The legislation is wrongheaded - link sharing isn't the problem. But, the problem still exists.
Also note, Australia has specifically said removing article snippets from search results is not enough for Google to avoid payment. This legislation is not about protecting websites from content theft. It's solely about the Australian government forcing Google and Facebook to pay the propagandists that helped them get elected.
If it was copyright infringement why was a new law needed? If it was not (hint: it was not) then why should they pay? And why should they have to pay news companies and not every other site? If you want to re-invent copyright so that search engines become non-feasible, please just don't, because I like search engines, the world is better off for having search engines, maybe just don't use them yourself if you have such a big issue with them.
> But, the problem still exists.
No it really does not.
As you mentioned copyright, world is better off for having piracy too.
A valid excuse for not infringing copyright? What is the action that needs to be excused here? And if the sites don't want to be indexed by the search engines, why do they go out of their way to be indexed by search engines?
What exactly is the problem that needs solving?
Fair enough, it is never a good defense, but in this case it is not meant as a defense as much as a reason against changing laws from what it currently is. There was no action to be defended until Australia changed their laws to something which makes search engines non feasible and to me that is a good reason why the law should not have been made.