Michael Geist’s commentary on Google removing corporate media from Search and News

That surely presented an unwelcome choice either way: agree to flawed legislation that creates a dangerous precedent on paying for links or knowingly decrease the value of its own service. By choosing to block links, the damage will be felt across Canada. For the news sector, this could result in news outlets shutting down altogether as the combined effect of blocked news links and news sharing on the Google and Meta will cut some sites traffic in half and lead to huge revenue losses. Services with existing deals with likely see that revenue disappear as well. For Canadians, Google search will be less reliable with Canadian news links removed and the Google News service shut down. This is likely to increase reliance on foreign news services and lower-quality services at the precise time that concerns over misinformation continue to grow.

(emphasis mine)

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  • ‘Leigh 🏳️‍⚧️
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    1 year ago

    So if I understand correctly… if Google and Meta don’t give us Canadian news, we’ll just stop reading Canadian news almost entirely? That’s nonsense.

    There is exactly one reason Big Tech is doing this: precedent. If they give in without a big fight, other countries will follow and their profits will be slightly fewer billions of dollars.