The Indian Newspaper Society has asked Google to compensate Indian newspapers "comprehensively" for their content and to share its advertising revenue, reported the Indian Express. In a letter to Google India country manager Sanjay Gupta, INS president L. Admiloolam said the Google should increase publisher share of advertising revenue to 85%. Google should pay for the news generated by newspapers, which employ thousands of journalists to gather and verify information, the Society said, arguing that newspaper content, which is generated at considerable expense, is proprietary and has given Google its "authenticity" ever since its inception. Publishers have been providing complete access to news, current affairs, analysis, information and entertainment, and there is a distinction between such editorial content and fake news spreading on platforms, INS said. It also said that publishers across the world have been raising the issue of fair payment for content and proper sharing of ad revenue with Google; the company has agreed to such deals in France, European Union, and in Australia. Publishers face a very opaque advertising system; Google should be more transparent in the revenue repots it provides to publishers, Admiloolam said. Further, Google is taking over a large chunk of advertising revenue, which the backbone of the newspaper industry, the Society said. The pandemic and current digital business model has been "unfair to publishers", making it unviable for the print media industry, according to the Society. This is the same spin that the Australian legacy media industry and the country's government put on…
