A California invoice that might pressure tech corporations similar to Facebook and Google to pay publishers for information content material has been placed on maintain within the Legislature till 2024.
The California Journalism Competition and Preservation Act, sponsored by Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, D-Oakland, would direct digital promoting giants to pay information retailers a “journalism usage fee” once they promote promoting alongside information content material. The invoice would require publishers to take a position 70% of these funds in preserving journalism jobs in California.
The invoice handed within the Assembly with bipartisan help June 1 and moved on to the state Senate. A listening to was initially scheduled for July 11, however Wicks’ workplace introduced Friday it will be rescheduled for 2024, selecting again up on the similar level within the legislative course of.
“I’ve agreed to make AB 886 a two-year bill in order to ensure the strongest legislation possible — because getting this policy right is more important than getting it quick,” Wicks mentioned in a information launch.
Senator Tom Umberg, D-Santa Ana, will maintain an informational listening to this fall to additional discover points the invoice makes an attempt to handle and have a look at examples of profitable laws in different nations to tell the California invoice.
“This interim hearing underscores my commitment to protecting journalism, California journalists and the access to a free and vibrant press that is essential to our democracy,” Umberg mentioned within the information launch. “My greatest concern is that we enact legislation that is fair, and that the benefits in this bill flow specifically to support local journalists — and in turn, all Californians.”
The California Legislature convenes in two-year periods, and payments launched within the first 12 months of a session may be carried over to the second 12 months. A primary-year invoice should cross its home of origin by Jan. 31 of the second 12 months to be prolonged, however there’s no assure that the invoice will probably be picked up once more.
The invoice has acquired robust help from information advocacy teams together with the California News Publishers Assn. and the News/Media Alliance. (The Los Angeles Times is a member of each organizations and helps the proposed laws.) However, it’s been vehemently opposed by varied tech trade commerce teams and Facebook mother or father firm Meta, which has gone so far as to threaten to take away all information content material from Facebook and Instagram if the invoice passes.
Meta has beforehand adopted by on this menace when an identical invoice was handed in Australia in February 2021 that required Google and Meta to pay journalism retailers for his or her content material. Facebook briefly blocked publishers and customers from sharing information hyperlinks on its platform however restored information content material days later after the Australian authorities agreed to make some adjustments to the News Media Bargaining Code.
Meta additionally introduced June 22 that it will be pulling entry to information on Facebook and Instagram in Canada after the nation handed a regulation requiring digital platforms to pay publications for his or her content material. Leading as much as the invoice’s passing, the corporate, together with Google, had already begun testing blocking entry to information hyperlinks for a small proportion of Canadian customers.
Meta confirmed in a press release it will transfer ahead with eradicating information content material for Canadians previous to the invoice taking impact in six months. Google has mentioned it’ll additionally do the identical for Canadian information websites in search outcomes.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”