[ad_1]
Three summers ago, congressional hearings revealed how Facebook and Google control 70% of the digital advertising market, siphoning billions of dollars in revenue from local newspapers and broadcasters in the process. Facebook and Google foster this monopolistic dominance by borrowing content and brands from legitimate local news organizations and paying nothing in return. For more than 20 years, American newspapers and broadcasters have been barred from collective bargaining with the tech giant.
Meanwhile, the news industry is fighting for its life.
The United States is losing two newspapers a week and is on track to lose a third by 2025, according to a recent Northwestern University study. Seventy million Americans — one-fifth of the nation’s population — now live in communities that have no local news outlet, or one that is at risk of closing.
Without a local news source, citizens lack the information they need to make decisions about their lives, their health and safety, their schools, and their local governments. This is a crisis for our democracy – as if we needed another.
Congress seems poised to do something about it.
Last week, Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat, and Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy, a Republican, introduced a bipartisan, bicameral bill that would give local news publishers a fighting chance against the tech giants.
The Journalism Competition and Protection Act gives local news outlets a temporary reprieve from antitrust laws, allowing them to negotiate with Facebook and Google on revenue from republishing our content. If the tech companies don’t come to the table or negotiate in good faith, they will be forced into binding arbitration. News publishers can have their content banned from the platform if they don’t pay for it.
Think what your Facebook feed or Google search would look like without the rigorously reported news, information, accountability and investigative journalism of local publishers like Syracuse.com/The Post-Standard. The stream of sludge left behind will not be worth your time. Google and Facebook do not and never will hire local journalists.
Tech platforms know the benefits our content brings to their businesses. You don’t want the free ride to end. News publishers are also aware that they are forced to rely on Google and Facebook to grow their audience. The powerful tech duopoly has no incentive to come to the negotiating table. This is why news publishers need this law.
Google and Facebook — the fourth and eighth richest companies in the world, respectively — have made efforts to help the news industry. You may have noticed Google’s full-page ads in the Post-Standard recently, with PR-focused support touting “the local news our communities want.” Facebook’s parent company Meta recently stopped paying news publishers for content in their News Feed. The platforms are constantly adjusting their algorithms to decriminalize news content and highlight conflict, polarization and virality. This is bad not only for news publishers but also for the body politic. If Google and Facebook believe what they are advertising, they should be eager to embrace this new law and engage in meaningful revenue sharing with the news industry. We have all learned to be suspicious of the words and actions of big tech companies.
The concern is not only in the United States. Australia already has a law requiring tech platforms to pay news publishers for their content. Canada is moving in the same direction, with legislation to be voted on next year if not delayed.
Klobuchar’s new draft excludes major news publishers and television networks. That addresses fears that national outlets such as the New York Times, Washington Post and CNN would vacate much of their revenue from any deals with tech platforms. The bill targets news publishers with fewer than 1,500 employees and requires them to demonstrate how the money they collect from tech platforms supports local news gathering.
Longtime readers of Syracuse.com and The Post-Standard know how the news industry changes and adapts. Our news staff is growing. We are committed to serving the Central New York community. Getting properly compensated for the first time in 20 years from Facebook and Google is critical to our long-term success — but it could be life or death for news publishers going out of business.
The journalism bill has attracted broad bipartisan support in both the Senate and House. We urge Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, to vote on it when Congress convenes in September.
About Syracuse.com editors
Editorials represent the collective opinion of the Advance Media New York Editorial Board. Our opinion is independent of news coverage. Read our mission statement. Editorial Board members are Tim Kennedy, Trish LaMonte, Katrina Tulloch, and Marie Morelli.
To respond to this editorial: Submit a letter or comment to letters@syracuse.com. Read our submission guidelines.
If you have questions about the Comments and Editorials section, contact Marie Morelli, Editorial/Opinion Lead, at mmorelli@syracuse.com.
[ad_2]
Source link