this post was submitted on 23 Jun 2023
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Meta has already removed any news link (might not be 100% active but the press release went out). The government was told this it seems, they thought FB and Google were bluffing -- even though there are many examples in Europe of this happening.
“Bluffing” is an irrelevant framing if you believe — as I do — that news publishers should be paid for their content.
But the way these laws are written, it isn't under the social media company's control. The laws are saying that if any user posts a link to a news article the company owes the publisher money. So the social media company will just ban links that are going to cost them money.
They do get paid, when a user leaves the original site to visit the publisher and views their ads.
A taxi driver doesn't pay the business that they drive you to for giving them the opportunity to drive you there. You pay the driver for getting you there and then you pay the business you wanted to reach.
This is very much just the huge Canadian media corporations lobbying the Federal government to get more money for no additional work. Something they're very good at by now.
Why do news sites include the meta tags in the HTML containing some of the content then if not for the express purpose of it being displayed on these sites?
News agencies' currency is attention, reach, trust. In this last cash grab as an attempt to salvage their dying industry they just made themselves even less relevant. I'm personally as happy as you are to see this happen, for different reasons.
Currently, Meta is testing their systems on 5% of Canadian users to block news links. Their press release said that they will activate full blocking 100% before the bill takes effect. While the bill has received royal assent and is now law, there is the process with the Governor in Council where they figure out when provisions take effect. I've read through the text of the bill and re-read the Coming into Force provisions (at the end of the bill), but there doesn't appear to be any hint as to when this takes effect beyond another government body figuring this all out.
So, for now, Meta is only continuing their tests and Google is rumoured to be speaking with the government on how all of this is even going to work. The government has had a long history of refusing to listen to anyone daring to criticize the bill, let alone anyone related to the platforms, so I'm not exactly holding my breath over the Google talks.
We're kind of in a weird calm before the storm moment with all of this. I don't know what the link blocks will look like or how severe everything will be, but barring some sort of miracle at the 11th hour, it's only a matter of time before things get ugly.