Roundup: Google joins the bully tactics

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Following Facebook’s particular tantrum over the online news bill, and their announcement that they will remove Canadian news links from their site, and end some of their media fellowship programmes, Google has stated that they will do the same, and lo, there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth. It’s absolutely a bully tactic, but so far the government is holding firm. It has been pointed out that when these web giants tried this in Australia, they lasted four days before they returned to the table, so we’ll see how long this lasts.

This having been established, a couple of things: Despite the media narrative, the bill is not a “link tax.” Links are nowhere in the spirit or the text of the bill. These companies were not supposed to be paying for hosting links on their sites, but rather, this was supposed to be an exercise in trying to rebalance the marketplace. Facebook and Google have so distorted the advertising market and destroyed it for media companies that this was supposed to be a way of essentially trying to compensate the public good of journalism for how they distorted the ad market. What the law is supposed to do, once it’s in force, is create transparent conditions for those negotiations to take place, with the oversight of the CRTC as an arm’s-length regulator. Again, this is not paying for links. There is no prescribed tariff rate for these links, but it was about addressing a market failure in a way that is as arm’s-length from government as possible. But web giants don’t like transparency (the deals they signed with media companies previously were all secret), and they don’t like to be held accountable. And the distance from government is also why the government didn’t just tax them and redistribute those revenues—never mind that web giants are expert at evading taxes, and the howls of government funding journalism from those revenues would be worse than the existing funds that the government already provides print journalism (which, again, they tried to keep as arm’s-length as possible through advisory boards making the qualification determinations).

I’m less inclined to be angry at the government, because they were largely being responsive to what the news industry was asking of them, even though that is tainted by the self-interest of certain zombie media giants. We should, however, absolutely be angry that these web giants are throwing their weight around and bullying sovereign governments like this, and it makes the case even more that these companies have become too big and need to be broken up. The fact that they are beating up on Canada won’t endear them to other jurisdictions, like the EU, but that’s in part why they’re doing it—they don’t want other countries to do what Canada is attempting here. But this may very well be a case that they are overplaying their hands, and those other countries or jurisdictions they are trying to scare off won’t be deterred.

Meanwhile, the opposition parties are having another normal one about this. Cripes.

Ukraine Dispatch:

No news from the front-lines of the counter-offensive, but emergency workers in the four districts surrounding the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant are conducting drills in preparation for the event of a nuclear incident or leak involving the plant, as they are convinced Russia will stage. Meanwhile, president Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with Greta Thunberg to discuss the ecological impacts of war, including of the burst dam. Zelenskyy also met with former US vice president Mike Pence, for that matter. Human Rights Watch says that they have evidence that Ukraine has also been using illegal landmines as part of their operations.

Good reads:

  • While the UK wants to fast-track Ukraine’s membership in NATO, Anita Anand maintains that they need to win their war first.
  • The deadline for arbitration now passed, Canada and allies are taking Iran to the International Court of Justice over the downing of Flight PS752.
  • CSE released their annual report yesterday, showing that they block an average of 6.3 billion malicious actions per day, and are also protecting Ukraine and Latvia.
  • From the better late than never file, The Canadian Press has an explainer about the Clean Fuel Standard (which no, is not a gods damned carbon tax.)
  • Police are treating the stabbings at the University of Waterloo as a hate crime.
  • There is grumbling in the Conservative ranks about Poilievre that is leaking out, particularly as he has re-imposed a high level of caucus discipline.
  • Chris Selley points to the recent stats on overdose deaths in Alberta, and how it complicates the narrative that Danielle Smith and Pierre Poilievre are pushing.

Odds and ends:

For Xtra, I had a one-on-one sit-down interview with tourism minister Randy Boissonnault, where he indicated that an LGBTQ+ Special Envoy could happen.

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4 thoughts on “Roundup: Google joins the bully tactics”

  1. Haven’t heard a word from the rightwingnut Polly on the looming dockworkers strike. I would suppose that the economic wellbeing of Canadians would not be of importance to Polly but the tasty dessert of an upheaval in our shipments of goods across Canada and the chaos that would follow is secondary to his ability to blame it all on Trudeau.

  2. “…and are also protecting Ukraine and Lithuania.”

    I think you’ll find it’s Latvia, not Lithuania.

  3. “But web giants don’t like transparency…and they don’t like to be held accountable.”

    True, but neither does the Trudeau government. And, unlike this government, the web giants never claimed to be transparent. On this count, the hypocrisy medal has to go to Justin.

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