Comments on: Did Google pay Belgian newspapers a $6M copyright fee? Sure looks like it

By: tatilsever

tatilsever — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 23:13:02 +0000

Google is not sending them traffic because it is oh-so altruistic. It is part of building a one-stop shop for all searches and monetize from the strength of that brand. Thus, despite your denigration, it is really a privilege of sorts to send that traffic. Yes, newspapers can cut off Google completely, but you can make the exact same argument against Google. If it does not want to share any revenue from its advertising business, it can shut off its News aggregation page.

Google cannot argue that it is OK for it to use copyrighted content in non-fair use ways, because it is beneficial overall for the newspaper websites. It has to prove that whatever it is doing is really fair use, regardless of whether it makes money for the newspapers in some ways. Well, either that or negotiate with newspapers to reach a mutually acceptable agreement. It seems Google picked the latter option. Google’s scheme looks like fair use to me, but I don’t think Google would settle the case if it was an open and shut case.

By: Durant Imboden

Durant Imboden — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 23:39:51 +0000

There’s a big difference between a search engine like Google News and an aggregator like The Huffington Post. A news-search engine feeds traffic to publishers by displaying links (with just enough information to whet the searcher’s interest), while a news aggregator like HuffPo generally rewrites other publishers’ stories, providing enough information to save readers the bother of clicking on links to third-party sites.

News publishers love to attack Google for doing what search engines do, but they know perfectly well that they can deny access to Google News with one line of text in a robots.txt file. Why don’t they take advantage of the Robots Exclusion Standard, which is older than Google or any of today’s news sites? Simple: They want free traffic from Google. At the same time, they want Google to pay for the privilege of sending them traffic. That makes no sense at all, and if news publishers can’t figure out how to earn revenue from their sites without biting the hand that feeds them, the future of their businesses would appear to be in jeopardy.

By: Brian Matthias

Brian Matthias — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 14:21:13 +0000

they should pay me for displaying the advertisement on my screen

By: Mike

Mike — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 13:41:44 +0000

Can you imagine a world where Facebook, Google and the like had to pay for what it uses? It would completely change its business model. I think it is inevitable though. You can only base your vision on other peoples stuff for so long before they get miffed and want something for their hard work. The flip side is to continue the if its free its for me til no one produces anything worth seeing, or reading. Like the Patch/AOL in the US

By: bob

bob — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 12:31:00 +0000

Why is their case for “fair use” strong? They don’t add anything to the conversation at all. They don’t do any work. Fair use is so writers can create something new while including simple references to the old. It’s not meant for someone to take the best and most important part of a work while adding nothing, nada to the world. It’s a way to free load.

By: Jan

Jan — Fri, 14 Dec 2012 06:56:14 +0000

Yes they have built up an enourmous reach, but most of them failed to monetize – that’s why they cry for lawmakers to assist.

By: Jeff John Roberts

Jeff John Roberts — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 20:34:17 +0000

Thanks for your comment, Christoph. I confess my opinions are based on my experiences in France, Spain, Norway and the UK — I am not in a position to judge Germany. That said, I am very skeptical of German lawmakers’ efforts to impose what amounts to a tax on Google in order to subsidize incumbent news distributors. I understand the political appeal but such behavior is not healthy from either an economic or free expression perspective.

By: Simon

Simon — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 18:39:57 +0000

and you should the UK papers efforts as well – the Guardian, Independent and even the Daily Mail have very popular website. In Belgium, Le Soir and others are also producing good online editions

By: Robert Andrews

Robert Andrews — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 17:51:16 +0000

It’s not necessarily “half-baked”…
Charging a levy for re-use of online news excerpts by commercial news aggregators has been a reality in the UK for over a year now — backed by court.

By: Christoph Keese

Christoph Keese — Thu, 13 Dec 2012 17:06:11 +0000

Jeff, your critical remark on Europe’s news digitization seems a bit strange. May I direct your attention to Schibsted, Axel Springer, Burda? And please note the enormous reaches German news websites have built up – in many cases online has by far surpassed print. Publishers having missed out on digital sounds more like Google propaganda than reality. Very best, Christoph Keese (Axel Springer AG, Berlin).