‘Google Should Pay’: Indian Newspaper Body Asks for 85% Ad Revenue

Following the face-off between the Australian government and Facebook, the INS penned a letter to Google.

Image for representative purposes.

(Photo: AP)

As global clashes between big-tech and media companies continue, a body of India's biggest newspapers, the Indian Newspaper Society (INS) on Thursday, 25 February asked tech giant Google to give them revenue in exchange for carrying their content online and share 85 per cent of the ad revenues, NDTV reported.

Following the face-off between the Australian government and Facebook, the INS, which is representative of 800 publishers, penned a letter to Google saying the US firm "should pay for news generated by the newspapers which employ thousands of journalists".

In a statement, it further stated that "since the content which is generated and published by newspapers at considerable expense is proprietary, it is this credible content which has given Google the authenticity in India ever since its inception," NDTV reported.

The newspaper body noted how big tech has recently agreed to better compensate publishers in the European Union, France and Australia after many years of publishers across the world raising their concerns on ad revenue and of payment for their content.

It said, "Advertising has been the financial backbone of the news industry. However, newspaper publishers are seeing their share of the advertising pie shrinking in the digital space, even as Google is taking a giant share of advertising spends, leaving publishers with a small share,” NDTV reported.

The INS further added that the tech giant should give greater prominence to editorial content from credible news publishers, in a bid to tackle fake news, stressing that Google often picks up content from sketchy sites, thus "amplifying misinformation and propagation of fake news.”

Digital giants Facebook and Google have each said they will invest around US$1 billion in news globally over the coming three years.

This development comes after the Australian parliament passed a law to make Google and Facebook compensate media companies for their content on their platforms.

Scott Morrison, Australian Prime Minster, had also expressed that he had discussed these legislative developments with Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

(With inputs from NDTV)