Fri 19 November 2021:
Google, owned by Alphabet, will begin paying Agence France-Presse (AFP) for its news output as part of a wide five-year cooperation announced on Wednesday, which is one of the largest licensing agreements negotiated by a tech giant under a new French law.
News organizations, which have been losing ad revenue to online aggregators like Google and Facebook for years, have complained about the internet companies utilizing stories in search results or other services without paying for them.
According to AFP, the agreement was based on French law’s “remuneration of neighboring rights,” and it came after months of negotiations inside the framework provided by the French Competition Authority.
Other projects will be included in the deal, including a fact-checking program about which more information will be released soon.
New regulations in France and Australia, fueled by media lobbying and public pressure, have given publishers more clout, resulting in a wave of licensing deals worth billions of dollars all over the world.
“This agreement is a recognition of the value of information. This will contribute to the production of quality information and the development of innovation within the Agency,” AFP CEO Fabrice Fries said in a statement.
A group of 121 French news companies, including AFP, agreed to pay Google USD76 million over three years earlier this year.
However, the deal has been put on hold pending the outcome of an antitrust investigation in which France’s competition agency accuses Google of not negotiating in good faith.
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