On Thursday, tech giant Google said that it looks forward to block Canadian news on its platform in Canada – joining a string of campaign initiated by Facebook against a new law requiring payments to local news publishers. The alphabet on search engine giant will remove links to Canadian news from its search results and other products in Canada once the law takes effect in around six months. Facebook owned Meta Platforms Inc. Also make a similar announcement in the previous week after the execution of Bill C– 18, or the online news act. The media industry of Canada has demanded stricter regulation of internet giants to enable News businesses to recover from financial losses suffered in the years in which Facebook and Google gained a greater share of the online advertising market.
Canada’s independent budgetary regulator last year forecasted that news businesses could receive about C$330 million (249 million dollars) Each year from deals made compulsory under the new law. Pablo Rodriguez – we heritage minister of Canada, has said that the platforms or not under any obligation in the act immediately and that’s the Canadian government was open to a dialogue with them ob the regulatory and implementation process.
according to Facebook and Google, the proposals were not sustainable for their businesses and for months, they had signalled a possibility of ending news availability in Canada, unless the act was amended or revoked. Canada’s federal government has refused to make any changes in the act and, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in June this year, alleged the companies of using “bullying tactics”.
In a statement on Thursday, Rodrigues said, “big Tech would rather spend money to change their platforms to block Canadians from accessing good quality and local news instead of paying their fair share to news organisations. This shows how deeply irresponsible and out of touch they are, and especially when they make millions of dollars off of Canadian users.”
In retaliation to the statement, Google’s President of global affairs – Kent Walker, said in a blog post that remains unworkable and that Google did not believe regulatory process would be able to resolve “structural issues with the legislation“. He also added, “ we have now informed the government that when the law takes effect, we unfortunately will have to remove links to the Canadian news from our search, news and discover products in Canada.”
The news outlets that were impacted by Google‘s decision would be based on what is the government of Canada calls “eligible news businesses“ when rules are finalised and implemented in some time. Google will also terminate its News Showcase program in Canada, in which it has agreements with 150 other news publications across the country. Bug news company like Reuters also has a contract with Google to produce news showcase panels – in Canada as well.
The law pushes online platforms to conversed with news publishers and pay for their content. Recently in 2021, a similar law was passed in Australia where Google and Facebook threatens to curtail their services. Both continued their services in the country continent after the legislation amended the bill.
Alphabet owned Google has also argued that Canada’s law is broader than those prevalent in Australia and Europe, as it has insisted that it can put a price for news story links displayed in search results and can apply to outlets that do not produce news. The company had also proposed that the displaying of news content instead of links, be a basis for payment, and that only businesses that are produced news as per journalistic standards will be eligible.
