Home » Facebook-News Corp agreement to pay for news, Thomson: “After Australia it will be Europe’s turn”

Facebook-News Corp agreement to pay for news, Thomson: “After Australia it will be Europe’s turn”

by admin

New York. Eventually Zuckerberg caved, and made a deal with Murdoch to pay for his newspaper content. For now, the agreement between Facebook and News Corp concerns Australia, but it can become a model to save traditional media around the world, starting with Europe.

The digital giants have dried up the advertising market, pushing newspapers into bankruptcy. So News Corp CEO Robert Thomson has been running a global campaign for years to persuade Facebook, Google and others to share some of the profits. The logical reason for the request is that the digital giants earn by relaunching the content produced by others for free, in terms of traffic and advertising, and therefore it is right that they pay. Also because quality information costs money, and by taking away the resources it suffocates, leaving to social networks only the fake news generated who knows how. According to the State Department, for example, the latest disinformation campaign launched by Russia wants to discredit the American vaccines against Pfizer-type Covid, to encourage sales of Sputnik and damage the image of Western democracies.

So far, digital companies have replied that news represents a negligible chunk of their business, and in any case newspapers are rewarded by the traffic they earn by relaunching them. This is perhaps partially true for clicks, but certainly not for advertising, an indispensable resource for survival. And then, however small, the news business is still useful for social media and search engines: what for them is small change, for traditional media represent survival. Furthermore, killing the most reliable newspapers in favor of fake news does not suit any civil society and undermines democracy.

See also  In the dispute over NordLB, a solution is probably emerging

Starting from these arguments, Murdoch convinced the Australian government to approve the News Media Bargaining Code, which forces digital giants to make deals with traditional media, or go to court for arbitration on the value of the content they consume. Facebook initially reacted by blocking access to news in Australia for its users. The law was changed, and now Menlo Park has made a three-year deal with News Corp to pay for the news, which Thomson called “a milestone in the transformation of journalism.” Now the hope of anyone who cares about quality information, and therefore the future of democracy, should be that the Australian agreement becomes a global model. As Thomson himself told La Stampa, hoping that Austra now also touches the Old Continent: “Europe will certainly be the next frontier for digital dialogue regarding a premium for premium journalism”.

You may also like

Leave a Comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. Accept Read More

Privacy & Cookies Policy