Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez says he won’t be pushed around by Google and Facebook in the ongoing fight over C-18, the Online News Act.
“They’re superpowers. They’re huge. They’re rich, powerful. Lots of big lawyers. They can be intimidating,” Rodriguez told reporters this week at a news conference convened to announce that the federal government would be suspending its advertising on Facebook and Instagram.
“But are we going to let ourselves be intimidated? We can’t.”
In fact, Rodriguez has framed this refusal to be intimidated in rather existential terms.
“We cannot have tech giants as powerful as they are, with big lawyers and everything, coming here and telling members of Parliament and the government elected by the people, ‘This is what you’re going to do,'” he told CTV last week. “We can’t accept that. We’re a sovereign nation.”
WATCH: Federal government suspends advertising on Facebook, Instagram
Federal government suspends ads on Facebook and Instagram
3 days ago
Duration 2:12
The federal government says it is suspending advertising on Facebook and Instagram, the latest move in a battle over the Online News Act. The new law compels digital platforms to pay news organizations when users access news content through its platforms.
Thing is, if you have to insist you won’t be intimidated, it’s probably because there’s a reason to believe you could be intimidated. And that’s the basic problem facing both the Liberal government and the Canadian media industry — they find themselves in a spot where the major Internet platforms are able to exert significant pressure on them.
On a fundamental level, the fight over C-18 isn’t really about journalism. It’s about power.
This week on Cross Country Checkup, our Ask Me Anything focuses on Google and Meta’s plan to eventually remove links to Canadian journalism in response to the federal government’s Online News Act. Fill out the details on this form to get your questions in early.
Our changing relationship with Big Tech
The Trudeau government may very well relish the idea of a fight with powerful global entities. At a news conference on Thursday, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland referred to the government’s antagonists as “American tech giants” — and neither the first nor the third words seemed accidental.
It wasn’t so long ago that the major social media platforms were celebrated — or at least respected — for the communication and innovation they facilitated. Their creators were treated like oracles. Few, if any, major political or media figures failed to embrace the social-media era. Google’s parent company nearly built its own neighbourhood in Toronto.
But the days when Trudeau would appear beside Sheryl Sandberg — the former Facebook executive — for photo ops and chats about gender equality now seem like ancient history.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau chats with Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s chief operating officer, during a bilateral meeting in Davos, Switzerland on Jan. 20, 2016. (Andrew Vaughan/Canadian Press)
The United States presidential election in 2016 imposed a reality check on the actual potential of these platforms. What followed was a push to deal with a series of related problems: misinformation, disinformation, “online harms,” foreign interference and the financial difficulties of the traditional news industry.
(The last nine months at Twitter have also served as a reminder of how much any given social media platform ultimately operates at the whim of the billionaire who owns it.)
Whether the Online News Act takes the exactly right approach to addressing the last of those problems or not, it exists downstream from the real issue — the dominance over digital advertising that Google and Facebook have been allowed to achieve. The best that might be said for the legislation is that it could represent a “stopgap” solution for the industry, buying it some time to adapt.
(CBC/Radio-Canada’s corporate position is that the Online News Act will help level the playing field and contribute to a healthy news ecosystem in Canada.)
The American media industry is belatedly realizing that chasing the viral Internet traffic social-media platforms can generate was ultimately a fool’s errand. But as the fight over C-18 makes clear, that traffic also gave a platform like Facebook an incredible amount of power — power it is now wielding by blocking Canadian news.
The lesson might simply be that, no matter how much fun the apps are, allowing individual corporate entities to accumulate so much unchecked power always comes with downsides.
That power was on display even as the federal government was announcing its advertising suspension.
After Rodriguez announced the move, a reporter asked if the Liberal Party would suspend its own advertising on Facebook. Rodriguez deferred — he was speaking as heritage minister for the government, he said, not as a representative of the party. But it soon became clear the party would not be pulling its ads.
If Trudeau really believes Meta is threatening democracy—he must do a full boycott. No more posts or Liberal Party ads. Go cold turkey.<br><br>It is a small price to pay to save our entire democracy. <a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/ItsAllAnAct?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>#ItsAllAnAct</a>
Never one to turn down an opportunity to make hay, Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre took to Twitter on Thursday night to challenge the Liberal Party to put its money where its mouth is and avoid the platform entirely. Poilievre’s party opposes C-18 and isn’t pulling its own ads. And both he and the Liberal Party surely understand that a suspension of Liberal ads would amount to unilateral disarmament.
The unique and expansive access to Canadians that Facebook provides — the political value of advertising on the platform — likely means that the Liberal Party can’t afford to abandon it. At least not unless every other party is willing to do likewise.
Facebook and Google may be taking a tough stance with the Canadian government because they fear the power of precedent — if Canada succeeds, other (bigger, more cost-intensive) countries might follow suit. But the vocal public support the Trudeau government is getting from American and British politicians might suggest other legislators realize what a challenge they’re up against.
The Online News Act may or may not play a useful role in fostering a healthier media ecosystem in Canada. But the legislation is ultimately the result of how deeply embedded private companies like Google and Facebook have become in democratic life.
PARIS (AP) — French judicial authorities are investigating the disappearance of two Paralympic athletes from Congo who recently competed in the Paris Games, the prosecutor’s office in the Paris suburb of Bobigny confirmed on Thursday.
Prosecutors opened the investigation on Sept. 7, after members of the athletes’ delegation warned authorities of their disappearance two days before.
Le Parisien newspaper reported that shot putter Mireille Nganga and Emmanuel Grace Mouambako, a visually impaired sprinter who was accompanied by a guide, went missing on Sept. 5, along with a third person.
The athletes’ suitcases were also gone but their passports remained with the Congolese delegation, according to an official with knowledge of the investigation, who asked to remain anonymous as they were not allowed to speak publicly about the case.
The Paralympic Committee of the Democratic Republic of Congo did not respond to requests for information from The Associated Press.
Nganga — who recorded no mark in the seated javelin and shot put competitions — and Mouambako were Congo’s flag bearers at the opening ceremony of the Paralympic Games, organizers said.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) — A linebacker at Division II West Virginia State was fatally shot during what the university said Thursday is being investigated by police as a home invasion.
The body of Jyilek Zyiare Harrington, 21, of Charlotte, North Carolina, was found inside an apartment Wednesday night in Charleston, police Lt. Tony Hazelett said in a statement.
Hazelett said several gunshots were fired during a disturbance in a hallway and inside the apartment. The statement said Harrington had multiple gunshot wounds and was pronounced dead at the scene. Police said they had no information on a possible suspect.
West Virginia State said counselors were available to students and faculty on campus.
“Our thoughts and prayers are with Jyilek’s family as they mourn the loss of this incredible young man,” West Virginia State President Ericke S. Cage said in a letter to students and faculty.
Harrington, a senior, had eight total tackles, including a sack, in a 27-24 win at Barton College last week.
“Jyilek truly embodied what it means to be a student-athlete and was a leader not only on campus but in the community,” West Virginia State Vice President of Intercollegiate Athletics Nate Burton said. “Jyilek was a young man that, during Christmas, would create a GoFundMe to help less fortunate families.”
Burton said donations to a fund established by the athletic department in Harrington’s memory will be distributed to an organization in Charlotte to continue his charity work.
West Virginia State’s home opener against Carson-Newman, originally scheduled for Thursday night, has been rescheduled to Friday, and a private vigil involving both teams was set for Thursday night. Harrington previously attended Carson-Newman, where he made seven tackles in six games last season. He began his college career at Division II Erskine College.
“Carson-Newman joins West Virginia State in mourning the untimely passing of former student-athlete Jyilek Harrington,” Carson-Newman Vice President of Athletics Matt Pope said in a statement. “The Harrington family and the Yellow Jackets’ campus community is in our prayers. News like this is sad to hear anytime, but today it feels worse with two teams who knew him coming together to play.”
DETROIT (AP) — Joe Schmidt, the Hall of Fame linebacker who helped the Detroit Lions win NFL championships in 1953 and 1957 and later coached the team, has died. He was 92.
The Lions said family informed the team Schmidt died Wednesday. A cause of death was not provided.
One of pro football’s first great middle linebackers, Schmidt played his entire NFL career with the Lions from 1953-65. An eight-time All-Pro, he was enshrined into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1973 and the college football version in 2000.
“Joe likes to say that at one point in his career, he was 6-3, but he had tackled so many fullbacks that it drove his neck into his shoulders and now he is 6-foot,” said the late Lions owner William Clay Ford, Schmidt’s presenter at his Hall of Fame induction in 1973. “At any rate, he was listed at 6-feet and as I say was marginal for that position. There are, however, qualities that certainly scouts or anybody who is drafting a ballplayer cannot measure.”
Born in Pittsburgh, Schmidt played college football in his hometown at Pitt, beginning his stint there as a fullback and guard before coach Len Casanova switched him to linebacker.
“Pitt provided me with the opportunity to do what I’ve wanted to do, and further myself through my athletic abilities,” Schmidt said. “Everything I have stemmed from that opportunity.”
Schmidt dealt with injuries throughout his college career and was drafted by the Lions in the seventh round in 1953. As defenses evolved in that era, Schmidt’s speed, savvy and tackling ability made him a valuable part of some of the franchise’s greatest teams.
Schmidt was elected to the Pro Bowl 10 straight years from 1955-64, and after his arrival, the Lions won the last two of their three NFL titles in the 1950s.
In a 1957 playoff game at San Francisco, the Lions trailed 27-7 in the third quarter before rallying to win 31-27. That was the NFL’s largest comeback in postseason history until Buffalo rallied from a 32-point deficit to beat Houston in 1993.
“We just decided to go after them, blitz them almost every down,” Schmidt recalled. “We had nothing to lose. When you’re up against it, you let both barrels fly.”
Schmidt became an assistant coach after wrapping up his career as a player. He was Detroit’s head coach from 1967-72, going 43-35-7.
Schmidt was part of the NFL’s All-Time Team revealed in 2019 to celebrate the league’s centennial season. Of course, he’d gone into the Hall of Fame 46 years earlier.
Not bad for an undersized seventh-round draft pick.
“It was a dream of mine to play football,” Schmidt told the Detroit Free Press in 2017. “I had so many people tell me that I was too small. That I couldn’t play. I had so many negative people say negative things about me … that it makes you feel good inside. I said, ‘OK, I’ll prove it to you.’”
