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Trudeau’s Online News Act has crushed hundreds of local Canadian news outlets: study

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From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

Trudeau’s Online News Act, framed as a way to support local media, has hurt small media outlets while giving massive payouts to legacy media, a study has found.

According to a new study, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Online News Act has successfully crushed local media outlets while mainstream media has remained relatively unaffected.  

According to an April study from the Media Ecosystem Observatory, Trudeau’s Online News Act, also known as Bill C-18, has caused a 84 percent drop in engagement for local Canadian outlets, as Big Tech company Meta – the parent company of Facebook and Instagram – has refused to publish links to Canadian news outlets on their platforms.  

“We lost 70 per cent of our audience when that happened,” Iain Burns, the managing editor of Now Media Group, which manages news posts for outlets serving smaller communities, revealed. He further explained that he experienced a 50 percent loss in revenue following the move. 

“We’re not the only ones. Many, many outlets are in this situation,” Burns added.

The Online News Act, passed by the Senate in June 2023, mandates that Big Tech companies pay to publish Canadian content on their platforms. While the legislation promised to support local media, it has seemingly accomplished the opposite.  

While Meta has blocked all news on its platforms, devastating small publishers, Google agreed to pay Canadian legacy media outlets $100 million to publish their content online. 

The study, a collaboration between the University of Toronto and McGill University, examined the 987 Facebook pages of Canadian news outlets, 183 personal pages of politicians, commentators and advocacy groups, and 589 political and local community groups.  

“The ban undoubtedly had a major impact on Canadian news,” the study found.  

“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,” it explained.   

However, LifeSiteNews has been relatively unaffected by the ban as viewership on its official Facebook page has remained relatively the same, similar to its Instagram account since most views already came from the United States.  

Similarly unaffected was Meta: “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,” the study said.  

While local media outlets’ viewership has declined thanks to Trudeau’s new legislation, larger media outlets have thrived due to increased payouts from the Trudeau government.  

Legacy media journalists are projected to have roughly half of their salaries paid by the Liberal government after the $100 million Google agreement and the subsidies outlined in the Fall Economic Statement.  

Mainstream Canadian media had already received massive federal payouts, but they have nearly doubled after Trudeau announced increased subsidies for legacy media outlets ahead of the 2025 election. The subsidies are expected to cost taxpayers $129 million over the next five years.   

However, just as government payouts increase, Canadians’ trust in mainstream media has decreased. Recent polling found that only one-third of Canadians consider mainstream media trustworthy and balanced.   

Similarly, a recent study by Canada’s Public Health Agency revealed that less than a third of Canadians displayed “high trust” in the federal government, with “large media organizations” as well as celebrities getting even lower scores.  

Media

CBC retracts false claims about residential schools after accusing Rebel News of ‘misinformation’

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From LifeSiteNews

By Clare Marie Merkowsky

CBC has issued a correction after falsely accused Rebel News of spreading misinformation while itself promoting the false claim that remains of Indigenous children were found in unmarked graves at residential schools.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) has issued a correction after blaming Rebel News of “misinformation” while spreading false information itself.

On April 17, CBC corrected a comment from chief political correspondent Rosemary Barton who accused Rebel News reporter Drea Humphrey of spreading “misinformation,” while repeating the false claim that bodies have been found in unmarked graves at Indigenous residential schools.

“Yes, there have been remains of Indigenous children found in various places across the country,” Barton falsely stated during a live broadcast following the French-language federal election leaders’ debate.

Her comment was in reference to New Democratic Leader (NDP) Jagmeet Singh refusing to answer a reporter’s question whether he would condemn the rash of church burnings and acts of vandalism across Canada.

“In this case you saw Mr. Singh, and this has been his position for some time, to refuse to answer questions,” Barton said during the live stream.

“Rebel News in particular traffics in misinformation, lack of facts, and as you heard in that question, which was woven with some truth and some things that weren’t true,” she claimed.

“Yes, there have been burnings of Christian, Catholic churches,” she admitted.

“Yes, there have been remains of Indigenous children found in various places around the country, which she misrepresented,” Barton falsely stated.

Despite mass excavations, there have still been no mass graves discovered at any residential schools across Canada, but politicians and media continue to promote the false narrative.

However, even in their correction statement, CBC failed to mention that, to date, no human remains have been discovered.

“As CBC News has reported on multiple occasions, what several Indigenous communities across Canada have discovered on the sites of some former residential schools are potential burial sites or unmarked graves,” the statement read.

However, CBC is now well known for pushing the false narrative that hundreds of children were buried and disregarded by Catholic priests and nuns who ran some of the schools. As a consequence of that false narrative, since 2021, over 100 churches have been burned or vandalized across Canada in seeming retribution.

Indeed, in addition to perpetuating the “mass graves” narrative, media and politicians have even threatened to punish those who oppose it. In October 2024, CBC ran a story which suggested that “residential school denialism” should be criminalized.

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John Stossel

Climate Change Myths Part 1: Polar Bears, Arctic Ice, and Food Shortages

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From StosselTV

Climate zealots tell us the end is near. It’s the era of “global BOILING!” says the UN Secretary General. Climate alarmists say the Arctic will soon be ice-free and cities will be underwater! But what do the facts say?

The facts say that the climate change fanatics’ catastrophic claims are wrong.

In this video and the next, we’ll debunk 7 myths about climate change.

First up: melting ice, polar bear extinction, and climate change famines.

Here are the sources for this video:

No new record low summer ice extent observed since 2012. https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.c…

Satellite data show average annual sea ice volume largely stable since 2010: https://psc.apl.uw.edu/wordpress/wp-c…

Total arctic ice mass: http://psc.apl.uw.edu/research/projec…

Polar Bear Estimates 1993-today: https://www.iucn-pbsg.org/wp-content/…

1981: https://portals.iucn.org/library/site…

1960s: https://www.google.com/books/edition/…

Global agricultural output: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/ag…

NASA Greening study: https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-faci…

Malnutrition deaths: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/ma…

Coffee production: https://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#compare

 

After 40+ years of reporting, I now understand the importance of limited government and personal freedom. ”

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Libertarian journalist John Stossel created Stossel TV to explain liberty and free markets to young people.

Prior to Stossel TV he hosted a show on Fox Business and co-anchored ABC’s primetime newsmagazine show, 20/20.

Stossel’s economic programs have been adapted into teaching kits by a non-profit organization, “Stossel in the Classroom.” High school teachers in American public schools now use the videos to help educate their students on economics and economic freedom. They are seen by more than 12 million students every year.

Stossel has received 19 Emmy Awards and has been honored five times for excellence in consumer reporting by the National Press Club. Other honors include the George Polk Award for Outstanding Local Reporting and the George Foster Peabody Award.

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In order not to miss the next video from Stossel TV, sign up here: https://johnstossel.activehosted.com/f/1

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