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Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

nationalpost.com

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Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#181

Post by brailsafe »

canadiantim wrote: post #177
brailsafe wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel similarly, but I do actually like CBC content usually. It's deeply ironic in my mind that one of the meme mantras of the PCs is defunding the CBC, good job literally every other voting MP except the PCs

It didn't used to be, but under the current Canadian government the CBC is intolerably biased towards the governing party

Meh, I've heard this claim but it escapes me how that's true. If anything it seems closer to the opposite. Most of the CBC content I see makes the current Liberal government look quite monstrous. Fifth Estate, Marketplace, current events, and almost every debate or interview with a Liberal representative.

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#182

Post by brailsafe »

canadiantim wrote: post #178
dmix wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of defunding it the Liberals created a situation where the CBC will essentially need gov gibs to survive in it's current state, which will certainly be deemed essential for publicly funded Canadian culture projection (that essential part of modern society). Economic self-owns via gov policy driven by the same small set of private school kids in Ottawa and whining about Americans is Canadian culture 101.

The CBC gets a billion a year of taxpayer dollars, plus other perks, so large parts of the CBC do already depend on this largess to survive.

Though a billion does seem high, I'm happy with some of my tax dollars going to the CBC

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#183

Post by xtqv »

defrost wrote: post #166
kevincox wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm also Canadian and feel the same. I don't like Google or Meta but this is just the media trying to be greedy. If the incoming likes from Google were harmful they would have configured a robots.txt. They are just trying to lobby laws to get extra money. But they were too full of themselves to realize that they need Google and Meta at least an order of magnitude more than Google or Meta needs them. The same thing ha…

> The same thing happened in Australia and as soon as Facebook blocked links they cried uncle. Australia didn't blink, Google and Meta did .. after that brief shutdown of Facebook news feeds in the country, both Google and Facebook agreed to pay: Since the News Media Bargaining Code took effect, the tech firms had inked more than 30 deals with media outlets compensating them for content which generated clicks and adv…

Australian media's successful extortion only serves to prove such a model works.

Perhaps you've strengthened certain HN commenters' arguments that incentive exists with a proven case.

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#184

Post by jtode »

smsm42 wrote: post #141
stubybubs wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, it's pretty reasonable. This is what it looks like when you really treat your party as separate from governance. They are not using public funds for their advertising. Contrast this with the last Conservative government, which made all of its publicly funded announcements from "The Harper Government" instead of "The Government of Canada." https://www.canada.ca/en/news/archive/2012/06/harper-governm...

The point is not public funds. The point is, in public they behave like FB is so horrible no reasonable person can use their services, but when it comes to using the services not for public benefit, but for their personal benefit, turn out FB is not so bad after all. Evidently, using FB is beneficial for them. They are OK with benefitting themselves, but withhold same benefits from the public in the name of political…

O noes, politicians being hypocrites!

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#185

Post by zulban »

crop_rotation wrote: post #104
qqcqq wrote: post #84

There was another post that was on the front page earlier today that pretty much asked: if the [Canadian] government hates [Facebook] social media platform so much, why don't they just build their own? https://loeber.substack.com/p/10-why-is-there-no-government-... And I agree with the author that it's sort of weird that for all the handwringing and grandstanding these governments are doing, none of them are willing…

Network effects aside, Governments can not build social media or any website competing with private markets (Even google with unlimited pockets gave up on G+). Government just trying to create a barebones micro-twitter straight from the rails tutorial will easily cost millions of dollars to the taxpayer.

Some in government are capable of that. It's the leadership building the team and designing the political and business requirements that make it impossible.

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#186

Post by canadiantim »

brailsafe wrote: post #181
canadiantim wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It didn't used to be, but under the current Canadian government the CBC is intolerably biased towards the governing party

Meh, I've heard this claim but it escapes me how that's true. If anything it seems closer to the opposite. Most of the CBC content I see makes the current Liberal government look quite monstrous. Fifth Estate, Marketplace, current events, and almost every debate or interview with a Liberal representative.

Simply take a look at the CBC’s latest debacle [1], where the CBC published an incredibly defamatory article against the premier of Alberta in the middle of an election. They of course just recently retracted it, but they will suffer no consequences. The CBC literally tried to pick the premier of Alberta themselves. This is just the tip of the iceberg. See also the Rosemary Barton lawsuits during the 2019 campaign for further evidence of CBC bias towards the current governing party.

The reason why the current liberal government looks quite monstrous even on the CBC tho is because they really are quite monstrous in reality and it’s finally starting to show. Just look at Bill C-18, who’s interests are they looking out for? Not everyday Canadians that’s for sure.

This is a government that on one hand says Meta is an evil foreign owned corporation interfering in our democracy and therefore will end all ads on Meta platforms, but on the other hand, made an exception for itself such that the Liberal Party of Canada will actually continue running ads on Meta because after all nothing is too evil if it helps get them elected. Rules for thee but not for me. A classic Canadian liberal party dynamic. Story as old as time.

[1] https://www.nationalnewswatch.com/2023/07/05/cbc-news-retrac...

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#187

Post by JohnFen »

brightlancer wrote: post #167
JohnFen wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might depend on the community, then. In my area, the big social media outfits are not useful in that way at all. (Except for selling stuff on Facebook, but that's not what I was talking about.) Facebook and Reddit are the only ones I'm familiar with for this, though, and they both have the same problem -- they are dominated by a very small number of people.

> It might depend on the community. Always. But maybe a factor is the size of the "community"? A hub city has X number of residents plus Y folks who work there plus Z folks who live in suburbs but are counted as part of the metropolis. OTOH a small city is small, so the folks may share more in common -- and thus push out interlopers and ignore noise makers.

I live in a small city. I think the reason that social media hasn't really become central for community here is because we have a small free arts & entertainment newspaper that has served the role for longer than I've been alive. That's where everyone expects to find public announcements, events, buying/selling things, etc.

Craigslist is also very popular here. Does that count as social media?

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#188

Post by brightlancer »

JohnFen wrote: post #187
brightlancer wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It might depend on the community. Always. But maybe a factor is the size of the "community"? A hub city has X number of residents plus Y folks who work there plus Z folks who live in suburbs but are counted as part of the metropolis. OTOH a small city is small, so the folks may share more in common -- and thus push out interlopers and ignore noise makers.

I live in a small city. I think the reason that social media hasn't really become central for community here is because we have a small free arts & entertainment newspaper that has served the role for longer than I've been alive. That's where everyone expects to find public announcements, events, buying/selling things, etc. Craigslist is also very popular here. Does that count as social media?

> Craigslist is also very popular here. Does that count as social media?

I was going to make a joke about "Not since they removed the personal ads", but CL has threaded discussion forums, so it's definitely social media.

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#189

Post by ipaddr »

brailsafe wrote: post #135
ipaddr wrote: post #81

I've never seen anyone appearing less qualified in parliament or interviews. Pablo Rodriguez isn't being roasted for his foolish responses and the Canadian media is losing credibility by taking sides. Seeing less national cartel linked media stories will do everyone good. The government not advertising on social media is positive.

Hmm... have you seen the environment minister's interviews? Not great.

The Minister of Crown–Indigenous Relations Canada is another truly awful character

Re: Ottawa pulls advertising, escalating showdown with Facebook and Instagram

#190

Post by DropInIn »

stubybubs wrote: post #172
smsm42 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is not public funds. The point is, in public they behave like FB is so horrible no reasonable person can use their services, but when it comes to using the services not for public benefit, but for their personal benefit, turn out FB is not so bad after all. Evidently, using FB is beneficial for them. They are OK with benefitting themselves, but withhold same benefits from the public in the name of political…

Political parties work quite a bit differently in Canada. The party structure, the part that purchases ads and such, is not the government. They can have opposing goals. One is governing, the other is trying to get elected. That's how we like it. Canada actually used to give federal funds to all political parties, including opposition parties, as long as they reached a certain level of votes in the last election. Thi…

It real interesting the Venn diagram of vocal opponents of the Trudeau government and those silent about or in support of the Harper government....

Almost like is has nothing to do with what's right or just and everything to do with them angry about not having authority....

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