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Trudeau Likens Bill C-18 Battle To World War Two Fight for Democracy as Government Suspends Meta Advertising (But Not Liberal Party Ads)

The government moved to escalate the battle over Bill C-18 yesterday, announcing that it was suspending advertising on Meta’s Facebook and Instagram platforms due the company’s decision to comply with the bill by blocking news sharing and its reluctance to further negotiate the issue. While the ad ban applies to federal government advertising, Liberal party officials confirmed they plan to continue political advertising on the social networks, suggesting that principled opposition ends when there might be a political cost involved. At issue is roughly $11 million in annual advertising by the federal government, a sum that pales in comparison to the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s estimate of at least $100 million in payments in Canada for news links from Meta alone.  

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July 6, 2023 104 comments News
Fred VanVleet by Erik Drost https://flic.kr/p/2n6xJ1C (CC BY 2.0)

Process Failures: What the Raptors Losing Fred VanVleet Teaches About Bill C-18

Evan Scrimshaw, who writes an engaging Substack primarily focused on Canadian politics, posted an interesting piece over the holiday weekend that linked the Toronto Raptors failure to resign guard Fred VanVleet and the reaction to Google and Facebook’s announcement that they plan to block news sharing or links as a result of Bill C-18. Scrimshaw argues that the public commentary on both developments featured similar “I told you so’s”: those that argue the Raptors should have traded VanVleet at the trade deadline rather than risk losing him for nothing and those who now argue that Bill C-18 would invariably lead to Google and Facebook blocking news sharing or links. Scrimshaw makes the case that it is too early to conclude anything with respect to Bill C-18 and that the Internet companies and government are merely engaged in a very public negotiation that could well result in either or both seeking a compromise before the law takes effect.  

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July 4, 2023 47 comments News
Théâtre du chaos - administration by Jeanne Menjoulet https://flic.kr/p/2aFB7ff (CC BY 2.0)

Media Chaos: How the Government’s Legislative Plans to Support Canadian Media Have Backfired Spectacularly

The Online News Act may be only days removed from having received royal assent, but the government’s plans to support the Canadian media sector have already backfired spectacularly. While it claimed its Bill C-18 would add millions of dollars to the sector and support struggling media companies, the reality has quickly intervened: blocked news sharing on Internet platforms with cancelled deals on the horizon, reports of direct corporate intervention in news departments, massive layoffs and regulatory requests to decrease spending on news, and now a nightmare merger proposal between Postmedia and Torstar. And that is just over the past week. Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez has amply demonstrated that there is no Plan B, offering up the prospect of further dependence on government through more public spending to mitigate the harms from his massive miscalculations. Not all of this is the government’s doing, but having relied on empty assurances that blocked news sharing was merely a bluff, Rodriguez picked politics and tough talk over good policy and is now left with media chaos.

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June 28, 2023 19 comments News
The Hulu experience by Jakob Skjerning https://flic.kr/p/4AEwxJ (CC BY-NC 2.0)

Made-in-Canada Internet Takes Shape with Risks of Blocked Streaming Services and News Sharing as Bill C-18 Receives Royal Assent

Bill C-18, the Online News Act, received royal assent yesterday, but any celebrations by the groups who lobbied for unprecedented government intervention into the news sector must surely have been tempered by the reality that quickly emerged. Meta confirmed that it would block news sharing from its Facebook and Instagram platforms in Canada, while Google met with Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez to see whether a compromise could be reach to avoid a similar outcome. The end result – at least for now – is a legislative mess that leaves no clear winners with Meta downgrading its platforms in Canada, Canadians cut off from their ability to share news on popular social media platforms, Canadian news outlets losing their second most important source of referral traffic, and the government looking to have made an epic miscalculation for having ignored the risks it created by establishing a mandating payments for links system with uncapped liability for the Internet companies.

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June 23, 2023 14 comments News
Schaar's Bluff, Spring Lake Park Reserve - Danger Cliff Ahead by Tony Webster https://flic.kr/p/KByfL3 (CC BY 2.0)

Tough Talk, Empty Answers: How Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez is Propelling Canada’s News Sector Toward the Bill C-18 Cliff

Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez appeared last night before the Senate committee studying Bill C-18, facing repeated questions about how his government will respond if Internet platforms such as Facebook block news sharing in response to bill’s system of mandated payments for links. Much like Prime Minister Trudeau earlier in the day, Rodriguez had few answers, relying instead on tough talk about not backing down against the tech companies or warnings that even talking about the risks was playing into their hands. Yet the reality is that the government has boxed itself into a corner with fatally flawed legislation that could leave Canadian news organizations  with lost revenues and Canadians with reduced exposure to reliable news.

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June 8, 2023 5 comments News