Google is running an experiment at the expense of European news websites, where it is no longer displaying their results to users in Belgium and the Netherlands, among others.
Google is banning European news websites from search results in one percent of users from Belgium, the Netherlands, Croatia, France, Denmark, Greece, Italy, Poland and Spain. European sites are also banned from Google Discover and Google News.
The search giant says it is doing so as an experiment. Google wants to investigate the extent to which the inclusion of those European news websites has an impact on users’ search experience. During the test, international results will appear in place of European ones.
Google is packaging the experiment as something that regulators and publishers are asking about, but does not say from whom exactly that demand is coming. In a response to ITdaily, Google said the following:
“Over the past few years, stakeholders have asked for more information about how news content, such as links or clippings, affects usage of our products. This test is in response to these requests and does not represent a change in Google’s strategy with news publishers. We value our partnerships and remain committed to supporting journalism in Europe. “
The test would therefore only run temporarily, but Google does not say for how long. Publishers who are compensated by Google for the snippets the search specialist uses in its results will continue to receive their compensation during the test as agreed. Google stressed in its response that the test will not affect payments to news publishers.
Threat or experiment?
The whole design of the experiment has something of a threat. Google has long been at loggerheads with Europe, in part because of the European Copyright Directive. This prohibits the search giant from simply showing integral parts of journalists’ work for free. Google has repeatedly threatened that it can simply ignore news websites if they become too demanding.
For many, Google is synonymous with the Internet. In Belgium, the search giant has a monopoly market share of 91.6 percent. If Google excludes Web sites from users’ results, they will not necessarily realize it unless they are aware of the experiment. After all, you don’t know what you don’t know. Google can then use the results, however, to claim that EU sites are not that relevant to the results, to add to the pressure.
Not optional
For the news websites, the experiment is by no means optional. Because Google has a monopoly, they depend on the search engine for traffic and thus revenue. Anyone who runs a Web site knows how important it is to optimize it for Google in order to grow.
Google has first established a market position, and is now in effect conducting an experiment to see to what extent it can abuse it. This is not unique. In Canada last year, Google blocked news links for a time in response to a law mandating compensation in order to get itself a better deal. In California in the U.S., the company did the same this spring in response to a proposed law with the same thrust.