The EU will put pressure on companies that make money from journalists

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European Union legislators overseeing the preparation of a new regulation of digital activities in Europe want to proceed similarly to Australia. They want to get big technology companies to pay for news. The British Financial Times reported on its website.

According to the Financial Times (FT) , an initiative by members of the European Parliament would be a heavy blow to the American Internet company Google. She has previously threatened to leave Australia to protest plans for a new Australian law that would force large Internet companies to pay media companies the right to use their content. Now they make money from news content through the sale of advertising, but companies do not even get a crown from this income.

We welcome the initiative of Members of the European Parliament as it seeks to avoid problems that are likely to arise in all EU markets if digital platforms are allowed to continue to abuse their dominance in the negotiation process for licensing agreements using the derived rights of publishers and journalists, photographers, graphic artists and other creative professions in the role of authors of published reports, said Václav Mach, Executive Director of the Professional Association of the Union of Publishers.

Members of the European Parliament working on proposals to regulate France Télécom's digital activities said that these proposals could be adapted as part of the approval process to include elements of Australian reforms. These include, for example, the possibility of binding arbitration on intelligence fees.

We are waiting for how the legislation will be implemented in individual EU countries and how the market will react. In France, for example, the debate is moving towards concrete conclusions. I believe that other countries will follow. I do not rule out that we will return to the debate on setting up the relationship between publishers and platforms if it turns out that the current reform was not enough, said Dita Charanzová (YES), Vice-President of the European Parliament, to iDNES.cz.

Abuse of dominance

Maltese MEP Alex Saliba said the Australian approach addresses an acute imbalance in bargaining power between publishers and large Internet companies such as Google and Facebook. Thanks to their dominant position in search, social media and advertising, large social platforms create an imbalance of power and benefit significantly from news content. I think it's only fair that he pays back a fair amount.

I support copyright protection for media content as long as it leads to an agreement between the media and internet giants and does not end with some drastic measures. We must be careful that this protection does not turn against ordinary Internet users, said Jiří Pospíšil, MEP and Chairman of the Prague TOP 09.

According to him, the current legal regulation is only partial and it needs to be completed. The Commission has already presented the relevant proposals and is currently being thoroughly addressed by the EP.

Google and Facebook stepped up their efforts to conclude licensing agreements for intelligence in Europe when the EU stepped up its copyright policy last year. These changes allow news publishers to claim compensation for portions of content that appear on Internet platforms. However, according to some MEPs, this system remains too weak, writes the Financial Times.

Estonian MEP Andrus Ansip, who was involved in adapting copyright rules, said he was open to further changes. The idea of ​​the Copyright Directive was to create a stronger bargaining position for news publishers. We will never accept a situation where someone uses the content and the authors are not rewarded in any way.

MEPs are in favor of fair payments

Support for the introduction of similar rules as in Australia, according to the Financial Times in the European Parliament, is growing. However, MEPs disagree on how best to make these changes and whether it would not be better to wait for the implications of amending the copyright rules to become clearer.

Google recently signed a copyright agreement with the lobbying association Alliance de la presse d'information générale (APIG), which represents French national and regional dailies.

Google said, People believe that Google can help them find relevant and reliable information from a wide range of websites. This helps publishers because it increases the use of their site. We are willing to pay to continue to support journalistic work. And we do it all over the world.