What news can learn from a pro Big Tech negotiator

Google signed on for $100 million, but Meta banned news in Canada. Here are some lessons from the man who led the news industry's fight...

How much does a bottle of water cost, $1.50 maybe? But to a dehydrated traveller in the desert, it’s priceless.

That’s because prices are relative. Professional negotiators cut their teeth on insights like this.

If you have water, and your customer needs a sip to survive, you have leverage.

And right now, AI needs news content because AI is dying. Newsrooms can solve the crisis, so they have leverage. And the market is $13 trillion and rising.

But newsrooms lack negotiators. Instead, the same tired licensing folk are sent to negotiate with AI, and they sell at supermarket prices because it’s all they know.

Worse, their CEOs push them to do so because they need quick cash to satisfy their board and not be sacked.

This short termism means selling the family silver for the next meal, and that will be fatal for most of those rushing in now.

A year ago this week, Google agreed to pay Canadian publishers $100 million to licence content.

In return, the Government dropped a controversial law called t…