The CRTC will hold its first public consultations on the application of the News Act in the autumn, but negotiations between the media and the web giants will not take place before the end of 2024.
So if Meta (Facebook and Instagram) and Google agree to meet future financial demands, the media that negotiated deals with these giants won’t see the color of their money until 2025.
The Canadian Radio, Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), which is responsible for enforcing the new law, presented its plan for the next year and a half on Thursday.
The Online News Act, passed in June, forces these two American multinationals to pay out reparations to recognized media outlets big and small after draining their advertising market for more than a decade, resulting in hundreds of closures and thousands of layoffs.
The public consultations in the autumn will focus on the stages, such as the code of conduct to be followed for the negotiations or the media admission procedure.
The CRTC also plans to hire an independent auditor starting in the fall who will be responsible for reporting annually on the law’s impact on the news market.
The summer of 2024 will provide an opportunity to set important milestones for the law: at this point, the federal body plans to publish the parties’ code of conduct for the negotiations and to hire the arbitrators who will be responsible for overseeing these negotiations. .
Funding applications from press organizations that may be eligible for funding will also be reviewed at this time.
It is possible that Meta will not participate in the negotiations due to the news blackout that was introduced in the summer. This strategy is a way for the multinational, led by Mark Zuckerberg, to comply with the law, as he put it.
By ceasing to publish journalistic content on its platforms, Meta avoids paying royalties to the Canadian journalism industry. According to the latest news, the multinational has halted talks with Ottawa, unlike Google.