After this what are they going to boost? Boost anything that supports their political agenda?
Looks like everything starts like this. Companies like facebook, amazon, google etc. claims they are supporting small business. They will often offer freebies because freebies makes people irrational. Later, in name of security, privacy, small business they forward their political agenda.
What if YouTube just said no? Like, remove YouTube from Canada. Then have Canadian citizens complain to their government and cause an uproar. This is such a sneaky thing the government is doing that most people won't care. But pull YouTube completely out of Canada and people will start to pay attention.
Are there any precedents of large companies doing that (successfully)?
YouTube particularly can't afford to play games like this because TikTok has no problem following the rules and taking YouTube’s viewers like it's been doing.
It's only sneaky if you're completely unaware of Canadian laws. Radio and TV stations have abided by domestic quota rules for a very long time. Online video was obviously going to come under that umbrella at some point.
The difference is that radio and TV stations only play one thing at a time. Mandating a domestic quota mandates that those content get airtime.
There is no such guaranteed for Youtube and the like.
How is that solved online? You can show you X% of domestic content, but if people don't play it will the legislation go further to mandate a certain % played/viewed?
We've seen some small scale attempts at this with Google News, but I eagerly await the day someone tries it for real. Imagine Whatsapp backing out of India to strongarm the government. It'll be awful for everyone involved in the long run, but the journey there will be interesting.
Doesn't YouTube already kind of do that? If you're not logged in, you will see content popular in the current region, which often is from the region itself. Once logged in, I generally see more of the same content I watch and search for.
I have a certain appreciation for what Canada is trying to do, but I think their regulations are kind of crazy and hard to understand. Someone can make a video in Canada about, say, Japan or the US and not mention Canada once, but it can count as Canadian content. Everyone I know in the content business says the Canadian rules are inconsistent and bureaucratic.
I'm conflicted about this. On one hand it seems kind of silly but on the other I do feel like different countries ought to be able to try out different rules and laws. The globalized tech industry means the entire world looks through the same lens and I think there's a lot lost there.
The globalized tech industry is already tailoring their content to adapt to local markets (try browsing YouTube with a VPN).
This legislation is just another handout to a very small but influential special interest group, who would rather invest in lobbying the government than invest in producing better content. It will do nothing to increase the diversity of points of view or whatever justification they are using to sell this.
Yeah my point is a more general one than this specific law. More, if Canada wants to pass a law (any law) they ought to be able to. If it's smart the world can learn from it. If it's dumb... the world can learn from it.
Realistically, what this will most likely do is require that these services modify their suggestions so that at least X% (probably between 35 and 50) of the recommendations are for Canadian content when viewed from Canada. (And probably additional rules where the topmost suggestion must be Canadian content X% of the time, etc).
There will also be some form of mandated spending on Canadian content, which I imagine will be required proportional to revenue generated by Canadian viewers. This may potentially require the providers to offer better terms to Canadian content creators than they offer elsewhere if the recommendation changes don't get spending high enough.
Unfortunately these changes could potentially hurt Canadian content producers. For example, the companies could deliberately under suggest Canadian content producers outside of Canada in order to "make up for" having to over-suggest them within Canada. But, less maliciously, it could also have totally accidental knock on effects. For example Youtube's algorithm might see the high level of viewership from within the producer's country (caused by this law) and erroneously conclude the content is only interesting locally, and suggest it less to people outside Canada. Since many Canadian content creators make more money from people outside Canada than from within, this sort of issue would hurt Canadian content creators.
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[ 4.6 ms ] story [ 62.3 ms ] threadLooks like everything starts like this. Companies like facebook, amazon, google etc. claims they are supporting small business. They will often offer freebies because freebies makes people irrational. Later, in name of security, privacy, small business they forward their political agenda.
YouTube particularly can't afford to play games like this because TikTok has no problem following the rules and taking YouTube’s viewers like it's been doing.
There is no such guaranteed for Youtube and the like.
How is that solved online? You can show you X% of domestic content, but if people don't play it will the legislation go further to mandate a certain % played/viewed?
This legislation is just another handout to a very small but influential special interest group, who would rather invest in lobbying the government than invest in producing better content. It will do nothing to increase the diversity of points of view or whatever justification they are using to sell this.
There will also be some form of mandated spending on Canadian content, which I imagine will be required proportional to revenue generated by Canadian viewers. This may potentially require the providers to offer better terms to Canadian content creators than they offer elsewhere if the recommendation changes don't get spending high enough.
Unfortunately these changes could potentially hurt Canadian content producers. For example, the companies could deliberately under suggest Canadian content producers outside of Canada in order to "make up for" having to over-suggest them within Canada. But, less maliciously, it could also have totally accidental knock on effects. For example Youtube's algorithm might see the high level of viewership from within the producer's country (caused by this law) and erroneously conclude the content is only interesting locally, and suggest it less to people outside Canada. Since many Canadian content creators make more money from people outside Canada than from within, this sort of issue would hurt Canadian content creators.