It was a joke, but it’s not that funny anymore. Google is threatening to block searches in Australia if the country implements a binding profit-sharing agreement that would force tech giants like Google and Facebook to pay media companies for their content. But Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison was not sweating.
Morrison suggested Monday Australian National Press Club that Australians can only use the Microsoft Bing search engine if Google really wants to leave the country.
“Are you confident that alternative search engines will be able to fill a massive gap left by Google, and that Australians won’t get worse?” asked Rosie Lewis, a reporter for the Australian newspaper.
“I can tell you that Microsoft is quite confident,” Morrison said with a confident chuckle.
“When I talked to Satya the other day, it was something like that,” Morrison said, rubbing his hands and referring to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.
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After the polite quarrels died down, Morrison returned to the points of discussion he had made before, insisting that Australians make Australian law and that the government will not respond kindly. threats from Google.
“Look, these are big tech companies. And what is important for Australia is that we set the rules that are important to our people, ”said Morrison. “And with a news environment in this country that is sustainable and commercially supported, then this is vital to the way democracies work.”
The proposed profit-sharing program has been dubbed the Media Negotiation Code, and Google users in Australia are currently inundated with announcements about how the proposed program would harm the Internet. every time they visit Google.
Morrison noted at today’s event that when he met with leaders of other nations at G20 meetings over the years, he often spoke not only about how to hold international corporations accountable through taxes, but about how to attract everyone. on the same page when it came to antitrust issues and competition policies.
“I’d like to see more alignment between the world’s economies when it comes to this kind of thing,” Morrison said, noting that there was little traction in the United States to break any of the big lawn tech companies.
But then Morrison hinted at the implications of the Media Negotiation Code, which did not take center stage. A potential consequence, as Morrison suggested, was that online speech could be regulated in new ways to ensure a more civil discussion.
“We just want the rules in the digital world to be the same as they are in the real world … in the physical world,” Morrison said. “And that means you can’t go around abusing people and continuing like people. You wouldn’t behave like that in a room like this. Or I don’t think you would.”
Needless to say, this item it had not really been discussed in the Australian media as a potential the consequence of applying the Code. But it makes sense that Morrison might be sensitive to things being said online. Morrison has become a meme several times, aAnd if people online were talking about the time you assumed Duck your pants at McDonald’s, you probably want a repression against the trolls.