That sounds completely contrary to the concept of a free press. If the government gets to decide access to news, then independent checks on the government can become impossible. It would be the end of a free press.
This is absolutely a big problem with democracy: on the one hand, it requires a free press to inform voters about the state of the country and the government, but on the other hand, there's no way to guarantee that the press will provide the necessary information; the press needs to be funded, but if the government funds it, the government controls it. If the people pay for it in a free market, then the press will publish what the people want to pay for, rather than what is necessary for them to know about their government.
What I meant was not that a democratic government has to be the free press, but that I has to keep laws, checks, balances and regulation to ensure that free press is possible.
And that a government is a better candidate to enable and ensure free press than a private entity: we can see this in action in e.g. China where either Google keeps away from, or companies self-censor to grab some Chinese cash.
I don't quite understand what you mean. Are you saying that the Chinese situation, where the government is the entity that decides on access to the news, is a good one?
I think it's vitally important that press can exist and publish completely independently from the government. Yes, that does mean there need to be laws protecting the press from censorship and subtler forms of manipulation. But this particular piece of regulation looks like it's going to hurt access to the press by forcing Google News out of the country.
Furthermore, it sounds like only large news corporations can get money from this, which makes me wonder what that means for independent journalists and small news publications.
(Admittedly fake news is a big problem, but so is a government deciding what is true and what is false.)
I think the Chinese situation is bad. But that was not my point. The point was that a government is the entity to protect, enable and allow free speech; a private entity is not.
The Chinese example shows that when a government does not allow, or protect free speech, the private entity cannot solve it either. Google cannot enable free speech in China:
only the Chinese government could do that.
I used this example to show that relying on private entities to protect freedom is not a very good one: you need a government that enables them; even if "enabling" means "not interfering" or "pulling back".
> "The point was that a government is the entity to protect, enable and allow free speech; a private entity is not."
This is true in the ideal case. In practice, governments don't always enable and protect free speech. Even the idea that governments should do this is fairly recent, and constantly under attack.
> "Google cannot enable free speech in China"
This is true. But Google can warn people when free speech is under attack. And some companies do have a habit of fighting for free speech.
In the end, there is no single entity that can and should bear the entire responsibility of protecting free speech; it's up to everybody.
This is absolutely a big problem with democracy: on the one hand, it requires a free press to inform voters about the state of the country and the government, but on the other hand, there's no way to guarantee that the press will provide the necessary information; the press needs to be funded, but if the government funds it, the government controls it. If the people pay for it in a free market, then the press will publish what the people want to pay for, rather than what is necessary for them to know about their government.