German cabinet backs law that could allow news publishers to sue Goog

[Brett_Tabke]

Update to an Earlier article with the German cabinit now backing the German law that would require Search Engines to pay for news listings:
[webmasterworld.com...]

The German cabinet gave its backing Wednesday to a draft law extending copyright protection to snippets of news articles republished by search engines, although proposals to make bloggers pay to quote articles they comment on have been dropped. Google said it was a bad day for the Internet in Germany.

Under the proposed law, news publishers could be allowed to charge search engines such as Google, as well as content aggregators, for reproducing short snippets from their articles. A publisher that thinks a search engine is infringing on its copyright by publishing snippets of text in search results could sue the search engine, said Hendrik Wieduwilt, spokesman for the German Ministry of Justice. The draft law is meant to protect news articles but also covers texts published by "professional" blogs, he said.

The draft law still has to pass through parliament, something Wieduwilt estimated could take up to a year.

The law will not require search engines to delete all the snippets, said Wieduwilt. "It is up to the publisher. The publisher can also agree that search engines can use the snippets for free," he said. "We won't install a snippet police."

The law is about piracy and stealing content on the internet, said federation spokeswoman Anja Pasquay. Search engines are pirating content by publishing the snippets, "and they don't even ask, they simply take it," she said. [pcadvisor.co.uk...]

[netmeg]

And Google's incentive to do that would be...

[SevenCubed]

Netmeg one incentive that comes to mind really quickly without giving this thing much thought is if google rivals decide to comply and pay for use of snippets whereas google decides not to, they could loose more searchers to the other engines. I guess it depends on how much Germans love to see newspaper snippets in SERPs. I'm only throwing this out as a high level train-of-thought as to where things might lead. There are probably others here who could see other peripheral consequences for those who don't conform.

[incrediBILL]

It could get even trickier.

Say for instance I'm a subscriber to that paper then I technically have paid to see those snippets already while non-subscribers have not.

Does Google need to pay to show them to an existing subscriber?

That would be double dipping.

[jecasc]

Netmeg one incentive that comes to mind really quickly without giving this thing much thought is if google rivals decide to comply and pay for use of snippets whereas google decides not to

Actually I think it will be the other way round. Some will demand money and Google will throw them out of the index. Others offering similar content will be happy to give Google a free license of usage and be happy about the new visitors. This can easily be managed by a robots.txt command. Google will intruduce a new robots.txt command and a new meta tag publishers can use to grant a free license. Two weeks after the law is in effect everybody will have opted in.

After all any publisher today could remove his content from Google or any other search engine and try to negotiate money for allowing Google to index his website. The reason it is not happening is simple: There is too much competition. Search engines will laugh them in the face and say: You need us more than we need you. And they are right. There is not a single website I can think of that is so unique and its content so valuable it has enough leverage to demand money for getting listed in a search engine.

[SevenCubed]

Lots of very good points jecasc. From my point of view I don't use a search engine for news. I already have my preferred newspapers and know their websites -- I just go there directly.

I guess the only time I would use search and find results from newspaper snippets is if I am looking for something obscure that hasn't hit the mainstream flow yet, or even at all -- and it's not in my geographic region so I would be unfamiliar with the newspaper name.

[Leosghost]

Say for instance I'm a subscriber to that paper then I technically have paid to see those snippets already while non-subscribers have not.

Red herring..:)

One "subscribes" to the newspaper or the site,in order to have "access" to the content and to view it on that site or the pages of that newspaper, one does not "subscribe" to the right to view the content of the newspaper or site presented by any passing scraper..and one's "subscription" does not give the right to any passing scraper to display it to one..

If it did..I could scrape "bild" or "die ziet" and show it to others , as long as I could claim "subscribers" were amongst my visitors..

[Leosghost]

After all any publisher today could remove his content from Google or any other search engine and try to negotiate money for allowing Google to index his website. The reason it is not happening is simple: There is too much competition. Search engines will laugh them in the face and say: You need us more than we need you. And they are right. There is not a single website I can think of that is so unique and its content so valuable it has enough leverage to demand money for getting listed in a search engine.

But search engines and Google in particular do not merely "index " and "list", they also scrape content and present "snippets", in order to have content to place their ads around..( and we won't get into Google and it's "image search" with it's use of "copyright imagery" without permission )..For some sites, Google moved from a model where it depended upon them ( parasitic ) to mutual benefit ( symbiotic ) to ( pathogenic parasitic ) ..the fact that it is now a very powerful parasite, living off myriads of hosts simultaneously, and can discard any one site it scrapes, or group of those it feeds upon, does not change the actual true nature of the beast..

[jecasc]

From my point of view I don't use a search engine for news.

And from my point of view as an Adwords user I don't use news relevant keywords for my ad campaigns on search engines. Where are all the ads for "euro crisis", "syria conflict" or "florida republican convention". When there are ads it's usually only news sites bidding on those keywords.

And were are the news snippets in SERPS for ad relevant keywords like "cheap widgets", "widget shop", "buy red widgets online"?

[londrum]

There is not a single website I can think of that is so unique and its content so valuable it has enough leverage to demand money for getting listed in a search engine.

if you're just talking about the main google news page, then i agree with you. but what about all the news stories that google slots into the regular SERPs?

what if i search for something local... if google can't include stories from local and regional papers then that is going to completely mess up google's universal SERPs, because big national papers don't cover that kind of stuff.

[jecasc]

what if i search for something local... if google can't include stories from local and regional papers then that is going to completely mess up google's universal SERPs

But they could ALREADY remove their content from Google since Google is following the robots.txt standard and try to negotiate payment for inclusion. But they can't because of the competition and - because there is no money to share.

There are simply not enough ads for their content. There are close to no ads for news - not for global, national or local news.

[scooterdude]

Thing is, newspapers are already news search engines, so,,,

[Brett_Tabke]

I just read the news here:
[news.google.com...]

I pretty much know the major things going on in the US and parts of the world now. I did not click a single link.

[SevenCubed]

^ Ahhhhhhhaha, the plot thickens

[jecasc]

I just read the news here:
[news.google.com...]

I pretty much know the major things going on in the US and parts of the world now. I did not click a single link.

And how many ads did you see, and how many did you click, and for how much did you buy?

But you shared one of the articles you found there which you would never have seen otherwise and for the first time in my life I visited pcadvisor.co.uk - a website I have never heard of before. And at least I saw some of the ads on their website. (I hope they get payed per view, though.)

[moTi]

it will have the same outcome as with the belgian news publishers some time ago. a few weeks after google had banned them from the news index, they all came back asking to be included again.

[cwnet]

I pretty much know the major things going on in the US and parts of the world now. I did not click a single link.

Running a news website I know that the majority of people feel informed by just reading the headlines - of course they are not really informed - they just feel informed.

As a publisher, I do not care about those - or random by-flyers from Google, Twitter or Facebook where I don't even no if they are real people or bots.

Those who want to be fully informed will need to read the full story - which requires a paid subscription - similar to the supporters section of webmasterworld :-)

As the publisher of a news website I do not care about advertisers - I care about my paying subscribers. As long as advertisers are not willing to pay serious money I don't care about them. An advertisement free website is a real pleasure for readers.

Its actually very satisfying to write for readers - not for advertisers or search engines (no SEO needed).

Google is blocked - if they want to use my content in any way, they will have to pay.

BTW: The German equivalent to "fair use" is called Zitierrecht - you are free to citate - not to be confused with copying.

You guessed it - I am German and I fully support the proposed new law :-)

[diberry]

I just read the news here:
[news.google.com...]

I pretty much know the major things going on in the US and parts of the world now. I did not click a single link.

That's skating right on the edge of a "fair use" violation of US copyright law, as I understand it (wiki "fair use" for more info).

You have the right, without permission, to quote short snippets of others' work and give credit. With printed media, this was simple: just don't quote too much.

But on the internet, we can tell whether links are getting clicked, so it's easier to prove when someone's link to a source is benefiting the source at all, or just benefiting the quoter. Best practice for bloggers is to make sure, no matter what size "snippet" or how you credit the source, that your links make your readers want to go visit your sources, too. That's your best defense if someone claims you used their material unfairly - "But I sent their site traffic. They benefited. No monetary damage was done."

Of course, there really haven't been enough cases to do with internet abuse of "fair use" to know for sure how it's all going to shake out. Google is definitely pushing the envelope, for Brett to be able to do what he just did.

I don't think the internet could function without fair use, so I'm not sure I'm a fan of this German law, per se. But I agree Google can't be allowed to essentially republish others' content without benefiting the original source in some way.

[driller41]

This is a very slippery slope, soon google wont be able to steal anyones content at all, whatever next. tic

[Bluejeans]

I'm more worried about the Knowledge Graph which has a greater potential to display content without even a link back to the source. Cutts said recently that fact-based websites could be in trouble but where does he think facts come from? Often they come from people who went to the trouble of researching them. As copyright doesn't extend to facts what Google is doing is probably legal but it sure ain't right.

[piatkow]

But they could ALREADY remove their content from Google since Google is following the robots.txt standard

That old chestnut again. You are saying that I have to explicitly tell people that they are not allowed to steal my property.

[Marketing Guy]

Isn't Google News opt-in?

[support.google.com...]

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

Google said it was a bad day for the Internet in Germany.

What? It was a bad day for Google in Germany but, in the long run, may very well shift some of Google's billions per quarter to the sites that publish the content. In reality a company that has little content, like Google, but deals almost exclusively in other peoples content shouldn't be making SO much more than those it borrows things from.

[blend27]

....In reality a company that has little content..

If we really think about it.... Think about casual boss that is 2-3 levels up, walks around, everybody says HI, makes "dude knows what, more than all below". Looks nice and prosperous to the masses with in.

"Next Cube Mate".com is giving in about all the "i & we & them" as it is expected, screw robots.txt.

Corporate. +$$.$$$.$$$.$$$. All because we as humans are nice to each other, scream via social media(none of that here) at someone in SE ASIA for scraping our content while in-house prosperous dude just walks by and says "HI", then thousand mile away, with in seconds, some ones opinion about what we really are changed by motivation to ...

[Leosghost]

^^^nailed it :)

[Maurice]

@Sgt Kickaxe

So Google just shows bare links with no snippet for sites that dont want snippets of course this will reduce ctr and drive traffic to other publishers.

I can see other publishers setting up German language sites to target german speaking audiences (maybe I coudl get Keith to get me Alan Rushbidgers mail address so i can pitch them :-)

German polaticians interaction with the internet always reminds me of the Don Camillo Stories - and NOT in a good way

[Maurice]

@cwnet so when all .de sites are opt in by default you will be happy works for me.

and how is a snippet not a citation?

[Sgt_Kickaxe]

@Sgt Kickaxe

So Google just shows bare links with no snippet for sites that dont want snippets of course this will reduce ctr and drive traffic to other publishers.

See, you're stuck on how Google HAS BEEN doing things. I propose they pay me a small amount for the RIGHT to borrow my content(for snippets or anything else), otherwise you're right and their site will look silly. Again, Google owns none of my content so why should the BILLIONS of dollars they make per quarter from showing "not their content" not trickle down a little further?

[ken_b]

What's the problem?

Google rewrites titles now anyhow, surely they can automate rewriting news titles and snippets to avoid copyright issues and still link to the original source?

[cwnet]

@maurice

a citation is a, well, citation you put into the context of your own content

a snippet is a simple copy - also known as scraping