The power struggle between Google, Facebook and Australia
To make tech giants pay for news content on their platforms, Facebook has implemented a ban on the sharing and viewing of Australian News that leaves Australians with unavailable local and global news sites.
This was a sudden move that not only blocked Australians from viewing news content but the rest of the world as well to accessing Australian news sites where the country's news publications were restricted from hosting their content on the platform to the
international sharing of links to news sites.
In response, the countries government has heavily criticized Facebook's move on who should be paying for the news content by stating, " it demonstrated the immense market power of these digital social giants."
Google, which holds fifty-three percent of Australian advertising, had threatened to make its search engine unavailable in the country as a way to open up a discussion on the current pricing on the news. While Facebook accounts for only twenty-three percent of advertising revenue, they decided to take an approach that would affect many people that would address a much bigger problem within media news and who pays for the content on their platforms.
"I think the Australian deal with Facebook and Google is a promising sign. Hopefully, it will allow media companies to afford more features and investigative journalism. . I'm pessimistic media giants like Bell will invest in journalism. They'll likely send the new revenue to the bottom line, but that could save jobs," says Doug Grant, journalism professor.
Amidst the fight over the price of news content, Australia's proposed law that forces internet companies to pay news organizations has other country governments like Europe and France stepping into pressuring Google, Facebook to pay news outlets and publishers for their material.
What does this mean for users'?
With seventeen million Australians accessing the site each day, a site that delivers emergency health updates and trusted key information- people are left furious at the sudden loss of vital content.
The ban had paved away and raised concerns for misinformation circulated on the platform leaving many to speak out about the controversy.
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