Re:Facebook is gambling Australia can't do without it. What ...
by tomhoward on Friday February 19, 2021 @09:10AM
(#26193298)
I'm not defending the new laws - I agree they're stupid. But all the public discussion about the laws in Australia, where I live, has focused on the giant publishers - News Corp and Nine Fairfax in particular. They were the primary lobbyists for the laws, and were the ones who would attain almost all the revenues from them.
My point is that Facebook's reaction is a tactical error in the PR battle. They've effectively conceded this themselves, having back-pedalled on at least some of the sites banned initially.
They could have responded in a way that won them support from the Australian populace, but instead they've made themselves seem worse than the AU government, which is quite a feat.
If any site of any kind publishing newsworthy content chooses to sue facebook for payment, there's nothing the Australian government can do to stop them. Also there is no way for facebook to know how he Australian government will actually choose to interpret and apply the law as regulators. They could even change the way they regulate it retroactively, that's the problem with at-will enforcement of vaguely worded laws.