Techdirt: ‘Senator Klobuchar’s Latest Bad Idea: Letting Smaller Journalism Outlets Demand Payments for Links’
Mike Masnick, Techdirt:
The main function of the bill is to allow news orgs to team up,
force internet companies that link to them into mandatory
arbitration, and force them to pay the journalism organizations
for linking to them. For linking to them. Literally for sending
them traffic. The bill says that each side submits their proposal
for how much the internet companies should pay the news companies,
and then the arbitrator picks one side’s proposal.But, again, let’s go back to what this is — what the internet
companies are being forced to pay for. They are being forced to
pay to send other websites traffic. This is ludicrous.
Has Amy Klobuchar’s name ever been on a piece of tech or internet-related legislation that was anything but a terrible idea? Masnick righteously skewers this one, concluding:
I can’t see how anyone thinks this is a good idea. And, again, I
run one of the companies that in theory would “benefit” from this
nonsense by getting free money.I used to just think that Senator Klobuchar was ignorant about
how the internet worked. But considering how frequently she
releases absolutely ridiculous and dangerous bills about the
internet, I’m beginning to realize that she is deliberately
seeking to destroy it.
