Media owners canvass fair compensation by Google, Facebook, others
The Nigerian Guild of Editors and British Broadcasting Corporation Media Action, as part of over 50 people/organisations in 20 countries, have adopted the principles of fair compensation for publishers across the globe.
The endorsement was done on July 14 at a conference held at the Gordon Institute of Business Science, Johannesburg, South Africa.
The conference, with the theme: ‘The Big Tech and Journalism – Building a Sustainable Future for the Global South,’ was aimed at promoting media sustainability across the globe.
A statement on Monday said the need to have a framework for negotiations between registered news businesses and designated big digital platforms, primarily Google and Facebook, over the payment that publishers would be entitled to from big techs for the inclusion of news content on their platforms, led to the global launch of ‘Big Tech and Journalism: Principles for Fair Compensation,’ at the conference.
The NGE, through its General Secretary, Dr Iyobosa Uwugiaren – with support from leading journalists, media organisations, scholars, publisher groups, activists and economists, including 2001 Nobel laureate, Prof. Joseph Stiglitz, was part of the adoption.
“These principles are intended to help in the design, implementation and evaluation of public policy mechanisms that oblige digital platforms and news publishers to engage with each other to develop fair economic terms.
“The principles also recognise freedom of expression as a foundational human right underpinning democracy and support public-interest journalism as a public good that should be available to all. Any mechanisms about the principles must, therefore, be founded on the same commitment,’’ the conference stated.
In the principles, ‘platforms’ mean social media, chat, search engines, generative artificial intelligence models and applications, and other such intermediaries; while ‘publishers’ is referred to providers of original print, digital, or broadcast news using any combination of text, audio and visual media.
While policymakers in different jurisdictions were advised to use different policies to achieve similar aims – referring to it as ‘mechanisms’ throughout, the conference proposed overarching principles that should apply in a wide range of contexts, including between platforms and publishers.
The conference shared lessons learned and identified commonalities within and across regions about media sustainability initiatives via legislation and competition authorities.
Robust discussions were held on the experiences of countries, which had already or were considering implementing such initiatives to sustain journalism.
Among the key highlights of the event, “many participants supported approaches that seek sufficiently good short-term outcomes over potentially impossible or long-term perfect ones.”
The statement added that “The power of collective bargaining in achieving change was emphasised, particularly for small and media organisations and countries with lower bargaining power over tech platforms.”
Some of the principles identified for fair compensation include the fact that such mechanisms adopted should support and invest in public-interest journalism; plurality in the platform and publishing markets; diversity in the news publishing market; sustainability in the news publishing market, for individual publishers and the sector as a whole, by ensuring they receive fair compensation for the use of their intellectual property and content.
Another mentioned principle was to “adapt to evolving market conditions and enhance the likelihood that publishers can build diverse revenue streams.”
Also listed was “Fairness, that is, mechanisms should ensure that terms of engagement between platforms and publishers are consistent across a market; collectivity: Small and medium-sized publishers should be allowed to coordinate their efforts, which may include collective bargaining with platforms; highest possible degree of transparency should be adopted for both the process by which policy interventions are designed and implemented as well as the outcomes obtained.”
The principles have been endorsed by Alexis Johann, Managing Partner, FehrAdvice & Partners AG, Zürich, Switzerland; Anton Harber, Director, Campaign for Free Expression, South Africa; Dr Anya Schiffrin, Senior Lecturer of Practice, School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University, United States of America (US); Bruce Mutsvairo, Professor and UNESCO Chair on Disinformation, Data and Democracy, Utrecht University, Netherlands.
Others are Camille Grenier, Operations Director, Forum on Information and Democracy, France; Dr Chamil Wariya, Chairman, Malaysian Press Institute (MPI), Cyberjaya, Malaysia; Churchill Otieno, Executive Director, Eastern Africa Editors Society, and Chairman Africa Media Convention, Kenya; Dr Courtney Radsch, fellow UCLA Institute for Technology, Law and Policy and Director, Center for Journalism and Liberty, US; and Dr Dinesh Balliah, Director, Wits Centre for Journalism, Wits University, South Africa.
Others were Edetaen Ojo, Executive Director, Media Rights Agenda, Nigeria; Emma McDonald, Executive Director, Impact Missions, Minderoo Foundation, Australia; Franz Krüger, Associate Professor, NLA Mediehøgskolen, Kristiansand, Norway and associate researcher, Wits Centre of Journalism, South Africa; Hamadou Tidiane SY, journalist, founder of E-jicom and Ouestaf news, Senegal; Hani Barghouthi, Campaigns Manager, Public Interest News Foundation, United Kingdom; Izak Minnaar, independent journalism consultant and trainer, South Africa; and Dr Iyobosa Uwugiaren, General Secretary, Nigerian Guild of Editors, Nigeria, among others.
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