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- Meta at the start of August began blocking news content on Facebook for users in Canada.
- Major news publishers there had for over a year seen a marked drop in traffic from Facebook.
- Now, many news outlets are seeing an increase in downloads and usage of their apps.
Meta’s decision to block user access to news in Canada is not having an entirely negative effect on the country’s major publishers.
The social media company started in August to prevent anyone in Canada from clicking a link or even engaging with a Facebook page of news publishers like CBC, The Globe and Mail, and CTV. In response to new legislation that would require Meta to negotiate licenses with news publishers and pay for their content, Canadians using Facebook or Instagram now see links to and posts of news stories covered up by a note stating “People in Canada can’t see this content.” The note adds that the block is in response to “government legislation,” although the Canadian News Act isn’t set to be enacted until December.
Prior to Meta’s news ban, web traffic to Canadian news sites had been flat to down for a year, according to an analysis from Similarweb of the country’s most popular news websites. CBC, The Globe and Mail, and CTV, along with Global News and the National Post, saw referral traffic from Facebook decline steadily since the start of 2022, Similarweb found. That decrease coincides with Meta’s decision last year to invest less in news content on its platforms and move those resources elsewhere.
Meta going so far as to block news content was a further, if more extreme, step away from news. The company kept up the ban even as Canada faced a historic wildfire season, a move Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said showed Facebook was “putting corporate profits ahead of people’s safety.”
Yet, because of the loss of access on Facebook and Instagram, several major news outlets in Canada are seeing an uptick in downloads and usage of their own apps, according to an analysis from Apptopia. The apps of CTV, and Globe and Mail, as well as French language outlet La Presse, saw thousands more downloads in August compared to July, when content was still available on Meta’s platforms.
The Globe and Mail in August saw a 98% increase in app downloads and a 27% increase in daily users; CTV News saw a 157% increase in app downloads and an 83% increase in daily usage; La Presse saw a 32% increase in app downloads and an 8% increase in usage; and The National Post’s downloads were up almost 10%, with daily usage up 3%. Meanwhile, CBC News saw downloads and daily usage remain relatively flat.
Since Meta’s ban went into effect, news outlets like CTV, which is part of major conglomerate Bell Media, have been urging people to download its news app.
“We are letting our viewers know through television, radio, and online messages that they can continue to receive and share the information and breaking news stories that will impact them, from their local community and from around the world, by downloading our news apps and by continuing to visit our news websites,” A Bell spokesperson said. “In recent weeks, we have seen an increase in CTV News app downloads, which demonstrates the importance of having access to online news from a Canadian perspective.”
News publishers in Europe and the U.K. may need to take similar steps to move readers away from the habit of receiving news via their Facebook feeds. Meta this week said it would, at the end of this year, remove Facebook’s News Tab in the UK, Germany, and France. Despite launching the tab in 2019, Meta said people simply “don’t come to Facebook for news.”
Are you a tech employee or someone else with insight to share? Contact Kali Hays at khays@insider.com, on secure messaging app Signal at 949-280-0267, or through Twitter DM at @hayskali. Reach out using a non-work device.
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