Small Bit Of Good News: Buffy Wicks Pushes Her Terrible Link Tax Bill Out Until Next Year

Well, one terrible bill won’t be a problem this year, though will come back next. The CJPA (California Journalism Protection Act) from Assemblymember Buffy Wick, won’t move forward this year. Technically it’s “become a two-year bill” which basically means they can (and will) pick it back up again next year without having to revisit the steps it’s already taken this year.

The CJPA is a terrible bill. It’s an attack on the open internet, creating a wealth transfer system on links. Even if there are good intentions behind it (and I have seen little evidence to support that in this case), any bill that puts a tax on links is dangerous for the open internet. There’s also the soft corruption side of it, in that this is literally a bill to transfer wealth from one industry to a different industry, where the recipient industry (media) is important to the careers of many elected officials.

Either way, that bill is not moving any further this year, and that’s worth a temporary sigh of relief.

From the details, it sounds like State Senator Tom Umberg (correctly) highlighted how the CJPA would basically benefit nonsense peddling media operations as well as vulturistic hedge funds.

Wicks said that Umberg had voiced concerns about who would benefit from the bill, and that it needed to be focused on California news publications specifically.

Of course, Wicks knew this already, because lots of us had raised these concerns, and she ignored or handwaved them away, insisting that those concerns were overblown. So it’s good that at least someone in the California legislature was able to point out how problematic the bill is.

That said, it’ll be back next year, and I have little faith that Wicks legitimately wants to engage on the vast problems with the bill when she provides statements like this one:

“I look forward to working with Senator Umberg to make this a first-in-the-nation bill, and continue to welcome all stakeholders to the table – including Big Tech – to help us get this policy exactly right.”

Calling out “big tech” that way suggests she thinks the only people opposed to this monstrosity are big tech. If you want to tax big tech, tax big tech. The issue is that you’re breaking the open internet. And that impacts those of us who rely on the open internet.