Markham Stouffville Review, November 2023

NOVEMBER 2023
COMMUNITY 9 MARKHAM STOUFFVILLE REVIEW
Local news the victim in government, big-tech battle
BY DUNCAN FLETCHER
Social media is about sharing. While
some arguably overshare frivolous details
of their lives, social media has become an
important platform to share fun and often
important community news and information.
But if you’ve tried to share a great article
from a local, regional or national news
outlet lately, you’ve undoubtedly found that
impossible. You can’t even share the URL.
Similarly, if you want to check out the
Stouffville or Markham Review’s latest post
on Facebook, sorry. You can’t do that either.
Either way, you’ve probably found a
message simply saying, “This content isn’t
available in Canada.”
But it’s not the news source preventing
you from seeing its content. We wish we
could share as much as possible with you.
In response to new, and some might
say, misguided federal government legislation,
the Online News Act will force
companies like Meta (Facebook, Instagram
and WhatsApp’s parent company), as well
as other large digital social outlets like
Alphabet (Google, YouTube) to compensate
traditional media for news they create and
then shared on social sites. In response,
Meta has gone nuclear and erased all hint of
news from its platforms – large and small.
Google has also said they will follow
suit shortly, erasing all search results for
Canadian news articles on their platforms.
The upshot of this legislative stand-off is
that your access to legitimate news content
will be severely curtailed, and news sites
will be unable to share even the most critically
important information except on their
site.
The backdrop to this story is a longrunning
erosion of advertising dollars from
“traditional media” to trackable digital platforms
over the last 15 years or so. Trackable
is a keyword here.
Facebook and Google have exceptional
data collection capabilities and know how
to use it. They know where you go on the
internet, what you like, when you are online
and where you’ll likely go. They see what
news interests you and where you go to
get it and use the data they get from your
behaviour and target ads your way and advertisers
pay to access you through various
means that the big two provide.
It’s been a resounding success. Over
80 per cent of all digital ads in Canada go
to the big two at the expense of traditional
advertising outlets — namely news sources.
Traditional media have tried to adapt by
putting all their content on websites and
gaining what meagre digital ad dollars
might trickle down to them, which isn’t
much – even for more prominent outlets
like the Toronto Star, CBC, CTV etc. Even
these outlets don’t have the power to drive
sufficient traffic on their own sites to live
off the ad revenue as they once did when
the content was delivered in print or on
traditional broadcast mediums.
So, knowing that many people have
become accustomed to accessing news via
social media, most news outlets post links
there, hoping to redirect the valuable eyeballs
back to their sites.
Markham-Stouffville Review General Manager Duncan Fletcher, seen here with print and
online versions of the paper, says that local media is being threatened by misguided government
policy and combative tech giants.
On the surface, it seems like a win-win,
doesn’t it? Facebook gets data and news
sites get referrals through links they post.
Over a third of Stouffville and Markham
Review’s traffic has typically come from
social media. We don’t complain. Sometimes
we’ve even paid Facebook to boost
our posts.
However many more prominent Canadian
news outlets contend that the dominant
market position Facebook and Google have
has been achieved on the backs of traditional
media as Meta, Google, et al, don’t
produce any news content they display and
benefit from. Also, they note, that ad dollars
from local businesses go right back to
a foreign jurisdiction and invest precisely
zero back into local communities. And
so, traditional media are demanding some
of the ad money back from them even if
Facebook and Google don’t make ad sales
directly from news content.
Facebook, for their part, says, ‘Don’t
blame us for building a better mouse trap.
If you want more ad dollars, build a better
system.’ They also argue the millions of
eyeballs they send to news sites are payment
enough. If news outlets don’t think
they’re valuable, don’t post on the platform.
That is a good point in principle. But
do they owe Canadians nothing beyond
well-targeted, increasingly expensive ads?
The Canadian government, allegedly
in the interest of promoting a strong and
vibrant domestic news sector, agreed with
news content producers.
Following similar legislation enacted
in Australia, it produced the Online News
Act, which will force big digital to collectively
negotiate with Canadian news outlets
and distribute payment to them for any links
used on their platforms.
Further, the Online News Act grandiosely
claims the Act’s outcome will be
the “sustainability of the Canadian news
ecosystem, including the sustainability of
independent news businesses….” The details
about how the negotiating process will
work are still to be determined, and assessing
what each link is worth will be messy.
But estimates from both the government
and Facebook/Google suggest numbers
totalling upwards of $200 million a year.
The digital giants will resist being
squeezed, and even if they do buckle, any
funds that do go back to media as a result
of the Act will be sucked up by larger,
lumbering, traditional, money-losing news
organizations like the already governmentfunded
CBC or struggling newspapers like
the Toronto Star who support the Act.
Torstar, the parent company of the
Star, has sought bankruptcy protection
for Metroland newspapers which includes
the Stouffville Sun-Tribune and Markham
Economist & Sun despite already having
a revenue-sharing deal with Facebook.
Traditional news sources are losing money
so fast that whatever money is wrung from
Facebook or Google will not change the trajectory
of their business. The Online News
Act is not doing anything to help build a
more vibrant media landscape. It is merely
a last-gasp attempt to shore up a failed business
model and delay the inevitable.
While big traditional media suck up
what they can, small, local, independently
owned outlets like the Stouffville and
Markham Review will get nothing from the
Online News Act arrangement.
That’s because the Online Act contains
a stilted and dated view of a news organization.
It itemizes, that, among other characteristics,
a news business must employ two
journalists to be eligible. Many owner-operated
news organizations stay afloat with the
assistance of freelance reporters. Many of
these small organizations wouldn’t qualify
for this funding (unless Indigenous-owned).
That doesn’t square with the new media
reality where many highly qualified and
talented writers, photographers, and digital
media producers, having worked with big
media, increasingly strike out on their own
and provide much-needed and insightful
local content, often online only.
In the Review’s case, a family-owned
outlet whose two owners have collectively,
more than 60 years of media experience
doesn’t count as an independent news business
no matter how many local stories we
write or of what quality or worth they are
because we’re classed as owners and not
paid exclusively as journalists. The dozen
or so contributors and freelance writers who
write on our printed pages and websites
don’t count either. Even though paid, they
are not officially employees, so not classed
as journalists for the purposes of the Act.
So here we are.
The federal government doesn’t classify
us as a news organization, but Facebook
and Google are punishing us like we
are.
So, who’s looking out for local news?
Well, it’s up to us. I guess. But we’ll
need your help.
First, pick up our print product and
pass it on to a friend when done. They are
available at local grocery stores, libraries,
community centres and other high-traffic
locations. Patronize the good advertisers
that still spend money on local news. They
are getting good results and helping pay for
local stories to be told.
If you’re a local business, consider
spending some of your local budget on local
media directly, in print or online. We offer
packages that combine both and you’ll be
noticed as a business that cares about independent
news.
Secondly, bookmark our website in
your browser and any other local site you
like. Go straight to the source often and
don’t rely on Facebook to decide what can
be shared with you. If you like the format,
our print product is replicated on our site in
an interactive PDF, but we update the site
daily with more news and information than
we can fit in print.
And then hope that common sense
prevails, and the government looks to more
productive ways of engaging digital reality
than subsidizing a dying business model
and Facebook and Google stop acting like
the schoolyard bully.
There are better ways forward. Maybe
even call your local MP and let them know
you expect more from the government than
the misguided, news-killing Online News
Act.
Tell them you read about the whole
mess in a local, independent news outlet.
Now, one of very few left.