Canadian Heritage committee  Thanks for that question. I think there remains deep concern among many digital creators about the implications of Bill C-11. Obviously, there's been a policy direction that has tried to assuage some of those concerns. However, even within that policy direction, there still rem

Canadian Heritage committee  I actually think what we've seen take place in terms of broadcaster response, both on news and on calls for reduced CanCon obligations, which we are also seeing now, does come out of this legislation. On CanCon, for example, it was an obvious consequence that, if you were lookin

Canadian Heritage committee  I think one of the reasons we've seen delays on the harms bill is that, in all likelihood, it is recognized—and rightly so—as being even more controversial than Bill C-11 and Bill C-18, and I think that's true. I also think that it never made sense to put it in heritage. I don't

Canadian Heritage committee  It does. I know that there are negotiations that the public is not privy to, where members around this table negotiate how many witnesses you're going to have and for how long the hearings are going to go forward. To me, the starting point has to be not how many witnesses, but w

Canadian Heritage committee  We've already talked about how the removal of news links certainly harmed many news entities by losing audiences. We've heard from other witnesses about the concern that filling that gap is hateful content or other kinds of content. There have been some reports that suggest some

Canadian Heritage committee  Standards for what? Is it for what appears on social networks?

Canadian Heritage committee  Freedom of expression is quite clearly there, but it is open to the government to establish online harms legislation that provides guardrails and addresses some of these issues. Candidly, one of the things that I have found most inexplicable about the government's strategy is no

Canadian Heritage committee  There may not be a lot of time, but thank you for the question. I would say that I think the time to conduct the kinds of studies you're talking about—to better understand the sector, to better understand the digital sector—is, in many ways, before you jump in with legislation.

Canadian Heritage committee  I do track some of the advertising activity. We do see both the Conservative Party and the Liberal Party advertising. I don't believe I see the NDP advertising. This notion of subsidies is being bandied about quite a bit. Advertising by government is not a subsidy. Advertising b

Canadian Heritage committee  With your permission, I'd like to expand that not just to C-18 but to C-11 as well. One of the real concerns with the legislative approach that this committee and that the legislation has taken on both the streaming act and on the news act has been to have significant negative i

Canadian Heritage committee  I'd say nobody has ended up with anything right now. There is certainly some hope that there may be a deal with Google, and if there is one, then there is some revenue. I have to say, given what seems to be a permanent position, where Facebook, Meta and Instagram will not be co

Canadian Heritage committee  Thanks for the question. No, I wasn't surprised. I appeared before this committee a couple of times on C-18, and I thought that if you understood the business model that existed.... We've heard a lot of the negative aspects of the business model, which is why I think there is a

Canadian Heritage committee  I guess I'd respond in a couple of ways. First, it ends up benefiting primarily the large broadcasters. The Parliamentary Budget Officer tells us that 75% of the money goes to the radio and television broadcasters, largely based on the way it was structured. It went outside of t

Canadian Heritage committee  Sure. As many have pointed out, the reality is that there were great benefits that came to the publishers from social media and from search. Indeed, that was the basis upon which, in many respects, this took place for a very long period of time. Frankly, what we have seen in th

Canadian Heritage committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good morning. My name is Michael Geist. I'm a law professor at the University of Ottawa, where I hold the Canada research chair in Internet and e-commerce law. I'm here in a personal capacity, representing only my own views. I've appeared before this commi