Dunno about Australia but Google ‘won’ in Canada, where the government agreed to accept what Google had originally offered, and make it up to their corporate media buddies in the following budget.
It ended with a negotiation and Google agreeing to pay $100M+ annually to Canadian news organizations, so I wouldn't exactly call that a "win" for them.
>Oh, you posted this story we really didn't like. Sorry, this month's check got lost in the mail. We'll sort it out in 6-15 business days.
Businesses eventually become reliant on significant revenue streams which gives the party that provides them power over the business.
It might not even be Google doing anything nefarious, just a case of "sorry, but our business is doing poorly and we might have to shut down Google News and stop paying if this keeps up."
In Australia there were concessions where the Australian gov of the time thought that having Google negotiate an agreement only with the major outlets (Rupert Murdoch) was acceptable so they don't pay every paper, just the ones that agree with the Liberal party (a right wing party) viewpoints.
The liberal party is now out of power but the labor party has no courage to stand up to Murdoch to repeal this.
It was all very clever and basically a way to fund right wing media in Australia via big tech. Blatantly corrupt as fuck and people need to be arrested for what went on to create this law but definitely clever.
