Juan J. Monroe 
CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Facebook announced preliminary deals with three Australian publishers on Friday, a day after parliament passed legislation that would force digital giants to pay for news.
Facebook said letters of intent have been signed with independent news outlets Private Media, Schwartz Media and Solstice Media.
Trade agreements are subject to the signing of full agreements within the next 60 days, according to a statement from Facebook.
“These deals will bring a new slate of premium journalism, including some previously paid content, to Facebook,” the statement said.
Schwartz Media chief executive Rebecca Costello said the deal would help her company continue to produce independent journalism.
“It has never been more important than now to have a plurality of voices in the Australian press,” Costello said.
Private Media chief executive Will Hayward said the new deal builds on an existing Facebook partnership.
Australia’s Parliament passed the latest amendments to the so-called Media Negotiation Code on Thursday.
In return for the changes, Facebook agreed to lift a six-day ban on Australians accessing and sharing information. Access to Australian news sites does not appear to have been fully restored until Friday.
Google, the only other digital giant targeted by the legislation, has already entered into content licensing agreements, or is about to enter into them, with some of Australia’s biggest news publishers, including News Corp. by Rupert Murdoch and Seven West Media.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the new Australian law was key to the deals Australian media companies were negotiating with the two gateways to the internet.
Under the law, if a platform fails to reach an agreement with a news company, an arbitration panel can be appointed to set a legally binding price for journalism.
“Global tech giants are changing the world, but we can’t let them run the world,” Morrison told reporters.
“People in free societies like Australia, who go to the polls and vote, they should be running the world,” Morrison added.
On Wednesday, Facebook Vice President of Global Affairs Nick Clegg delivered a veiled swipe at News Corp. in a social media post criticizing the Australian law, which aims to set a fair price for Australian journalism that digital platforms display.
“It’s ironic that some of the biggest publishers who have long advocated free markets and voluntary commercial enterprises now appear to be in favor of state-sponsored price-fixing,” the former deputy prime minister wrote. British.
The executive chairman of News Corp. Australia, Michael Miller, said last week that his company was in wage negotiations with Facebook.
“Having been someone who has dealt with Facebook for the past few months, we have a few weeks where we get good engagement and think we’re making progress and then you get silence. I think the door is still open,” Miller told a Senate inquiry into Australian media diversity.
