Google has settled with two of the five Belgian publishing groups suing the company for damages in a Belgian court, according to Bloomberg. The deal with Sofam, representing photographers, and Scam, representing journalists, removes the groups from the suit and allows Google to use their content in exchange for some undisclosed payment.

This could have a ``huge impact'' on how Google is approaching content providers and could even ``have an impact on their business model,'' said Stijn Debaene, a lawyer at Allen & Overy in Brussels.

Deals like this, and one with AP last year, suggest that Google News will have to pay its own way, compensating publishers for the content it uses, even if it does push traffic to newspapers' sites.

- Richard Koman