The restriction on Meta news in Canada has little impact on Facebook usage

 The restriction on Meta news in Canada has little impact on Facebook usage

Beginning in August, the firm stopped allowing Canadians to share news on its services, and Google has stated that once the law takes effect, it will remove news from Canadian search results.

In spite of harsh condemnation from the Canadian government, statistics from independent tracking companies on Tuesday showed that Meta's decision to ban news links in Canada this month has had essentially no effect on Canadians' use of Facebook.

Data provided by Similarweb, a digital analytics firm that tracks traffic on websites and apps, at Reuters' request, shows that the number of daily active Facebook users and the amount of time spent on the app in Canada have remained largely unchanged since parent company Meta began blocking news there at the beginning of August.

Similarly, Data.ai, another analytics company, told Reuters that its data did not indicate any appreciable shift in platform usage in Canada in August.

Although still preliminary, the estimations seem to confirm Meta's claim that news has minimal value for the company given the ongoing conflict in Canada over a new rule mandating internet companies to compensate authors for news stories shared on their platforms.

Meta opted not to comment on the projections

With the passage of the Online News Act by the Canadian government in June, platforms like Meta and Google parent Alphabet are now required to enter into economic agreements for the usage of Canadian news publishers' material. Google, a division of Alphabet, and Meta have both stated that their companies cannot comply with the regulation. Links to news stories make up fewer than 3% of the information on Meta's Facebook feeds, according to the business, and have little commercial value. The largest social media corporation in the world has been attempting to lessen the amount of news and other civic information on its platforms in recent years as a result of regulatory pressure in important global economies. It instead attempts to promote more lighthearted topics.

According to recent research from the Reuters Institute and Pew Research Centre, the change has led to a sharp decline in news consumption on social media.

Facebook referrals to a sample of well-known Canadian news websites were down approximately 35% year over year in July and roughly 74% since 2020, according to Similarweb, even before Meta discontinued offering news connections in Canada.

Even Nevertheless, according to the company's transparency reports, news is still among the most popular types of material on Facebook, at least in the United States, the only nation for which Meta provides the most popular content.

In the first quarter, 13 of the top 20 domains seen on Facebook in the US were news websites, and 18 of the top 20 individual links were to news stories, according to its most current report.

Instagram, Meta's second significant social network, has less of an impact on the news landscape since it does not permit links within specific user postings.

Beginning in August, the firm stopped allowing Canadians to share news on its services, and Google has stated that once the law takes effect, it will remove news from Canadian search results.

Government representatives in Canada have charged Meta with brinksmanship for purging news off its platforms during a time of crisis as wildfires drive thousands of people from their homes, despite quiet talks about those guidelines going on behind the scenes.

By the end of December, the regulations outlining how the law will be applied are scheduled to be published; at that point, platforms are expected to have agreements with publishers in place.

Since assuming office following a cabinet reshuffle at the end of July, Canada's new Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge has had conversations with both Facebook and Google, her office told Reuters. 

The negotiations were confirmed by a Meta representative. A framework for discussions between news organisations and internet behemoths will be established this autumn, according to the Canadian agency in charge of carrying out the nation's online news law, with the intention of starting mandatory negotiating by early 2025.