Those Who Buy Ideas By The Crate Execute For The Joy

Michael Hedges October 12, 2020 - Follow on Twitter

Digital economics is perilous. Even the high tech world can be rattled by uncertainties at the intersection of consumer preference and profit. Old school practices provide no refuge as the replacement rate defies gravity. Ideas are wonderful; execution tedious and expensive. In the middle find the lawyers.

Over the course of this month and part of last search engine giant Google, subsidiary of Alphabet, announced several initiatives with the seeming intent of mollifying rowdy publishers. All of these involved, in one way or another, promising publishers more Google Money. There were conditions, of course. Google executives want to keep publisher’s sticky hands off their proprietary technologies, never want their business confused with publishing and always want to contain any financial impact.

Several months ago the French Competition Authority (l'Autorité de la Concurrence) moved to transcribe new European Union copyright rules meant to fund news publishers from revenues earned by Google into French law. Publishers have twisted themselves into knots justifying demands on a privately-owned technology company for subsidies of dubious legality under State Aid rules. Google lawyers appealed this ruling and, last week (October 7), the Paris Court of Appeals rejected that appeal and ordered Google lawyers into binding negotiations with publisher association Alliance de la Presse d’Information Générale (APIG).

Neighboring rights, known in France as droit voisin and, more correctly, related rights are at the distended end of copyright law. As original creators benefit from usual and accepted copyright provisions, theoretically, from the moment of creation, neighboring or related rights accrue to other rights holders, often employers of the original creators. The neighboring right at current issue was created by the European Commission specifically for publishers to force search engine providers into binding agreements for compensation. After all, search engine providers - specifically Google - have hundreds of millions of users and commensurate advertising revenue.

News publishers ran out of leverage decades ago as the World Wide Web took shape. IT geniuses invested considerable time and talent roping together disparate regions of the Web to “index everything.” They designed languages, protocols and algorithms where none had existed before. Borrowing from academic attribution long accepted under copyright law this indexing showed a title, link to the original work and a short description, often called a “snippet.” Readers widely preferred these digital access points, mostly giving up physical copies.

Publishers scoffed, at first, at these new fangled things. They never liked TV, either. Then search applications came to mobile devices. Advertisers and media buyers, never ones to miss a trend, got their own bots. Finding themselves so far behind the digital curve as to be indistinguished from disappeared, publishers went for their last, best option and called in their political friends. There needs to be a law, they howled.

The main parties, it seems, have already taken talks to some level. "Our discussions.” said Google France managing director Sébastien Missoffe, quoted by AFP (October 8), “could make it possible to validate the key principles of an agreement based on criteria of audience, non-discrimination and contribution to the production of political and general information. We want to support journalism and ensure continued access to quality content for as many people as possible.”

The talks "have clarified numerous points and confirmed that Google accepts the principle of remuneration for newspapers,” said APIG chairman and Groupe Les Echos chief executive Pierre Louette,” quoted by AFP (October 8). It is a hopeful note for French publishers, starring at the possibility of Google simply walking away as it did when the Spanish parliament imposed an “inalienable right” in 2014 for publishers to claim compensation for any search index entries with no recourse. Google executives saw no choice and closed Google Spain.

At the first of October Google teased a US$1 billion payment scheme - the mobile app News Showcase - for “high quality” content. So far about 200 titles are involved from Germany and Brazil. Including French publishers, reportedly, was delayed ahead of the Court of Appeals ruling. French solidarity being something of a myth, news agency AFP signed up for News Showcase and, according to media watchers, major daily Le Monde is next.

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