‘Tech Giants’ vs ‘Media Giants’: Who Do We Want to Win?

Clarifying the Canadian Media Landscape in the Wake of Bill C-18

Canadian media companies have had twenty years to respond to the ‘internet tech giants’ that ‘threaten our media landscape.

TWENTY YEARS.

Twenty years of endless whining and moaning about not getting how the internet works and twenty years to adapt to competitive pressure.

Instead, they’ve spent the last dozen or so years pretending they have the best interest of Canadians in mind and lobbying the government for legislative garbage like Bills C-11 and C-18. They lobbied hard to the CRTC while Harper was in charge and now the Liberals, NDP and Bloc have caved to their childish antics.

For those who need a reminder of how the internet has worked VERY WELL up to this point:

1. You post a story.
2. It’s relevant and it’s not just click bait.
3. Search platforms like Google or Mozilla connect your relevant story to their search bots.
4. Search bots display results based on relevant searches executed by users.
5. Users click on relevant stories.
6. When users click on a link – and here’s the critically important part that whiners in the Canadian mainstream media don’t seem to understand – they’re your customers to lose. You generate ad revenue, you get them to sign up for newsletters, you encourage discourse and conversation, maybe they’ll even subscribe.

To this point, all of the ‘tech giants’ have been doing traditional Canadian media companies a massive favour by not charging them for this traffic.

Unfortunately, most Canadian mainstream media companies have paywalls. You visit a site, you’re blocked out unless you pay money.

By blocking news, you intentionally also close the door to search bots that will generate traffic for you.

I wouldn’t say companies like Canadaland or The Breach are doing much better, but at least they’re following a better model and are generating new revenue unlike any traditional companies have in the past.

Sadly, even The Breach has decided to jump on the ‘tech giant’ bandwagon, not considering the real situation and how the internet works.

Google and Meta have already killed hundreds of journalism jobs—they’re back for round two, and there’s no need to play nice.

This is not true and it’s disappointing that what should be the future of progressive voices in Canada is pointing the finger at the wrong villains.

Companies like Google and Meta are technology companies and they only act to INCREASE traffic to LEGITIMATE sources.

To gain more insight into what’s actually happening, please check out Michael Geist. He has been providing context, history and informed legislative structure into what a disaster Bills C-18 and C-11 are for Canadians.

Turning the Tables

Let’s turn the tables: maybe it’s time the tech giants turned the tables and said ‘you owe us for billions of visits over the last twenty years. Please pay up now.’

It is critically important that we all understand that companies like Google and Facebook have actually been helping Canadian media companies by sending them qualified traffic over the last two decades. Some media companies even monetized this traffic in the form of online ad revenue.

This is how the internet works. It will NOT change.

What’s going to happen if Google and Meta decide that they should be compensated for this activity?

To date, this has been a free service to Canadian news companies and other media organizations.

They were never stealing content.

This is a FALSE narrative.

The tech companies get residual ad revenue because they sell ads for the media companies but also companies that target consumers based on those interests, stories and history. That’s the arrangement.

No one is forcing Canadian media companies to participate and it’s time they backed down and approached things in a different way. Maybe negotiate rather than shout out rude names.

People. please understand that the worse thing the Liberals did was fall for the whining of Canada’s mainstream gate-keepers, most of which push right-wing agendas.

Let them face extinction.