IEA Director General Mark Littlewood appeared on GB News. Appearing on Esther and Phil, Mark discussed a new report published by the IEA which argues against proposals to force digital companies to pay publishers for hosting their content:

“I can understand at first blush why [making digital platforms subsidise publishers] might sound like a good idea.

“Actually, the online platforms are helping some of the legacy media, not the other way round.

“When we saw some of these ideas come in Australia, it didn’t so much get money out of the tech giants and in to the pockets of struggling newspapers. The internet giants stopped linking so heavily to news pieces and you actually saw a fall off in news traffic.”

See Mark’s full appearance here (7:00).

You can also read the paper, Breaking the News: Should digital platforms be required to fund news publishers? by IEA Head of Public Policy Matthew Lesh, here.