In a move aimed at helping¹ newspapers generate new revenue from struggling online operations, the German government intends to require search engines and other Internet companies to pay publishers whose content they highlight.

为了帮助萎靡不振的网上报纸业务获得新收入来源，德国政府拟要求搜索引擎和其他互联网公司，在页面突出显示这些报纸的内容时付费给报社。

The German governing coalition², led by Chancellor³ Angela Merkel's Christian⁴ Democratic Union, said last week that it planned to introduce legislation to create a new kind of copyright for online publishers. Under the proposal, Internet aggregators and search engines would have to pay the publishers if they wanted to display all or parts of their articles — even small snippets（片段） like those that are shown in search links.

The proposal was cheered by German publishers, who complain that Internet companies like Google have profited hugely from their content, while generating only scraps⁵ of digital revenue.

"In the digital age, such a right is essential to protect the joint⁶ efforts of journalists and publishers," the Federation⁷ of German Newspaper Publishers said, adding that it was "an essential measure for the maintenance of an independent, privately⁸ financed news media."

But the announcement set off howls of protest from Internet companies and bloggers, who said the proposal could threaten free speech and stunt⁹（阻碍） the development of the digital economy in Germany.

The proposal, in an announcement of the coalition's legislative¹⁰ agenda, follows intense lobbying by publishers, after the idea was initially¹¹ put forward several years ago.

The plan authorizes¹² ministers to draft a bill, which is expected to go to the Bundestag, the lower house of Parliament, this summer.

The proposal addresses a debate that has raged since the early days of the Internet: Who benefits more from digital links and the traffic they generate — search engines, aggregators and other online hubs, or the sites that produce the content?

Google does not sell advertising¹³ on its German news aggregation¹⁴ service, which displays snippets of articles and links to the originating sites. But the company earns billions of euros from advertising on its search engine and other services.

Most German newspaper publishers, on the other hand, generate only minuscule¹⁵（极小的） revenue online from advertising or other sources, like so-called pay walls around their content.