Canadian Publishers Report Sharp Drop In Web Traffic

Small and mid-size publishers across Canada are suffering sharp drops in traffic and revenue as Meta has been locked in a standoff with the government over a law requiring that it pay news organizations for their content, according to a report.

Meta yanked news from Canadian publishers from Facebook and Instagram in August after Canada’s Parliament approved legislation two months prior that calls on Meta and Google to compensate domestic media outlets when they promote their news reports.

The bill — dubbed Bill C-18, or the Online News Act — isn’t set to fully take effect until Dec. 19. Meta, however, has already decided to stop sharing news from Canadian organizations rather than pay up, according to The Wall Street Journal.

“We’re literally being completely handicapped from making revenue, which was based on pushing news out on Facebook,” said Khaled Iwamura, the founder and CEO of local news site Insauga.com that serves the Toronto area.

Iwamura told The NY Post that up until August, when Meta started blocking its news links, 30% of Insauga.com’s traffic came from Facebook.

Jeff Elgie, the chief of hyperlocal Ontario media company Village Media, said he has seen its traffic drop by about one-fifth across the company’s 24 websites since Meta’s link blocks began two months ago, according to The Journal.

Elgie isn’t blaming Meta for his losses, and says it’s the Canadian government that’s at fault for not listening to Canadian news executives’ warnings that cracking down too hard on the tech companies would have grave repercussions.