15 March 2010 | Author: L. Sutherland Head of Media Content
A new report has called for the taxation of companies who make money from aggregating news, as a way to aid struggling local newspapers.
All the search big boys have news aggregators, and Google News is one of the most popular. Such a tax could see the Mountain View giant paying out up to £100 million, Brand Republic reports.
The proposal, Making Good Society, came from The Commission of Inquiry into the Future of Civil Society in UK and Ireland, a body which has warned that original journalism is being squeezed out in favour of "creative cannibalisation in the newspaper industry, due to economic restrictions".
The report was funded by non-profit foundation The Carnegie UK Trust, and it suggested that taxes on news aggregators could help improve news provision and help against the "recycled 'churnalism' and aggregated content" it claims the news industry is suffering from.
The Guardian reports that the commission, headed by Geoff Mulgan, will call on the government to preserve freedom on the internet in the future, to ensure that media remains accurate and is not controlled by powerful interests.
According to Brand Republic, the report said: "As the news media landscape rapidly changes, there is an urgent need to strengthen the role of civil society associations in helping to develop independent news media that survey the socio-political environment, hold governments and other officials to account, scrutinise the behaviour of powerful institutions, provide platforms for intelligible and illuminating advocacy, and offer the opportunity for diverse voices and agendas to deliberate meaningfully."
The study also referred to a report from the Public Policy Research to show that a levy of 1 per cent on TV operators like Virgin Media could provide up to £70 million per year to aid public service broadcasting, and that a similar model applied to mobile operators in the UK could generate around £208 million per year.
Google and co could face tax to aid news providers
A new report has called for the taxation of companies who make money from aggregating news, as a way to aid struggling local newspapers. All the search big boys have news aggregators, and Google News is one of the most popular. Such a tax could see the Mountain View giant paying out up to £100 million, Brand Republic reports.
The proposal, Making Good Society, came from The Commission of Inquiry into the Future of Civil Society in UK and Ireland, a body which has warned that original journalism is being squeezed out in favour of "creative cannibalisation in the newspaper industry, due to economic restrictions".
The report was funded by non-profit foundation The Carnegie UK Trust, and it suggested that taxes on news aggregators could help improve news provision and help against the "recycled 'churnalism' and aggregated content" it claims the news industry is suffering from.
The Guardian reports that the commission, headed by Geoff Mulgan, will call on the government to preserve freedom on the internet in the future, to ensure that media remains accurate and is not controlled by powerful interests.
According to Brand Republic, the report said: "As the news media landscape rapidly changes, there is an urgent need to strengthen the role of civil society associations in helping to develop independent news media that survey the socio-political environment, hold governments and other officials to account, scrutinise the behaviour of powerful institutions, provide platforms for intelligible and illuminating advocacy, and offer the opportunity for diverse voices and agendas to deliberate meaningfully."
The study also referred to a report from the Public Policy Research to show that a levy of 1 per cent on TV operators like Virgin Media could provide up to £70 million per year to aid public service broadcasting, and that a similar model applied to mobile operators in the UK could generate around £208 million per year.
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