I have for a long time been opposed to the idea that Google et al should pay newspapers ANY money.
Firstly, I simply thought that the idea that Google et al would fork over dollars and not find a way to later hit me (and everyone on the internet, for that matter) in a way that allows recovery and more was simply naive.
Second, if I wanted to prop up, say, the Toronto Star then I can buy a subscription to that publication. If I don't want a subscription then why should I "participate" in funding it?
Third, and very importantly to me, I really didn't see how Google et al benefited from the passthrough of clicks more than the particular newspaper. That, of course, is the point of Peter Menzies column herein. Really, the newspapers should be sending money to Google et al rather than the other way around.
The government is trying to solve the wrong problem. They are trying to fix the now broken business model on the behalf of media companies. That's not the public's problem.
The public's problem is that democracy requires universal access to accurate information to help us gauge how well (or not well) government is fulfilling their mandate. News does more than that -- it entertains, supports other businesses -- but those can be delivered by other means.
The problem with social media is that it provides all kinds of information (and disinformation) without an easy means to determine quality (at least not built into the platform). Worse, it's designed only to keep you on the platform, so its algorithms with actively push you to low quality information if you indicate any interest in it at all (even hovering over something clickbaity). That creates an "idea marketplace" that's easily manipulated, where people don't have access to a similar set of basic information (if social is their only source) and that's difficult to trust.
We regulate information in financial markets, creating penalties for those who attempt to manipulate the market. We also mandate that really important information gets shared with everyone at the same time. An open information marketplace requires similar oversight.
I would submit that government regulation should focus on two things.
First there should be legal penalties for attempting to use social platform to sway public opinion in a non-transparent manner. If you used bot farms or networks of related sites to make a piece of content seem way more popular than it is -- the equivalent of talking up a stock as an analyst that you hold interest in -- there should be a legal penalty. Right now, we are relying on tech firms' terms of service to regulate this, but their primary interest is profit and the damage exists in the public sphere. Now, realistically, this will be hard to police. But let's at least acknowledge that defrauding the public in this manner is undesirable!
That said -- if you are transparent; if you are an advocacy group and you work with other aligned with your cause -- have at it. The goal here isn't to stifle legitimate discourse. It's to squash illegitimate (and fraudulant) tactics to hack the algorithm and get access to a lot of eyeballs.
Second: focus the regulation on the algorithm. Social media companies only care about engagement and ad revenue. We need to make the automated decisions on what content they serve up to people transparent. Ideally, the criteria should NOT be the platform's choice. I as a user should be able to determine the criteria behind the content served to me. And, businesses serving content (eg monitizing it) should be held accountable for the content they serve up. That doesn't mean censoring, but it does mean a higher level of accountability at to who these actors are, where they are, and what their business model is. A bunch of sites in Russia all sharing political content for profit in Canada should not be able to hide behind social media anonymity.
Now, this is all new ground and and I think getting this regulation right will take time. But let's focus on 'public good' -- defined here by a trustworthy information ecosystem that still preserves freedom of expression -- and not on propping up specific sectors!
The competitive media marketplace will self-balance over time. It's already bubbling. We have SubStack ("The LIne") and Rumble.ca emerging with "build your own newspaper" models. Entrepreneurial journalists, video analysts and 9-year-old kids are replacing conventional "eyeballs".
Meta is correct. The golden goose will be killed by a passé "print" industry.
The public doesn't need newspapers; it just needs news. No business model is guaranteed (ask a farmer). Maybe it will all become old-persons-hobbies, and billionaire-funded propaganda.
Most journalists worthy of being heard are those who are diligent in reporting facts and the majority of them are already out of the Corporate style media and on substack or creating a news worthy site of their own. What is left in the Corporate media outlets are those who are far from being termed "journalist". They would not know a story if it knocked them off their chair. They repeat the drone of the Liberal/Progressive Canadian Press and thats as far as they look for a story. If it makes the Government in Ottawa (Liberal) look bad, they dont report it at all. They can do all they like and recieved money from Google or Meta but for what? Most Canadian's are very aware of the downward dive in integrety, or truth, stated or heard from the media today. They handed in their journalism degree (if indeed they ever had one) repeating the Government narrative and pushing social justice, like the activist they are. They do not report the news or write stories any longer, they propogate and initiate or contribute to activism.
The major legacy news media and the CBC should be ashamed of themselves going cap in hand and asking to be put on the federal payroll. He who pays the piper calls the tune and in 2022 that piper is the PMO. Just like in Putin's Russia and Xi's China.
With respect, Mr Menzies, your op-ed relies an awful lot on claims made by Meta. Perhaps I'm misreading it, but by doing so you appear to be undermine the credibility of the arguments you've presented here.
Which is not to say that the present federal government has adopted the right approach with the proposed legislation. Nonetheless, in this context Meta strikes me as the boy who cried wolf or, at the very least, a self-interested party to the dispute.
Ben Thompson wrote a very long article on this a few years back. Here's the relevant part
It’s hardly controversial to note that the traditional business model for most publishers, particularly newspapers, is obsolete. Absent the geographic monopolies formerly imposed by owning distribution, newspapers have nothing to offer advertisers: the sort of advertising that was formerly done in newspapers, both classified and display, is better done online.
-and
fail to understand about newspapers is that it is not simply the business model that is obsolete: rather, everything is obsolete. Most local newspapers are simply not worth saving, not because local news isn’t valuable, but rather because everything else in your typical local newspaper is worthless.
In other words do I really need a subscription to my local paper to read bout the FBI raid on Trumps compound?
Journalism livelihoods are being destroyed for no good reason as we have created a habit of allowing companies like Meta, Amazon, Google, Uber and Apple to continually blur the lines between traditional industries and themselves. Their mantra is disrupt first and deal with laws they've broken later---after getting rich.
People need to stop being afraid of being run over on the information highway and afraid of being labelled a Luddite for daring to question these companies' practices. Amazon is a leech on society, being one of the biggest companies in the USA and paying what... about 10% of the taxes they should, simply by dangling employment in front of governments. Sounds like railroad barons. Meta is the same bully in its own ways. And they all have zero customer service while they make billions. Worse than traditional telecoms and banks that we all love to complain about.
I was hoping the editors at The Line would be a voice of common sense instead of being sucked in by the well-crafted public relations efforts from these companies with tons of money. Our traditional news media is essential to our democracy, and Meta is not a news organization. Maybe people should be allowed to put text-only links in their Facebook post about interesting news they've read, so they are more likely to go to the source. A flashy Open Graph graphic and text feed do more to keep you from leaving the site than being a gift to traditional news media. I don't know what the solutions are, but I'm glad people are starting to stand up through their governments. The recent tax break for news subscriptions is a good idea. Let's tax these companies properly to pay for the maintenance of our democracy if they have no concern about how their activities affect our society, as evidenced by their quickness to use their money to defend themselves with PR and lawyers.
I have for a long time been opposed to the idea that Google et al should pay newspapers ANY money.
Firstly, I simply thought that the idea that Google et al would fork over dollars and not find a way to later hit me (and everyone on the internet, for that matter) in a way that allows recovery and more was simply naive.
Second, if I wanted to prop up, say, the Toronto Star then I can buy a subscription to that publication. If I don't want a subscription then why should I "participate" in funding it?
Third, and very importantly to me, I really didn't see how Google et al benefited from the passthrough of clicks more than the particular newspaper. That, of course, is the point of Peter Menzies column herein. Really, the newspapers should be sending money to Google et al rather than the other way around.
The government is trying to solve the wrong problem. They are trying to fix the now broken business model on the behalf of media companies. That's not the public's problem.
The public's problem is that democracy requires universal access to accurate information to help us gauge how well (or not well) government is fulfilling their mandate. News does more than that -- it entertains, supports other businesses -- but those can be delivered by other means.
The problem with social media is that it provides all kinds of information (and disinformation) without an easy means to determine quality (at least not built into the platform). Worse, it's designed only to keep you on the platform, so its algorithms with actively push you to low quality information if you indicate any interest in it at all (even hovering over something clickbaity). That creates an "idea marketplace" that's easily manipulated, where people don't have access to a similar set of basic information (if social is their only source) and that's difficult to trust.
We regulate information in financial markets, creating penalties for those who attempt to manipulate the market. We also mandate that really important information gets shared with everyone at the same time. An open information marketplace requires similar oversight.
I would submit that government regulation should focus on two things.
First there should be legal penalties for attempting to use social platform to sway public opinion in a non-transparent manner. If you used bot farms or networks of related sites to make a piece of content seem way more popular than it is -- the equivalent of talking up a stock as an analyst that you hold interest in -- there should be a legal penalty. Right now, we are relying on tech firms' terms of service to regulate this, but their primary interest is profit and the damage exists in the public sphere. Now, realistically, this will be hard to police. But let's at least acknowledge that defrauding the public in this manner is undesirable!
That said -- if you are transparent; if you are an advocacy group and you work with other aligned with your cause -- have at it. The goal here isn't to stifle legitimate discourse. It's to squash illegitimate (and fraudulant) tactics to hack the algorithm and get access to a lot of eyeballs.
Second: focus the regulation on the algorithm. Social media companies only care about engagement and ad revenue. We need to make the automated decisions on what content they serve up to people transparent. Ideally, the criteria should NOT be the platform's choice. I as a user should be able to determine the criteria behind the content served to me. And, businesses serving content (eg monitizing it) should be held accountable for the content they serve up. That doesn't mean censoring, but it does mean a higher level of accountability at to who these actors are, where they are, and what their business model is. A bunch of sites in Russia all sharing political content for profit in Canada should not be able to hide behind social media anonymity.
Now, this is all new ground and and I think getting this regulation right will take time. But let's focus on 'public good' -- defined here by a trustworthy information ecosystem that still preserves freedom of expression -- and not on propping up specific sectors!
The competitive media marketplace will self-balance over time. It's already bubbling. We have SubStack ("The LIne") and Rumble.ca emerging with "build your own newspaper" models. Entrepreneurial journalists, video analysts and 9-year-old kids are replacing conventional "eyeballs".
Meta is correct. The golden goose will be killed by a passé "print" industry.
The public doesn't need newspapers; it just needs news. No business model is guaranteed (ask a farmer). Maybe it will all become old-persons-hobbies, and billionaire-funded propaganda.
Most journalists worthy of being heard are those who are diligent in reporting facts and the majority of them are already out of the Corporate style media and on substack or creating a news worthy site of their own. What is left in the Corporate media outlets are those who are far from being termed "journalist". They would not know a story if it knocked them off their chair. They repeat the drone of the Liberal/Progressive Canadian Press and thats as far as they look for a story. If it makes the Government in Ottawa (Liberal) look bad, they dont report it at all. They can do all they like and recieved money from Google or Meta but for what? Most Canadian's are very aware of the downward dive in integrety, or truth, stated or heard from the media today. They handed in their journalism degree (if indeed they ever had one) repeating the Government narrative and pushing social justice, like the activist they are. They do not report the news or write stories any longer, they propogate and initiate or contribute to activism.
The major legacy news media and the CBC should be ashamed of themselves going cap in hand and asking to be put on the federal payroll. He who pays the piper calls the tune and in 2022 that piper is the PMO. Just like in Putin's Russia and Xi's China.
With respect, Mr Menzies, your op-ed relies an awful lot on claims made by Meta. Perhaps I'm misreading it, but by doing so you appear to be undermine the credibility of the arguments you've presented here.
Which is not to say that the present federal government has adopted the right approach with the proposed legislation. Nonetheless, in this context Meta strikes me as the boy who cried wolf or, at the very least, a self-interested party to the dispute.
Ben Thompson wrote a very long article on this a few years back. Here's the relevant part
It’s hardly controversial to note that the traditional business model for most publishers, particularly newspapers, is obsolete. Absent the geographic monopolies formerly imposed by owning distribution, newspapers have nothing to offer advertisers: the sort of advertising that was formerly done in newspapers, both classified and display, is better done online.
-and
fail to understand about newspapers is that it is not simply the business model that is obsolete: rather, everything is obsolete. Most local newspapers are simply not worth saving, not because local news isn’t valuable, but rather because everything else in your typical local newspaper is worthless.
In other words do I really need a subscription to my local paper to read bout the FBI raid on Trumps compound?
https://stratechery.com/2017/the-local-news-business-model/
Journalism livelihoods are being destroyed for no good reason as we have created a habit of allowing companies like Meta, Amazon, Google, Uber and Apple to continually blur the lines between traditional industries and themselves. Their mantra is disrupt first and deal with laws they've broken later---after getting rich.
People need to stop being afraid of being run over on the information highway and afraid of being labelled a Luddite for daring to question these companies' practices. Amazon is a leech on society, being one of the biggest companies in the USA and paying what... about 10% of the taxes they should, simply by dangling employment in front of governments. Sounds like railroad barons. Meta is the same bully in its own ways. And they all have zero customer service while they make billions. Worse than traditional telecoms and banks that we all love to complain about.
I was hoping the editors at The Line would be a voice of common sense instead of being sucked in by the well-crafted public relations efforts from these companies with tons of money. Our traditional news media is essential to our democracy, and Meta is not a news organization. Maybe people should be allowed to put text-only links in their Facebook post about interesting news they've read, so they are more likely to go to the source. A flashy Open Graph graphic and text feed do more to keep you from leaving the site than being a gift to traditional news media. I don't know what the solutions are, but I'm glad people are starting to stand up through their governments. The recent tax break for news subscriptions is a good idea. Let's tax these companies properly to pay for the maintenance of our democracy if they have no concern about how their activities affect our society, as evidenced by their quickness to use their money to defend themselves with PR and lawyers.