Meta adds to protest Ottawa’s Online News Act. The web giant is ending its royalty agreement with the National Cooperative for Independent Information (CN2i), which bodes ill for other organizations with similar agreements.
The organization, which brings together six regional daily newspapers, is part of a group of around 20 publishers, including daily newspapers such as Le Devoir, the Globe and Mail and the Toronto Star – having concluded agreements with Facebook since 2021. They planned remuneration in exchange for the use of journalistic content.
“We are obviously disappointed with this decision by Meta, because the regulatory framework which was initially intended to help the media should not end up harming them,” CN2i CEO Geneviève Rossier said in a statement sent to La Press.
The agreement with Meta will end on July 31. According to what Ms. Rossier told the daily Le Soleil, which is part of CN2i, it represented a “substantial” amount.
The move by the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp comes about a week after the passage of Bill C-18 aimed at forcing web giants into retribution deals with the outlets whose content they publish. Mark Zuckerberg’s company immediately reacted by announcing that media content would be blocked for its 24 million Facebook and Instagram users in the country.
This should happen before the law comes into force, in about six months.
Wednesday evening, it was not possible to know if other Canadian partners of Meta had suffered the same fate. The Toronto Star and The Globe and Mail did not respond to emails sent by La Presse to this effect.
“We have no comment to offer at this time,” Le Devoir director Brian Myles replied.
Professor at the UQAM School of Media, Jean-Hugues Roy is not surprised by Meta’s decision against CN2i. This is part of a “negotiation strategy” on the part of the Californian giant, says the expert.
“They give a turn of the screw, estimates Mr. Roy, in a telephone interview with La Presse. Meta has six months ahead of her. It takes the pressure up a notch. If the past is any guarantee of the future, they won’t [block Canadian media content]. »
Before raising the tone against Canada, the owner of Facebook had given similar treatment to Australia, in February 2021. The sharing of news content had been blocked in protest against a bill that Canberra was about to adopt. This gesture had been strongly criticized. Agreements had finally been reached.
Laura Scaffidi, the press secretary for Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez, deplored Meta’s decision against CN2i, recalling that the web giants had “no obligations” for the moment.
“Facebook would rather spend money modifying their platform to block access to news than pay their fair share,” she wrote in an emailed statement. This demonstrates how irresponsible and out of touch they are. »
For Mr. Roy, the actions taken by Meta are also intended to send a message to elected officials in California, where the state assembly adopted a text obliging the major social networks to pay the media.
“By doing this [blocking news and ending royalty deals], the company is not talking to Mr. Rodriguez, but to California’s elected officials. There are going to be public hearings in July there. It will be interesting to follow. »
According to a report prepared by the Parliamentary Budget Officer last October, Canadian news organizations would split $329.2 million under the legislative provisions in Bill C-18.
