2 Articles: META – Blocking News Content Investigation and Satirical Sites Get Caught Up in News Ban
News Publishers, Broadcasters Call For Investigation Into META’s News Blocking
META HAD PREVIOUSLY BEEN BLOCKING NEWS CONTENT FOR SOME USERS IN CANADA BUT THE MOVE IS SET TO EXTEND TO ALL CANADIANS ON TUESDAY [August 8th]
Courtesy of Barrie360.com, Canadian PressPublished: Aug 8th, 2023
A group of Canadian news publishers and broadcasters are calling on Canada’s Competition Bureau to investigate and prohibit Meta from blocking news content on its digital platforms.
Social media giant Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, has said it will begin blocking news on its platforms in Canada starting Tuesday after the Canadian government passed a bill forcing Google and Meta to pay publishers for content they link to or repurpose.
News Media Canada, the Canadian Association of Broadcasters and CBC said in a joint statement they have filed a request to the Competition Bureau to investigate Meta’s “abuse of its dominant position.”
They said the practices of the social media giant are “anticompetitive” as they will prevent Canadian news companies from accessing the advertising market and significantly reduce their visibility to Canadians on social media platforms.
“Meta’s conduct will inevitably diminish Canadian news consumers’ exposure to news content and the volume of traffic to Canadian news organizations’ websites, thereby impairing their ability to compete for revenue from online advertising and from their readers,” the three said in a news release.
The news publishers and broadcasters said they are calling on the Competition Bureau to use its prosecutorial tools to prohibit Meta from blocking Canadians’ access to news content.
Asked to respond to the application, Meta spokeswoman Lisa Laventure pointed to the company’s previous comments on the Online News Act, also known as Bill C-18, where it has said the law is built on a flawed premise that leads it to block news.
“The only way we can reasonably comply with this legislation is to end news availability for people in Canada,” the company said.
Meta had previously been blocking news content for some users in Canada but the move is set to extend to all Canadians on Tuesday. Canadians will no longer be able to view or post news on Facebook or Instagram and news organizations will start to see their stories blocked on those platforms.
The company noted that Canadians can still access news online by going directly to news publishers’ websites or using their mobile news apps.
Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge said in a statement that Meta does not yet have obligations under the Online News Act. The government is still developing regulations for the law that is set to come into effect by the end of the year.
St-Onge said the company has not participated in the regulatory process.
“They would rather block their users from accessing good quality and local news instead of paying their fair share to news organizations,” she said.
No Joke: Satirical Websites Get Caught Up In META’s Quest To Block News In Canada
THE BEAVERTON’S SATIRCAL CONTENT BEGAN GETTING BLOCKED THIS WEEK
Canadian PressPublished: Aug 10th, 2023 1:24pmLast Updated: Aug 10th, 2023 3:58pm
By Mickey Djuric in Ottawa
Luke Gordon Field is trying to figure out how he can explain the concept of deadpan satire to an algorithm.
He says he never thought in a million years that the need to explain a joke would transcend humans. But it’s a situation he believes he has found himself in as editor-in-chief of The Beaverton, a Canadian comedy website.
Meta is in the process of removing all news from its Facebook and Instagram platforms in Canada in response to a new law that would force the company to compensate media outlets for content that is shared or otherwise repurposed on their platforms.
But satirical sites are getting caught up in the tech giant’s quest, too — even though their human audiences know they aren’t news.
It’s an error that some publications say could threaten their survival.
“I don’t want to be too dramatic, but in a world where Facebook completely cuts us off, I mean, there’s a very real chance we do not survive that,” Field told The Canadian Press.
He said he started The Beaverton over a decade ago with a group of comedy writers who just wanted to put their funny jokes online for people to see.
They don’t have major financial backing or wealthy owners, and they have relied heavily on Facebook to promote their content and grow their audience, he said.
“I would equate (Facebook) as a drug dealer where the first taste is free, and they make you keep coming back for more.”
This week, Field said he discovered that their supply was getting cut off after he received messages from Canadian readers saying they could no longer see The Beaverton’s posts.
“If traffic really decreases because of Facebook, and then by extension revenue decreases, then there’s a scenario where we can’t keep the lights on,” Field said.
Scott Slute, who runs the satirical site The Toronto Harold, had his content blocked by Meta last month on Instagram, which he said similarly affected his business. He saw likes on his Instagram posts dropping to hundreds from thousands.
He said he believes a default tag that labelled him as a news site led to the account being captured by Meta’s block. After removing the tag, Slute reached out to the company and appealed its decision.
“It was a little devastating to see something I’d worked so hard on for three years to just be taken away from me like that,” Slute said. “It was a helpless feeling.”
It took less than a week for Meta to resolve the problem after he filled out a questionnaire, with Slute noting the process was “pretty good.”
“They got back to me and said they had determined that it was not a news site, so they put it back up,” Slute said.
Field is hoping Meta will realize its own error when it comes to The Beaverton, which he emphasized would not qualify for funding under the Liberals’ Online News Act.
“So much of our stuff is not even remotely news,” Field said.
“It should not be blocked by this this ban.”
Meta has said it is taking a phased approach to removing news from Canadians’ feeds in order to ensure the process works as expected.
The company is hoping to avoid mistakes it made in Australia when it temporarily blocked news on Facebook in that country. In doing so, it accidentally limited access to non-news content — including the pages for some emergency services.
The Beaverton has changed its Facebook settings to make it clear they’re an entertainment and comedy company, not a news company, Field said.
“I want to believe it’s an algorithm that is not functioning properly and it’s an error that has or will be sorted, because of course we’re a comedy website.”
In the meantime, he’s having fun by writing satirical articles about the issue and responding in jest on other social media platforms.
In a letter posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, The Beaverton threatened Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg with what Field calls a “clearly fake lawsuit” for defaming The Beaverton by calling them a news organization.
Canadians can expect to see news removed from their Facebook and Instagram accounts in the coming weeks, but seeing satire go along with it would be a disaster, said Field.
“I think we have a role to play, a very small role, but a role to play nonetheless in the conversation about issues in this country, about what’s going on in the world,” Field said.
“And I think satire can be such an important beacon of truth. It would suck to lose all of that, let alone the fact that it would mean that me and my friends who do this together wouldn’t be able to hang out quite as much.”
Patricia is the Business Mentor and owner of Grow Vantage and a Past President of the Barrie Chamber of Commerce. She applies over 30 years of business experience (from start-up to corporate) to mentor entrepreneurs. Since 2011, she has held over 6,500 coaching and training sessions in-person and online. Through Ask For Directions Training, her entrepreneurial training program (and parent company Grow Vantage), and as a business coach, she works with start-ups who are new (or who have lost traction) to design, launch and grow their businesses. Along with 20 other expert instructors she teaches strategies in marketing, sales, communications, and finance, as well as practical techniques to increase productivity, and manage their businesses. In other words, everything entrepreneurs need to learn to grow and run their businesses successfully, and avoid the costly mistakes they can't even see coming - that lead to delays in growth and getting stuck.
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