Google’s parent company Alphabet and the Australian government are embroiled in a battle over the country’s impending News Media Bargaining Code bill. The bill proposes a payment system for Google to the country's publishers for the news links and snippets its search engine surfaces. Last month, Google said it may stop providing search results in Australia if the government passes the new bill. Facebook too is a party to this fight and has reaffirmed a threat of its own, vowing to block users in Australia from posting or sharing links to news if the bill passed. The Australian government has had conversations since then with Google CEO Sundar Pichai but the conclusion of this legal wrangle has implications for the rest of the world.
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