Editorial | Big Tech showdown to make news in Hong Kong
- The city’s government should be prepared for a battle between publishers and social media giants over news payments on the home front
In the long battle over content payment between Big Tech and news publishers, Big Tech has won every step of the way. After all, one industry is in ascendence, the other in rapid decline.
In this unequal fight, first Australia and now the European Union are stepping in to force Big Tech to pay up. News groups around the world are watching closely, as everyone – from consumers to journalists and publishers – will potentially be affected.
It’s tempting to see the fight as one between David and Goliath. After all, practically everyone agrees that social media and search giants such as Facebook and Google have become too powerful. More people, especially younger generations, get their news from news aggregators rather than news sites or God forbid, a physical newspaper.
News producers want Big Tech to pay them, but Big Tech says it is not stealing anything. Rather, it is helping to collate content and direct viewer traffic, so news groups may get readers who otherwise might have never known their existence. Its searches also respect the paywalls of proprietary news sites.
It’s not that Big Tech has won the argument so far. Rather, by sheer market clout and dominance, it has been able to impose its will. The intervention of big governments, however, has now equalised the fight.