Evan Leibovitch

@Kecessa

The reality is that the Canadian media need Facebook more than Facebook needs the Canadian media.

If the “bump” is so small, why is everyone complaining when this “exploitation” is removed? They should be cheering!

@Pxtl @StillPaisleyCat

Re; “we need the loudest voices in Canada to also help Canada out”, speak for yourself. I’m tired of the loudest voices drowning out the reasonable ones. It’s these same loud voices that have polarized society and tanked trust in the media as a whole.

C-18 is all about helping Canada’s big media companies solidify their positions and inhibit innovative startups. Meta and Google helped level the playing field so they must be published.

@Kecessa @cheery_coffee

Whose work is bringing who profit?

The cruel reality is that the Canadian media need Facebook more than Facebook needs Canadian media.

@StillPaisleyCat @ArbitraryValue
Looks like they’re following the law pretty well here.
In return for being asked to pay for making links, they no longer make links.
Sure, Meta and Google can be nasty on other grounds (and fighting C-11 isn’t nasty), but they’re being quite law-abiding here.
Flouting the law would be sharing links and refusing to pay.

@StillPaisleyCat They don’t have any duty, unless you want to compel speech.
Consider that governments have access to emergency systems already; consider the amber alert and the emergency broadcast system.
Why expect non-contracted private companies to do this?

@ram
They monetize everything; cat pix, political rants, food reviews etc. And they don’t pay for that either.
FB is enduring zero loss for blocking Canadian news. Even the call for an ad boycott is a bust. The biggest losers are the very media sources that pushed for this crap law.

@Kecessa @festus
Being at the table != having a deal.
Alphabet is no less set in its position that Meta. It’s at the table to allow the feds to save face in backing down while Meta has no interest in even that.

@ram @festus
What is your evidence that Facebook is making money off of linking to news? They say it’s not earning them much money, which is why cutting Canadian media off is not losing them anything.

@Kecessa @ram
So tax them!
C-18 is the absolute WRONG way to extract revenue. It hurts Canadians as well as smaller Canadian news and content providers.
The CBC and our oligopoly of mainstream news are pushing C-18 to cement their own status, not help Canadians to be better informed.
It’s not Meta and Alphabet’s fault that our media can’t monetize their content once people get to their sites. Taxing links is not the answer and the consequences are obvious.

@jimmyjamxoxo I was in a hotel room in Hanoi Vietnam, watching Mel Lastman make a blubbering fool of himself on CNN half a world away.