One of the Justin Trudeau government’s most notable failures was its inability to understand the internet and how it continues to change the way people consume information.
Mark Carney may have restored an aura of adult supervision to the nation, but there are hints the new prime minister—who often comes across as more #okboomer than Gen X—doesn’t “get” the internet any better than the last one did. And he doesn’t understand the news media ecosystem as well as he should.
This is why I worry.
Earlier this month, Prime Minister Carney responded to a Kelowna reporter’s question about the lack of news links on Facebook by suggesting he might be open to scrapping the Online News Act. In case you missed it, that 2023 legislation was designed to force Meta to pay publishers for posting links for free. Rather than face a shakedown based on a false premise, Facebook chose to no longer carry news links. Google, for its part, paid what amounted to a ransom by setting up a $100 million fund for news organizations to squabble over and, in return, got exempted from the act.
This is now the third August—a month in which forest fires frequently dominate the news—without news links on Facebook. And while for the third straight year reporters have asked about the perils endangered citizens face because they can’t access their reports via Facebook, there is a paucity of evidence to suggest anyone in need of emergency or evacuation information was unable to access it because they couldn’t read their local Daily Bugle on Facebook.
That’s because Facebook, in particular, does a very good job of providing that information without news links. Nova Scotia Emergency Management, for instance, has all the information anyone needs on its website and all its social media platforms. The days when governments and first responders depended on the media to help them get the word out are long gone. Every news organization in the country could cease to exist tomorrow and people would be unimpaired, provided they had internet access, in getting the critical information they need. If they don’t have internet access, there is always radio, through which officials have direct access to the public any time they want via the emergency alerts system.
And if that isn’t enough, links will soon be as redundant as print newspapers now that artificial intelligence can provide us all the information we need with a simple request. No need anymore to hunt and peck through Facebook or a search engine.
