The 2021 really has had an interesting start. Across the Tasman Sea, in Australia, the government is in a process of implementing a new law – media bargaining code – which requires Google and Facebook to negotiate with news companies about compensation for their content. To pre-empt some more drastic measures, Google has signed multiple substantial deals with news companies including News Corp and Seven West Media for compensation. These deals each are tens of millions of dollars. In contrast, Facebook, created a media storm on 18th of February, by banning Australians to share or read any news content on its platform. Facebook, simply, does what it wants to do, and it certainly does not want any government to tell it how much it should pay for the news content.
In the context of this ‘perfect storm’, I was interviewed on mentioned in the NZ media about these issues. Here are some links to the stories:
Dr Merja Myllylahti 