The NWT government and city of Yellowknife are describing in tweets, Instagram messages etc. how to search key evacuation information on CPAC and CBC. The broadcast carriers have a duty to carry emergency information, but Meta and X are blocking links.
While internet access is reportedly limited in Yellowknife, residents are finding this a barrier to getting current and accurate information. Even links to CBC radio are blocked.
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Should they? Absolutely. Should they be forced to? I don’t think so.
But, it seems like an easy gesture of goodwill to do it, if there’s a system in place for it.
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It’s more than time that we show these private platforms that they can’t act however they want if they want to do business in our country without paying a cent of taxes on the profit they make here. Yes they should be forced to pay by our rules or face the prospect of being outright banned in Canada.
We made the rules, and now they’re playing by them. You can force them to pay for news links, but you can’t force them to display news links and make them pay for them.
We absolutely could, if they had the choice between paying taxes on all profit made out of Canadian content OR not being allowed to access the Canadian market at all they would quickly bend the knee because it would hurt them directly, the issue is that the current rule doesn’t hurt them enough, people still go on Facebook to check non news content.
But my point is you have to legislate new (potentially very unpopular) rules for them to follow if you want to do things like that. We put forth new rules that they didn’t like, and they’re following the rules.
As much as we rag on Facebook, and as harmful as they may be, they’re playing by the rules. We tell them they have to pay for their news links, they decide not to host news links. And as far as the laws are concerned, they did nothing wrong. Public opinion is another story, but that’s irrelevant in this context.
Pablo Rodriguez mentioned that during talks with then they said they could relay selected urgent news though (which they had done in Australia when they had banned their news), they’re just acting in bad faith to prove a point.
Agreed, they definitely could relay urgent messages, or even put it up as their own news without falling afoul of the new law.
I did mention in my first post that it would be an easy gesture of good faith, but I think there’s some spite there. They made their threats, the government acted anyway, and now they’re sticking to their guns.
So they shouldn’t compensate the people whose work brings them profit? Know what we call that in the physical world?
Stealing.
If the government is willing to make an exception for emergency news, that Meta proved they’re able to do it in Australia and even told the Canadian government it’s something they could do, then who’s in the wrong here?
@Kecessa @cheery_coffee
Whose work is bringing who profit?
The cruel reality is that the Canadian media need Facebook more than Facebook needs Canadian media.
Journalists and media company produce content, journalists are paid by media company that profit from their work and pay taxes on that profit.
Facebook is used to share content from media companies and make profit from it, they don’t compensate media companies or pay taxes in Canada.
Media companies receive a small bump in traffic compared to the total number of views, they get a small bump in profit from ads revenues on their website and they pay taxes on it.
In the end the majority of revenues generated from views on Facebook doesn’t profit the content creators/owners in any way nor does it profit the country in which the owners are established.
So you need me to make it even simpler than that? You’re arguing that medias should settle for the scraps when Facebook is feasting by exploiting their work.
@Kecessa
The reality is that the Canadian media need Facebook more than Facebook needs the Canadian media.
If the “bump” is so small, why is everyone complaining when this “exploitation” is removed? They should be cheering!
Reaction from Radio-Canada and La Presse has been negative only in the sense that they think it sucks that because some people only take their needs from Facebook they’ll now lose access to reliable information if they don’t bother going directly to the source. There’s also the obvious criticism that comes with Meta saying “We can still do it in case of emergency like we did in Australia” and then turning around and not sharing critical info when the situation presents itself.
I honestly believe they should simply be banned from Canadian internet at this point unless they start paying taxes on all profits made from Canadians and their content, but I don’t make the rules.
So Lemmy instance admins should be paying for all the links on their sites too?
Are they directly making profit from it?
They may be.
Well then, you’ve got your answer.
It is sad there are people like you who think everything is a transaction. Posting a link is a recommendation, it is no way stealing.
It’s sadder that there’s people like you who don’t understand that there’s a difference between posting a link and copying the whole article or a bot generated shorter version of it.