Why Meta Stopped Paying Australian News Publishers — and What Happens Now

In March 2024, Meta (the company behind Facebook and Instagram) stopped paying Australian news outlets for the articles and stories that appear on its platforms. This came after Australia passed a law in 2021 that was supposed to force tech companies to pay publishers for news content. What happened reveals something important: when powerful companies don't like a rule, they can sometimes just walk away.

What Australia Tried to Do

In 2021, the Australian government created something called the News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code. The name is long, but the idea was simple: tech platforms like Meta and Google make money from news articles — people click on them, see ads, stay on the site longer. The publishers who created those articles see almost none of that money. The law was meant to fix that unfair situation.

At first, it worked. Rather than face a forced process to settle payment disputes, Meta and Google agreed to pay dozens of Australian news businesses. It looked like a win for the government and the press.

But the law had a weakness that nobody fully grasped until later.

The Loophole: Just Remove the News

A government review discovered the critical problem: tech platforms could simply stop showing news altogether. If Meta decided not to display news on Facebook, the government couldn't force them to — they'd have nothing to negotiate about. The law assumed the companies would keep news on their platforms and just argue about payment. It didn't account for them refusing to carry news at all.

In March 2024, Meta announced it was stopping payments to Australian publishers. The company also said it might block news from Facebook entirely if the government tried to force it back into negotiations.

This isn't entirely new. In 2021, when the law was being debated, Meta briefly removed news from Facebook in Australia to prove it could. Now it seems serious about doing it for real.

What's at Stake for Publishers

Many Australian news outlets had come to rely on payments from Meta and Google. When Meta pulled out, it created a real problem — especially for smaller, regional news organizations that don't have the resources to find other sources of money. These publishers can't easily replace that income by selling ads directly to readers or creating their own subscription services.

Google is still paying, which creates an odd situation: one big tech company is following the rules, and the other is not. That splits the money between fewer players, and makes publishers more dependent on Google alone.

The Bigger Picture

Australia's approach — using the threat of forced negotiations to pressure companies into voluntary deals — has caught the attention of other countries. Canada, the UK, and the European Union have all looked at what Australia did and are considering similar laws. If Meta's strategy of withdrawal works in Australia, it could spread to other countries too.

Here's the key problem with the original plan: it assumed the platforms needed to keep news on their services. But Meta's business — connecting people with entertainment, friends, and user-generated content — doesn't really depend on professional journalism the way Google's search engine does. Google needs news articles to give people good search results. Facebook doesn't need them as much.

What the Government Could Do

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said in June 2024 that Meta was being "arrogant" for refusing to pay. The government can still force Meta into mandatory negotiations, but it's not clear that will work if Meta just refuses to show news in the first place.

Meta is also facing other legal and financial pressure in Australia. It agreed to pay A$50 million for privacy violations in December 2024 and paid A$20 million in fines for secretly collecting user data. These costs may be making the company less willing to accept new payment requirements.

The real question now is whether Australia will try to force Meta into arbitration, knowing the company might simply remove news from Facebook altogether. Is that a fight worth having if the end result is that Australian news outlets lose that audience entirely?

This situation reveals something worth considering: sometimes new rules can't control companies that are willing to walk away. We've seen this before with music streaming — platforms changed faster than laws could adapt. But this time, the stakes involve who gets to decide what information ordinary people see online.