The institution closes an open affair two and a half years ago, with the complaint of publishers demanding the remuneration of extracts of articles by the search engine.
By
A “complex and eventful dossier, with many episodes” ends, welcomed Tuesday, June 21, Benoît Ciseuré, the president of the Competition Authority. The institution rendered its third decision in a case started in November 2019, when several press publishers’ unions filed a complaint against Google. The authority accepted the commitments of the search engine: they, she explained, create “a more stable and equitable framework” for the negotiation of “neighboring rights”, which compensate for the resumption of extracts of Articles by digital platforms.
“We want this decision to have the value of an example, commented Mr. Cueuré. France was the first country to transpose the 2019 European Directive on Copyright [which created the neighboring law]. It is also the country in the world where Google makes the most concessions. “
The authority validated – after having “strengthened them” – the commitments made in December 2021 by the American company. Thus, Google has agreed to negotiate the amount of neighboring rights separately, without mixing them with other commercial licenses such as Showcase, a tab of its search engine intended to take up, in a few months, in Extenso items. The company will discuss with “all press securities”, or around 1,200 online media, and no more than 300 “general information” newspapers “.
direct and indirect income transmitted to the media
The platform will be required to transmit to the media concerned its direct income (advertisements on research results pages containing links of its articles) and indirect (advertisements on the other pages of Google then visited by the Internet user). Publishers will be able to request additional information, and an “independent agent” will be responsible for judging whether their transmission is “necessary and technically feasible”.
If the data is subject to business secrets, it may decide not to share it with the media. The agent will have access to the negotiations of the various publishers, and he will be able to rely on experts. Finally, Google accepted that in the event of blocking negotiations, an international arbitral tribunal resl.
“The decision of the authority validates the commitments that we have written with all stakeholders and closes a chapter open for several years”, welcomed in a statement Sébastien Missoffe, Managing Director of Google France.
The group claims to have already signed agreements with 150 French titles in recent months (including Le Monde, Le Figaro, Liberation, L’Express, etc.). In March, the group concluded with the Association of the General Information Press (APIG), which brings together the national daily newspapers (Les Echos, Le Parisien-today in France …) and regional (La Dépêche du Midi, Ouest -France…), as well as the regional weekly press.
You have 41.44% of this article to read. The continuation is reserved for subscribers.