Social platform Facebook banned Australian users from sharing links to news sites from Thursday (18). On the same day, Canada announced that Facebook must pay for news content and vowed that it would not back down even if Facebook shut down its news service, as it did with Australia.
Canadian Minister of Cultural Heritage Steven Guilbeault condemned Facebook’s approach and said it would not deter Canada. Guilbeault is in charge of drafting a bill similar to the one in Australia, which is scheduled to be published in the coming months.
He told reporters, “Canada is at the forefront of this tug-of-war …… We are really one of the first countries in the world to do this.”
Canadian media industry players warned last year that the government’s failure to act could lead to an imbalance in the market. They said following Australia’s lead would result in an annual gain of C$620 million for media distribution units; failure to act would leave 700 of Canada’s total 3,100 print media workers unemployed.
Gilbert said Canada could follow the Australian model and require Facebook and Google to reach a payment agreement with the news media, or agree on prices through mandatory arbitration.
Another option, he said, would be to follow the French example of requiring large technology platforms and media distributors to enter into negotiations to pay for the use of news content.
On the other hand, Australian Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said on Friday (19) that he had told Facebook chief Mark Zuckerberg that Australia would still enforce laws requiring platforms to pay for news content.
Frydenberg tweeted that the two sides would continue to talk about the issue over the weekend.
The bill under consideration in Australia would require Facebook and Google (Google) to pay Australian media when they use news links. Facebook then implemented new measures on Thursday that prevented users in Australia from viewing the Facebook pages of local and international news organizations, and cleared the Facebook pages of Australian media outlets.
“It’s a stark reminder of the power of Facebook,” said Kjerstin Thorson, a Reuters professor at Michigan State University who specializes in social media.
He pointed out that Facebook’s response may prevent users from getting “high-quality information” but “does not remove the desire of people to be informed about current events, which allows harmful information and rumors to spread.
Some analysts say that although Facebook was not a news agency at its inception, it has become an important source of information for many people around the world, especially for young Internet users, while traditional media has been on the decline.
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