Online news publishers accuse Line of copyright infringement
The Society for Online News Providers Association on Tuesday (January 31) warned Line Company (Thailand) not to publish its news on other platforms, claiming that doing so would be a breach of the contract between the two parties.
The agreement between the two parties permits Line to publish the society members’ news on its Line Today platform, with the society member getting a share in the revenue from advertisements.
The society accused Line of violating the contract as the news was being posted on other platforms too, namely Google and Google News.
The society said this was an infringement of copyright as their contract clearly states that publishing the news on platforms other than Line Today was prohibited, the society said in a statement.
The society warned that it would sue Line for breach of contract if the company does not stop posting news on other platforms.
Despite being disallowed, news from members of the society, which was supposed to be available only through Line Today, was found to have been released by Line on Google, said Rawee Tawantharong, the president of the society, adding that this would result in less search visibility for society members’ websites.
“Nearly 80% of Google users will click on one out of five websites that appear first, probably due to the credibility of the websites or relevance to their search,” he said.
Rawee, who is also Nation Group's executive vice president, added that users see Line websites instead of news websites of society members when searching on Google.
Related Stories:
