Belgian newspapers back on Google News

The Belgium French language newspapers are back on Google News. However the conflict is not officially solved yet between the two parties. But it looks like the parties are nearing an agreement.

In February, Google lost a court case about publishing newspaper articles on Google News. According to the judge Google infringed on the copyright of articles or parts of articles by placing the articles or parts of them on the Google site. In order to avoid heavy penalties Google removed all article from Google news and from its cache.

But since Thursday 17 French language newspapers, united in Copiepresse, are back on Google. In a statement Copiepresse says that Google can show articles despite the lack of an agreement. It means that both parties are close to an agreement. The newspapers might be back, but not all articles will be entered into the Google index. Archived articles, for which readers will have to pay, can not be accessed through Google News. These articles bear the tag NO ARCHIVE.

Representatives of Copiepresse and Google stated also that they do not want to fight the conflict in court. The newspapers are also talking to Yahoo and MSN.

Blog Posting Number: 745

Tags: Copiepresse, Google News