Meta may have won out in its battle against the Trudeau government’s Online News Act, according to a new study by the Media Ecosystem Observatory.
After opting to remove Canadian news content from their platforms, instead of being forced to compensate the outlets nearly a year ago, Meta has seen no loss in usership.
The Media Ecosystem Observatory, a collaboration between the University of Toronto and McGill University, released a study about the initial effects the Meta news ban has had on media outlets. The evidence revealed it’s hurting the local Canadian outlets the most.
“We find little evidence that Facebook usage has been impacted by the ban. After the ban took effect, the collapse of Canadian news content production and engagement on Facebook did not appear to substantially affect users themselves,” reads the study.
While the study found that the ban didn’t affect user engagement, it did negatively impact local news outlets, the very group that the legislation purported to be protecting.
“However, the ban undoubtedly had a major impact on Canadian news. Local news outlets have been particularly affected by the ban: while large, national news outlets were less reliant on Facebook for visibility and able to recoup some of their Facebook engagement regardless, hundreds of local news outlets have left the platform entirely, effectively gutting the visibility of local news content,” read the study.
The study analyzed the 987 Facebook pages of Canadian news outlets, 183 personal pages of politicians, commentators and advocacy groups, as well as 589 political and local community groups.
“The Facebook Pages of Canadian political influencers experienced neither an uptick nor a downturn in engagement. Facebook Groups dedicated to discussing Canadian politics did not experience an exodus of members, nor a decline in frequency of posting,” it said.
Canadians quickly adapted to the new measures by simply taking screenshots of new articles to continue sharing the content.
“And while news link sharing became impossible, users quickly adapted by posting screenshots of news articles. Meta’s ban on news sharing in Canada does not appear to have had an adverse effect on the number and attentiveness of active Facebook users in Canada.”
While the cat and mouse game unfolds between the government and Canadians still wishing to view and share online news content via Facebook and Instagram, Canada’s national outlets have made off better than the small ones.
National news outlets lost about 64% of the engagement they previously had via Facebook users, while local news outlets lost about 85% of their Facebook engagement.
According to the study, about half of all local news outlets completely quit posting on Facebook within four months of the ban.
“In fact, the loss of local news on Facebook has already had profound consequences for Canadians,” reads the study. “Soon after the ban, wildfires began raging in northern Canada. In previous years, local news organizations had relied on Facebook to share essential information about the spread of forest fires and safety orders; in 2023, they found themselves blocked.”
Media Ecosystem Observatory director Aengus Bridgman said that the Online News Act has not changed Canadians’ overall interactions with Meta’s platforms.
“One of the remarkable things we saw was the overall behaviour on the platform didn’t decrease,” said Bridgman. “We didn’t see Canadians saying, ‘Oh, I no longer use Facebook, I no longer use Instagram.’ It doesn’t seem there’s been sort of an exodus from the platform in any meaningful way.”
Some outlets were able to maintain engagement on their Facebook pages from users located outside of Canada.