Barry Lynn - Google and Facebook are strangling the free press to death. Democracy is the loser
After Europe’s top
monopoly buster Margrethe
Vestager fined Google more than $5bn for abusing its dominance over
mobile phone technology, it’s tempting to relax about the power of big tech.
Not only is there a cop watching these giants, she’s carrying a really big
stick. But this week’s firing
by the New York Daily News of half the paper’s staff shines a different
light on the matter.
The reason given by the publisher – a sharp decline in
revenue – is largely the result of Google abusing its monopoly over online
advertising, in tandem with Facebook. Vestager’s
move against Android does nothing to protect the free press in Europe or
America. This means it’s time for other regulators and legislators in America
and in Europe to speed the process of bringing Google to heel.
To be sure, the
decision by Europe’s Directorate General for Competition (DG Comp) last
Wednesday is important. The fat fine was the clearest statement yet that
Google’s practices break the law. Further, the restrictions DG Comp imposed on
Google’s business model will crimp its behavior in key ways. Vestager and her
team deserve thanks. Given the political power of Google, their actions
took courage.
But it’s vital to put
the fine into perspective. In an industry that changes by the day, the case
took eight years to complete. Further, it deals with just one part of a problem
that is now very large and sprawling. And even after the fine Google will be
left holding more than $95bn in cash. Vestager’s fighters put out the fire on the
first floor, but only after the blaze had spread to the rest of the building.
Of all the social
goods now in flames the one we must protect first is trustworthy journalism. In
the nine years since Google bought mobile ad company AdMob, annual ad revenue
at Google and Facebook has soared, to more than $95bn and
almost $40bn,
respectively. During this period, ad
revenue at newspapers fell around $50bn in 2005 to under $20bn today.
This means fewer
reporters on the streets. The number of people working in America’s newsrooms
dropped from more than 400,000 in 2001 to fewer than 185,000 today. In New
York, the picture is especially bleak. The number of reporters at the Daily
News is nearly 90% below 1988 levels. The New York Times cut local
reporting staff by more than half over the last decade, from 90 to 40...
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