Facebook to ban Australian users from seeing news

[Celerity]

https://eu.usatoday.com/story/tech/news/2021/02/17/australia-law-has-google-making-publisher-deals-facebook-walking/6785773002/

Facebook said users and publishers in Australia won’t be able to put news on its site. The announcement Wednesday was in response to Australia’s proposed law to make social media companies pay news outlets for their content. The decision means that Australian publishers can’t share or post content to their official Facebook pages. Publishers outside the country can still post content on Facebook, but Australians will be unable to view or share it. Facebook users globally will not be able to view or share news stories from Australian publishers.

In a blog post, Facebook said the country’s policies would have a detrimental effect on publishers. “It has left us facing a stark choice: attempt to comply with a law that ignores the realities of this relationship, or stop allowing news content on our services in Australia,” Facebook said. “With a heavy heart, we are choosing the latter.” In a separate blog post, Campbell Brown, Facebook’s vice president of global news, said Wednesday that the proposed law fails to recognize the “fundamental nature” of the relationship between the site and publishers. “From finding new readers to getting new subscribers and driving revenue, news organizations wouldn’t use Facebook if it didn’t help their bottom lines,” Brown said.

However, the leader of one group has publicly taken exception with Facebook's decision. The social network's action severely restricts content for Australians, impacting not only news sites, but government health, emergency services and police pages that share crucial information such as COVID-19 updates, Elaine Pearson, the director of the Human Rights Watch Australia, tweeted Wednesday.

"This is an alarming and dangerous turn of events. Cutting off access to vital information in the dead of the night is unconscionable," Pearson said. "Mark Zuckerberg has publicly stated that he doesn't think it's a right for a private company to censor the news and Human Rights Watch agrees. We call on Facebook to immediately lift these restrictions."

snip

Link to tweet

[roamer65]

1. Makes me even happier that I killed my rarely used Facebook account about a year ago.

[radical noodle]

2. Do US media companies expect Facebook to pay

when they post their news stories? Seems to me that Australia might be as much at fault as Facebook.

[Celerity]

3. Facebook's decision came on the same day Google said it would pay publishers for content,

striking a three-year deal with News Corp. to run its global content on Google News Showcase, according to The Associated Press. Google reached a similar deal with Australian publisher Seven West Media and is close to an agreement with Nine Entertainment, the AP reported. “Everything that I have heard from the parties, in both the news media business and in terms of digital platforms, is that these are generous deals,” said Australia’s treasurer, Josh Frydenberg.

[PSPS]

4. Nobody (facebook, google, etc.,) should be able to freely profit from stealing

Newsrooms have to have a paid staff of reporters who go out and do investigations and write stories. Who pays them? They're on the newspaper's payroll, so the newspaper does. Or, it tries to. Where does it get its money to pay them? It used to be paid advertising in their print editions, the most profitable being classified ads. Well, the internet destroyed classified advertising, so they have to rely on paid subscriptions to pay their bills and employees.

So, along comes "news aggregators" and others like facebook, google, etc., who steal the newspapers' writing and put it on their websites. More money for them, less money for the people who did the work. Sound familiar? So the newspaper's budget gets smaller, less reporters, less output, less scrutiny on the shenanigans in the local city hall. Eventually, the newspaper goes out of business or gets absorbed by some national conglomerate with no roots or interest in the local community.

Newspaper revenue is down 2/3 in just the last ten years.

[True Dough]

8. Excellent summation

of a very troubling situation. I would add that many fine mainstream and alternative media outlets have suffered from years of a devious "president" repeatedly declaring them "fake news" while numerous highly-partisan publishers, stations, channels and websites have sprung up. It's a mess out there.

[radical noodle]

11. I agree with that but...

Individuals post links on Facebook of stories on the news websites. Almost any news service provides little buttons on the side to share in different places like Facebook and Twitter. I never see a news story posted by Facebook, only individuals. Often if I click on the link a person has posted I hit a paywall as I have limited subscriptions. Sometimes I'll pay if I'm really interested, and sometimes I just leave. What about Twitter? Their setup is more like Facebook than Google.

Google is different. They have Google News that has links to lots of news stories that they've gathered and that's a news service that's profiting from sharing stories others have written.

Don't get me wrong. I want newspapers to thrive and have the incomes they need to continue but if they don't want people on Facebook to see it, don't put the buttons there to share it. They have their paywalls to prevent free access. Additionally, many newspapers have their own Facebook page where they put the stories up themselves.

Maybe I'm missing something...

[msongs]

5. so should DU have to pay for all the news clips posted here? nt

[PSPS]

10. That's why DU has its limits on what can be quoted.

[radical noodle]

12. It's mostly links with a photo

that are posted on Facebook. I don't see the entire article there.

[Thyla]

6. This whole big money circle jerk would be quite funny

If it didn't do the complete opposite as to what it set out to do.

Here is a reasonable explanation.
https://theconversation.com/facebook-versus-australia-the-government-hands-facebook-a-free-pass-155628

Besides the above, FB are well within their rights and are abiding by the ridiculous law implemented. People should stop losing their shit over it and see it for what it is.

No actually it still is quite funny.

[Violet_Crumble]

7. I don't think it's funny that govt pages and charities etc were blocked...

I don't use FB to get my news, I've always gone directly to the news sites, but I'm extremely pissed off that FB blocked pages like state govt Covid info and the Hannah Clarke foundation just before the first anniversary of the murders.

Misinformation about the virus is rampant on FB. It let the Stop the steal crap fester unchecked for so long, but now it's removing charities and official news sources? Fuck Mark Zuckerberg. It's all about the money and I really hope FB goes the way of myspace....

[PSPS]

9. The answer is to bring the hammer down

The blocking of legitimate sites is just zuckerberg getting "revenge" for being forced to do the right thing, thinking that this will bring pressure to scuttle the legislation. You're right, it's not "funny" at all. People should direct that anger where it belongs -- at zuckerberg.

[radical noodle]

13. It's my understanding

that page is now back on Facebook (yes, just checked and it's there). I also see Australian government pages. I thought the only ban was of newspapers who demanded payment.