The Antitrust forces Meta to (re) negotiate with Siae: Italian music is back on social media

The Italian Antitrust requires Mark Zuckerberg to reopen the negotiation with Siae, the body that protects the copyright of a large part of Italian music, after the agreement between the two parties fell apart just over a month ago. And, at least momentarily, Italian songs will be usable again by users in the reelsin the feeds and in stories of Instagram and Facebook. The Competition and Market Authority defines “abusive” Meta’s behavior is “such as to cause serious and irreparable damage to the competitive dynamics in the markets relating to the management of copyright”: hence the need to intervene, for restore “a canon of good faith and fairness”.

The Antitrust had opened an investigation into the case on April 4 and in recent weeks has heard the representatives of both parties in hearings. Concretely, now it will be a question of finding a compromise that was missing in the initial negotiations for economic reasons: Siae was demanding more recognition than Zuckerberg was willing to grant. But, even before that, Meta will have to provide the information requested on the matter by the Antitrust: in the event that this does not happen, the Authority has ordered the appointment of a “third party, independent and in possession of adequate technical expertise” who will identify .

“As soon as possible we want to go back to sitting at the negotiating table on an equal footinghaving from the giant Meta all the necessary information to allow us to re-establish a balance in the entire commercial relationship”, said the president of Siae, Except Nastasi. Adding that “today a new page opens in the history of the relationship between this great technological platform and national copyright”.