Lawmakers Ready Bill as Big Tech's War With News Outlets Flares
Lawmakers Ready Bill as Big Tech's War With News Outlets Flares
Wednesday, 10 March 2021 08:47 AM
The
battle between news publishers and Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Facebook Inc.
that flared up in Australia recently is coming to the U.S.
Lawmakers
plan to re-introduce legislation Wednesday to allow news organizations to band
together to negotiate with the technology companies over payment for content
and the data the companies have about readers.
The
legislation, which is being proposed in the Senate and House with bipartisan
support, would make the U.S. the next front in the news industry’s war against
Facebook and Google. Publishers scored a major victory last month when
Australia passed a law to force the companies to pay for news content. In
Europe, publishers have been lobbying European Union lawmakers to copy parts of
the Australian law.
“A
strong, diverse, free press is critical for any successful democracy,” said
David Cicilline, the Rhode Island Democrat who chairs the House antitrust
subcommittee and has introduced the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act
in the last two Congresses.
Publishers
have long complained that Facebook and Google are profiting off their content
by siphoning ad revenue and controlling valuable data about readers.
Media
organizations argue that to gain negotiating leverage and level the playing
field, they must be able to collectively bargain with the platforms, something
that’s prohibited under U.S. antitrust laws.
The
proposed legislation would grant them a safe harbor from that restriction, but
it doesn’t include a proposal for forced arbitration between the tech companies
and the publishers, a provision that’s included in the Australian law and which
the tech companies fought. Facebook even went so far as to blackout its news
feed in the country before winning some concessions.
Amy
Klobuchar of Minnesota, who is leading the initiative in the Senate, said the
legislation is necessary to help publishers better negotiate by giving them
tools to counteract the power of Google and Facebook.
“The
reason that we’re brought to this moment is that they have an unfettered
monopoly,” Klobuchar said in an interview. Google and Facebook “thought they
had so much power they could literally exit a major country,” she added.
Klobuchar
said the legislation has a better shot at passage this time because of
bipartisan interest in antitrust issues today. Senate Minority Leader Mitch
McConnell will be a cosponsor of the bill, she said. Ken Buck, a Colorado
Republican and the ranking member of the House antitrust committee, is a
co-sponsor of the legislation in the House along with Cicilline.
“Local
journalism plays such an important role in keeping the American people
informed, but many of our community newspapers have been crushed by the threat
of big tech,” Buck said in a statement. “This bipartisan bill will send a
lifeline to local news organizations struggling to survive because Google and
Facebook have decimated the news industry.”
The
House will wade into the issue Friday when the antitrust panel holds a hearing
as part of its initiative to consider antitrust reforms following a 16-month
investigation that accused tech companies of squashing competition.
In
its report on the findings of the investigation, the committee recommended
providing publishers the antitrust safe harbor provision, saying the risk
associated with antitrust exemptions are low, “while the benefits of preserving
access to high-quality journalism are difficult to overstate.”
David
Chavern, the president of the News Media Alliance, a trade association that
represents about 2,000 news organizations in the U.S., said the biggest
beneficiaries would be small publishers, and it’s the “only way to get some
capacity to negotiate.”
Australia’s
initial proposal would have forced the companies to submit to arbitration to
determine how much to pay publishers if deals couldn’t be struck. In response,
Google threatened to shut down its search engine, while Facebook imposed a news
blackout on its platform in the county.
Google
is moving to negotiate deals with publishers, while Facebook backed down after
concessions from the government allowing the companies to choose which
commercial deals to pursue, and only subjecting them to arbitration as a last
resort. The Australian Parliament passed the legislation last month.
Facebook’s
standoff with Australia prompted Cicilline to lash out at the company.
“Threatening
to bring an entire country to its knees to agree to Facebook’s terms is the
ultimate admission of monopoly power,” he tweeted.
The
possibility of forced arbitration could emerge in the U.S. Chavern said the
News Media Alliance is examining proposals that could force the platforms to
pay for news when an agreement can’t be reached.
“The
foot can’t be taken off the gas,” Jason Kint, chief executive officer of
Digital Content Next, an internet publisher trade group that counts Bloomberg
News as a member, said in an interview. “You have to convince the public that
these companies are problematic to the health of the industry the way it works
right now.”
Danielle
Coffey, senior vice president and general counsel of the News Media Alliance,
said the group is working with the lawmakers to include an oversight mechanism
in an expanded bill.
“I’m
sure they will look at Australia in considering what to do,” said Coffey. “The
most important thing is the goal to get equitable terms for small and local
publishers and to require good faith negotiations by the platforms.”
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