I'm very curious to know how they would determine how much Google should pay, and how to distribute that money to the different publishers.
Anyway, I think that Google, if the law is passed, should refuse to pay and stop publishing news from publishers from Germany (there are always still Austrian and Swiss newspapers for German news).
Of course the quality and quantity of German news on Google would worsen, but the point would be to see if it is Google benefiting more from the newspapers, or the other way around.
It would be interesting to see an official statistic from the big papers where they get their traffic from. I get my news by surfing directly to their homepages. I think I read somewhere that they get most of their hits through the google search although I cant really belive that.
I would imagine the bulk of traffic comes from headline news. Some people check the paper every day, some people catch a bit of news on the bus or TV or whatever, then google it.
I think the rest of the traffic historical articles, looked up by people trying to win arguments on the internet. I don't know how many times i've been pulled to the NYT because of that sort of behavior. I would guess all of that traffic comes from google.
Could newspapers actively allow search engines etc. to quote them? I am thinking of heise when I say this, one of the few utterly "good guys" where "we won't sue, you can trust us" would actually work.
Or would this law mean the state attorney can simply sue Google et al, regardless of the stance of the supposed victim?
IANAL but I think this doesnt fall under the responsibility of the state attorney since it isnt part of the "strafrecht"/criminal law. I guess the process would be comparable to how copyright violations are currently handled.
Oh, so I would assume without anyone to sue, there'd be no case? If that is correct, I would predict if these publishers get their way, those that make use of the law would paint themselves into a corner. So it's not just about protecting our interwebs, but also about protecting them from their own stupidity ^^
Anyway, I think that Google, if the law is passed, should refuse to pay and stop publishing news from publishers from Germany (there are always still Austrian and Swiss newspapers for German news).