Digital platforms and the future of news: regulating publisher-platform relations in Australia and Canada

Abstract

This article provides an overview of news media bargaining codes as a way of regulating relations between digital platforms and news publishers. Taking the Codes developed in Australia and Canada as policy case studies, the paper discusses recent reforms which respond to the unequal bargaining power between digital platforms and news media publishers. Despite these reforms, there are few guarantees that funds received by news publishers will be reinvested into public interest journalism. The article asks whether the discourse surrounding digital platform regulation generally, and measures by nation-states to rebalance market relations to the benefit of news publishers, are likely to yield necessary safeguards required to sustain public interest journalism, promote reliable information, and stabilise democratic societies.