνει νόμος, δεν θα μας έδινε καμία πραγματική επιλογή παρά να σταματήσουμε να διαθέτουμε την Αναζήτηση της Google στην Αυστραλία”, δήλωσε ο εκfaceof Google Australia and New Zealand Meg Silva to the Australian Senate Economic Legislation Committee today.
"We had to decide after scrutinizing the legislation and not finding a way, with the financial and operational risks, to continue to offer the service in Australia," he added, according to The Sydney Morning Herald.
The company, which has been pushing against the Australian bill for months, claims the country is trying to make it pay to display links and snippets in Google Search News, and not just Google News.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), which drafted the law, appeared to suggest in August that this should not affect Google's search business:
"Google will not have to charge Australians for using them free υπηρεσιών της, όπως η Αναζήτηση της Google και το YouTube, unless he chooses.”
But it is clear that Google disagrees.
As Google explains with Silva's statement and in a post on her blog, would prefer to pay publishers for their products on Google News. (It already announced a publisher payment schedule in Australia, Germany and Brazil in June.)
However, Australia does not believe that is enough. The ACCC believes the proposed law addresses "a significant imbalance of bargaining power between the Australian news companies Google and Facebook".
Australia's proposed media law, which currently targets Facebook and Google, follows a 2019 survey in Australia that found that companies receive a disproportionately large share of online advertising revenue, although much of it of their content comes from news companies. Since then, the news and media industry has been hit hard by the pandemic. The Guardian he says that more than a hundred local newspapers in Australia had to lay off journalists or shut down or stop printing as advertising revenue fell.
* Correction after a comment on Facebook.
