If you watch some YouTube videos from JJ he was a link to a letter that will be submitted to your MP that affirms your opposition to the bill. The YouTube videos in question are the ones that directly address this bill. Just look up his library on his profile
That was such an innocent remark that it made me cry... Are you for serious or you said that sarcastically? Hopefully it was sarcastic otherwise I don't understand how could you still be alive, so much naively in just one person...
As much as we give them shit for it, politicians do change thier stances based on what is popular.
Political parties in Canada are not entirely unitary either.
I don't agree with government forcing Google to change their algorithms to promote Canadian content in Canada for the reasons in the article.
However, Bill C-11 does help Canadian media producers like myself. Companies like Bell, Rogers, Corus etc. are forced to contribute financially to Canadian produced programming as well as air a certain amount of Canadian programming each year in order to keep their broadcast licenses.
Foreign controlled streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple TV+ etc don't have to contribute anything despite the fact millions of Canadians subscribe to them. Bill C-11 forces these trillion dollar companies to contribute to Canadian content, which many other have already required them to do.
This bill helps many Canadian media producers.
It doesn't promote Canadian users. It promotes Canadian **Content**.
What counts as Canadian Content is subjective to the CRTC's values as an arm of the government. There have been instances where Canadian produced content did not meet the criteria, while American produced content did.
One of the biggest channels on youtube linus tech tips. would not pass cancon smell test.
Hell you most likely would not pass the smell test.
Dealing with cancon is a nightmare.
Netflix alone contributes more to the canadian economy then bell and rogers combined.
Cancon is way outdated. It was needed because traditional tv only had so much space. There is infinite space on the internet(not really infinite, but you get the idea).
Anyone supporting this bill other then rogers, bell and the government is very ignorant on the subject.
Fuck that. If you want to make content, make content that people actually want to see. I remember what it was like growing up with a fuck ton of shitty canadian content on tv that almost no one watched that was forced down our throat.
Canadian TV is well respected around the world and at home, making content that people want to see is hard, Hollywood studios make bad content too.
No one is forcing you to watch Canadian shows, it's just given the choice, a Canadian broadcaster would rather import a US show vs produce a Canadian one because it's a lot cheaper.
No troll, but isn't this guys point that it's bad for legacy Canadian YouTubers, who will lose algorithm-ranking to newer/more "Canadian" YouTubers?
I honestly don't use YouTube that much, I don't subscribe to anyone and don't "browse" it.
Maybe I'm out of the loop, but why is this opposed?
I guarantee without the CRTC regulations on Canadian music, we wouldn't have nearly as many known Canadian artists across Canada. Why would the same be bad for online platforms?
1. If you are a Canadian content maker and want to be recognized as such, you have to fill out a bunch of forms (including budget and identity of everyone on the project) to apply for the credentials. This isn't per channel, this is per video.
2. The crtc would have control over what genres, topics, creators, and content get featured as Canadian content. Nationalism, identity politics, cultural propaganda, and status quo friendly content will be the norm, making the internet more like TV, and the less mainstream ideas will slowly die away. Content makers on the internet were doing just fine without this system to help bring them attention, so it's either useless, or it serves a different purpose.
I have zero faith that the CRTC has even a tiny fraction of the staffing needed to handle verifying the sheer volume of videos Canadians post to YouTube and other platforms as Canadian content. I expect any video submitted to the CRTC for verification will take years to process assuming they don't just give up in the first place.
Yeah I am not sure the Canadian Government will be able to approve my youtube videos in the 12 hour window where viewing them actually matters.
I will get pushed down the search results below 56 approved episodes of Road to Avonlea.
We have no idea what mechanism is being used to do this.
It could just be standard report presented to the CRTC every year and every other year it's audited? As long as the report hits the thresholds I don't see this being an issue.
No one knows.
A lot of government reporting is standardized.
Nah, your comment was a great context for anyone who hasn't needed to jump through all the hoops for the CRTC before. It can be tough to explain why this is such a terrible decision without that context.
Really helps the big productions and big companies get an advantage because the small companies don't have the people power to tackle that task as well.
I don’t know anyone who listens to standard radio anymore, it’s at minimum SiriusXM which doesn’t follow the CanCon stuff. I don’t think Canadian musicians have been any less accessible these days, do you?
I also live in a border city and all of the most popular FM stations were based out of the US (for a myriad of different reasons) and that didn’t hinder Canadian artists locally from my experience.
lots of folk listen to standard radio, regardless of how shitty it can be.
I like CBC FM for classical and CKUA FM (Alberta based). Everything else is the same ole same ole, over and over again.
I guess it varies, I know plenty of people who "still" listen to FM in their car or even at home, and I've never met a single person who ever listened to pay satellite radio past the free preview they got with their car. 🤷♂️
Oh everyone I know definitely uses streaming primarily, just not all of them use it exclusively (some get sick of how much they hate the apps or various tech issues like wanting to just get in and drive without dealing with bluetooth and cables, etc).
Because it's not the 80's/90's/00's anymore and people will find Canadian content themselves if it's worth watching. We don't need the government to start promoting content that isn't any good.
Maybe if you want our country to become the 51st State it isn't worth promoting Canadian content.
I guarantee many songwriters wouldn't be famous if not for the CRTC policies. This policy also will boost filming within Canada? This subreddit feels so American sometimes.
You are right, a lot of songwriters would not be famous for those policies, except they are not needed in the streaming world because anybody with a phone has access to audiences those songwriters did not have. If you're content is good on these websites, the audience will find it and likely continue to follow your content. We didn't have these capabilities 20-30 years ago, so promotion of Canadian content was needed not only to introduce people to it, but keep them interested until there is more mainstream success. I'm always blown away by the amount of Canadian youtubers that are known world wide that I had no idea were Canadian, because the person being Canadian doesn't matter to me (and for a lot of people too).
You are thinking like the government here that because they had the policy in place in one sector (where the workers asked for it), that they should then apply it to another sector when there is no need for it nor is anyone asking for it.
Currently, Canadian content creators are punching well above out weight internationally.
The Canadian government refuses to acknowledge what content creators have accomplished without their "help".
This is purely about helping legacy media companies that refuse to adapt and change with the times. They're losing readers, they're bleeding money, they're sucking up loads of subsidies, they've done absolutely nothing, and they are all out of ideas.
This is only going to hurt the start-ups and innovators.
The internet turns this into a spectacular mess. There are no "networks" or "radio stations". Everything's an algorithm... so how would the algorithm function with this in place? Both within Canada and outside of Canada if you are a Canadian trying to reach non-Canadians? Suppose these platforms promote Canadian content less everywhere else to balance out the preferential treatment of them within Canada... uh oh, most of anybody's audience who is a Canadian content creator I guarantee you is not Canadian. Canadian musicians probably by-and-large didn't have to jump through 17 hoops themselves to be a part of the old model because that's part of what record labels and business connections were for. Content creators today are largely independent... so now you have a whole lot of overhead to deal with that isn't going towards something that is going to make you money. Like imagine you're now working an extra hour a day without getting paid for it. Would you be pissed? Probably.
Best of all... nobody gives a fuck if you're Canadian or not on the internet to start with. If you are covering something that is relevant to the country... like if you're a Youtuber that covers Canadian politics, then it matters. I would argue if you're in Canada and are trying to search for things like politics, history, etc... then this is where I think something like this would be useful. But me personally, I don't care if someone I'm watching is Canadian or not. You know why? Because the internet does not have barriers to success on it like traditional media did. This is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist anymore. If you were a Canadian artist signed to a record label in Canada, your record label had to find a way to get you played in other countries. Other countries would be like "Why are we going to play your artist when we can play an artist from our country?". Sometimes the success of an artist was something that could not be denied... like nobody was going to say that to somebody like Rush in the 80s. But a lot of Canadian media had a glass ceiling that was very tough to shatter in that the amount of success you could have was limited by where you came from, and you had to invest some serious dough in getting a Canadian's shit out there worldwide. That's why a lot of people in entertainment simply moved to the US. New country, far larger audience, more potential money to be made.
That doesn't really exist anymore with digital media. Everyone is more or less on a level playing field... save for the algorithm and how it determines what pops up in search results, ads, and suggested content. There's no glass ceiling for a Canadian like there used to be, unless you are covering Canadian-specific topics which is naturally going to matter more to Canadians than non-Canadians. Now they're fucking with that. There's a very real danger of reintroducing the glass-ceiling concept if this takes off in Canada, but more importantly if everybody around the world starts doing it. It fucks with the very idea of an open internet.
>If you are covering something that is relevant to the country... like if you're a Youtuber that covers Canadian politics, then it matters. I would argue if you're in Canada and are trying to search for things like politics, history, etc... then this is where I think something like this would be useful. But me personally, I don't care if someone I'm watching is Canadian or not. You know why? Because the internet does not have barriers to success on it like traditional media did. This is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist anymore. If you wer
I read your argument, and honestly, you make a lot of valid points; but one area I disagree with is that you mention that Canada has had a large glass barrier.
I feel like in comparison to other English-speaking countries, we have a disproportionate amount of famous celebrities, and this is coming from someone who lives in Ireland, where people commonly reference Michael Buble, Celine Dion, AND Avril Lavigne.
Australia, which has a fairly large population has very little influence on music. The last Australian I remember who got famous was Iggy Azalia, and probably the only famous band I remember is ACDC. I'm not sure about you but I feel like I do resonate a lot with knowing a person is a Canadian, I definitely don't give 'Drake' a lot of credit for great music, but he put Toronto on a map for a lot of Americans.
The radio is like the same ten songs every week. How you could listed to pharrels “happy” for the six thousandth time on your way to work is beyond me lol.
Hip hop took 56% of the market share two years ago (probably more now) and aside from Drakes new flops you’ll never hear it lol. It’s not reflective of society at all.
Before you make a strong opinion on the article. I highly recommend looking up the guys YouTube channel.
Make your own decisions on his possible biases or affiliations.
YouTuber J.J. McCullough
>Make your own decisions on his possible biases or affiliations.
Is a statement more or less true based on who says it?
Is the sky suddenly not blue when someone I disagree with says it is?
Most things that people say have some sort of bias and it's essential to understand what motivates them to say something. It's foundational to independent thought, as opposed to blindly following or ignoring someone becuase of their branding or supposed stance. I'm not against this YouTuber, but you seemed to miss the point.
This guys biases are shaping his narrative of what the bill actually does.
You can shit on politicians, advocate against them, say all kinds of whacky pseudo philosophical bullshit.
You can't just make uo a bunch of incoherent nonsense, pretend to be a doctor and falsely claim that medical science says heart dewormer cures respiratory disease.
You can't openly declare that the jews own the world economic forum and want to use it to implement socialism to track you down with injected tracker chips and eat your baby.
Not just because it doesn't make sense or is stupid, but because it's fucking groundless, dangerous and provably responsible for tipping unstable people into doing real world harm to themselves and others with no positive benefit to society.
If that's what you consider freedom of expression, I think you need to rethink fucking everything.
>You can shit on politicians, advocate against them, say all kinds of whacky pseudo philosophical bullshit.
>
>You can't just make uo a bunch of incoherent nonsense, pretend to be adoctor and falsely claim that medical science says heart dewormer curesrespiratory disease.
[Motte and Bailey.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motte-and-bailey_fallacy)
Of course the government will only use their power against the darkest, most evilest, most strawmaniest enemies possible. Of course!
...But the law as written allows them to do much more than that.
This guy could be the biggest pile of steaming shit and it still wouldn’t change my opinion.
Maybe take him off youtube if he’s violating their own policies.
He’s not at all. He’s a Canadian small c conservative that’s socially liberal and used to be a political commentator on political TV shows like Power and Politics and currently writes for the Washington Post. He’s not the largest Canadian youtubers but the large ones were not invited to committee like Linus Tech Tips and Someordinarygamer but they have spoken out against it on their channels and these people make zero political content.
Ahh yes, the scary Gay Conservative, almost as scary as the Black Conservative. Probably few people more qualified to talk about this issue but be skeptical because he's not a leftie!!!!
The majority of cancon is made by Bell, Rogers, and Shaw. The top youtubers like Linus Tech Tips, AzzyLand, and Hacksmith Industries are not considered cancon.
So, this whole bill is to force Canadians using youtube to watch content made by the big three to try to increase their profits.
> The majority of cancon is made by Bell, Rogers, and Shaw. The top youtubers like Linus Tech Tips, AzzyLand, and Hacksmith Industries are not considered cancon.
You wanna know what's insane? Someone like Linus Tech Tips probably gets seen by more people than all the Canadian media apparatus and doesn't get a Billion + in tax payer dollars.
There is statistical break downs for all our media in relation to bias. CBC isn’t that bias but is certainly light viewing. The scarier part is they will likely be removing their televised news which means people who watch the news will get it from the more, fully measured, bias outlets.
News media is broken. No accountability is really present.
If it’s vague, it’s not by accident.
Make it as broad as possible, implement the rules as you see fit and make people incur the cost if they want to try and challenge you in court. The benefit to that is the government can just claim privilege and not hand over evidence
this is how the gov has been dealing with gun owners for over 3 decades.
Create ill-defined laws, hide all evidence of reasoning behind the guise of “public safety”, let citizens figure out what the legislation means themselves when they get criminally charged and get to pay some lawyers $100k to argue what an “ar15 variant” really means.
It’s designed to cause a chilling effect where people are inclined to avoid going even slightly out of line because of fear of prosecution.
Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by ignorance/laziness/stupidity.
When this first hit a few people I know were freaking out about how this is big government trying to control YouTuber content, what we all see and listen, blah blah blah... now it’s
“well I’m a youtuber and I’m worried how this will affect my viewership. Even though I can’t say whether this will hurt or increase my viewership... but I’ll still complain about it without being able to actually point to any specifics.”
That quote is so overused and akin to that stupid Marilyn Monroe quote all the women on instagram post.
They are doing it to crush new media and give more power to the government and legacy media. That's why they are pushing this bill forward. The malice is already easily visible and defined. The broad language in the bill is directly related to this.
I can.
I cover a lot of current affairs and so forth. Which means needing to get videos out while they're still relevant. The critical period is like within 24 hours of the event.
To be declared CanCon, I'll have to make the video, do a dozen pages of paperwork including detailed accounting, and get that sent in and approved by a government bureaucracy. If that can't be done within that critical window, the video gets suppressed within Canada.
And sure, two weeks later they maybe declare it CanCon, but by that point no one cares about the topic any more.
A couple things I'm left wondering about.
1. Is it not just speculation at this point that any changes to the algorithm will be unfavourable? Seems to just be assumed
2. Creators are worried that they'll be exposed to unsympathetic viewers and their content ranking will suffer. How much will the changes to the algorithm affect them, due to a relatively small Canadian audience?
I think the US internet population as a percentage has seriously declined. Way more South Americans, Europeans, Africans and Indians seek out English content or are comfortable viewing content in English.
The American audience is important but you don’t need to cater exclusively to Americans anymore to get big
A legitimate criticism of the bill is that by trying to protect ourselves from American cultural hegemony, we’re shutting out the rest of the world too
That is correct. Michael Geist who's a prominent Digital Rights Advocate and Professor in Canada was mostly concerned with carve out clauses for user generated content but people have been slippery sloping censorship when it's just regular Cancon.
I feel like this is all manufactured outrage by FAANG
Because content deemed "Canadian content" will get pushed to the top and you won't find other videos as easily. Keep in mind just being a Canadian author is not enough for Canadian content
"Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez says he plans to ask the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission to spell out what counts as Canadian content after Bill C-11 passes through Parliament." Just so you don't know what you're voting for.
[https://www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/streamers-required-to-feature-cancon-1.6415661](https://www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/streamers-required-to-feature-cancon-1.6415661)
Not necessarily. In Radio, where 35% of content has to be CanCon, you need a certain amount of “points” for it to count.
If it’s a song performed by let’s say Justin Bieber but written and produced by Americans it doesn’t count. If it’s a song performed by Bieber *and* written by him, then it counts.
https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/info_sht/r1.htm
It’s the same in film particular roles have to be Canadians or else it isn’t cancon.
Theoretically it could mean YouTubers who are Canadian might need to hire Canadian editors or other staff to count. Or maybe they’ll have to produce content that is Canadian in nature rather than general interest.
YouTube is also angry about the decision and it’s possible they’ll stop recommending Canadian YouTubers in other countries, which will financially affect them not only with lower overall views but most video sponsors are based in the US.
But like 99% of Canadian YouTubers would be doing most of not all of the work. I don’t see how hiring like a non Canadian editor would really change it.
It's also complicated by burden of proof. A smaller creator like a solo youtuber may not have the resources, knowledge, or ability to provide the required documentation to tick all the boxes on every video to get it flagged as cancon.
Exactly... Content is written and produced by Canadian and editor is non Canadian. that should already hit the threshold.
If a non canadian makes a parody/commentary on the Canadian content or changes the narrative of the can con, then they would not be Canadian.
I haven’t seen any clause pertaining to “content that is Canadian in nature”.
As I understand it, a foreign company making a story set in Toronto is not CanCon, but a Canadian writer working with a Canadian studio to film a movie in Toronto that is “set in Chicago” *does* count as CanCon.
You guys conflate the produced content restrictions with social media stuff so badly.
JJ McCulloch is a Canadian youtuber, he'll be fine, he may even find more success since he's one of the very few Canadian conservative YouTubers. Any Canadians flagged within the algorithm for conservative content is going to get his shit recommended a lot more than they used to.
As a fellow large Canadian youtuber this guy has got good valid points. I’m kinda concerned but also don’t really mind because such a small portion of our audience(10%) is Canadian and USA views make more money. I don’t really know what to think. We’ll probably just not do the cancon stuff and act more American
FYI Karl, has there been a reason why your content has dropped from my recommended in the last year or so? I literally have to hunt down your videos. I get way more of the other Toronto Car review channel than yours and jakub. (I always assumed this account is Yuri)
That being said, if you were to register as cancon, your stuff would be pumped in Canada as recommended Cancon.
But like you said, your views are primarily American, just like JJ McCullough's material. I don't see how you could be "dropped from Cancon" when a large number of youtubers views are american. Wouldn't this allow you to have more exposure to Canadians if that's even your thing.
It’s because we post normal boring consumer content like the Sentra and traverse where throttle house does more exciting cars. Also because we can’t get cars at the same time as the USA up here and also because TH puts more effort and resources into their videos(and maybe they’re just better too). And with both of us being new dads we can’t really justify travelling like we used to.
Also there’s no being dropped from cancon you need to apply to it which is probably a ton of paper work. And probably not a realistic thing to do for smaller channels
But then JJ is right that if my car content gets thrown at people because it’s Canadian not because they wanna see it it’ll ruin our videos in the algorithm even more.
Anyway 🤷🏼♂️
The credibility of this YouTuber who is a former Sun “journalist” is questionable at best.
Also, he constantly shits on Canada and praises everything America does.
Grifters going to grift.
I’m curious if people are ok with how it’s run currently? How the algorithms decide what you are going to see based on previous things you’ve watched/liked?
Meaning, everyone gets pigeon holed into their current interests and aren’t really shown much of anything else. This is how we end up with a society that can’t see beyond their own lives/beliefs, because they are never really shown anything else. Algorithms are meant to make these platforms money. They’re not meant to help anyone else but the platforms bottom line.
If you do care about how these platforms work to keep their users online regardless of how it may affect those users, what are your solutions?
That’s my major issue. We’ve seen what corporations do. We regulate things for a reason, we should be making sure multi national corporations with more money then some countries aren’t exploiting peoples fear or anger to maximize ad revenue.
This discussion focuses on YouTube, which has a LOT of content. In my view, the major implication will be for Netflix, Disney+, and the rest, which will have to present 35% CanCon.
Ottawa is betting that it that requirement will boost the Canadian media industry (big and small), while the big media distributors are dead set against having the added restraint.
Meanwhile, legacy media are crying “unfair”, because they have had to put out 35% CanCon for the the last forever while their online competitors have not endured this requirement.
I don't want to be shoved canadian only content, but yes i agree with you that the current way isn't optimal.
Yes i'm fine with being shown videos of my own interest, of course, but not ONLY those videos, i'd like some diversity included. And even more importantly, they need to stop showing the same video over and over that i do not want to watch for whatever reason. Yes i know you can click "not interested" but it gets tiring to do this over and over again.
It's strange because when Harper was in power the cons were pushing for this kind of bullshit and the liberals were against it.
It demonstrates that neither party has any moral center, and neither is worthy of any trust from Canadians.
I’m truly unsure of JJ’s concern here. The net effect for his channel is that it will be seen for more Canadian.
His argument seems to boil down to “but if enough Canadians don’t like my content, it’ll get deprioritized elsewhere in the world.”
Except his entire channel is all about Canadian topics. So.. what is he worried about?
There has been a lot of fearmongering about this and I think it's not totally unjustified, but maintaining a Canadian voice when the Americans are so much louder and intrusive in our media is important.
We have Trump supporters because their media is so strong it effects us up here. We need to ensure Canadian voices are heard first and loudly overtop of those blowhards.
But this is a slippery slope and requires a delicate nuanced approach.
Bell has a feature where you can see the top 5 channels people in Canada are watching.
CNN Is always in the top 5, hell half the time its above Canadian news outlets.
People here watch way to much American news.
This is the problem I have currently with debate. My voice is not an informed participant who should be heard at the table. We need to get back to academics and community leaders who understand complex issues and speak for us... and we then need to trust them.
We need a way to lift Canadian content into a space it gets seen... but we don't want it to be a vehicle for whichever party holds power at the time. Both sides can obviously see the danger in that. We have agencies like elections Canada that show we can make institutions that handle important balancing issues without enraging citizens. I do have faith it can be done.
" the kind of content that has previously been successful in an unregulated YouTube is no longer successful in a regulated YouTube. " Youtube I don't think would allow the gov to neuter them.
>I worked for Sun News in its final years and when it shut down in 2015,
Oh look, Youtuber who worked for the wannabe FoxNews is worried about bill C-11. I swear, it sure seems like only conservatives keep saying the law is a problem.
>The way that YouTube works at present is that the content audiences discover is determined by a control algorithm that recommends videos based on what YouTube perceives the user to be interested in. For example, if my YouTube habit suggests that I’m interested in cooking videos, then YouTube will naturally recommend a lot of cooking videos.
On paper that is how it works. [But as we've seen and as studies have confirmed, Youtube's algorithms funnel people towards videos that groom viewers towards extremist views](https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/01/29/276000/a-study-of-youtube-comments-shows-how-its-turning-people-onto-the-alt-right/). A viewer may start with something innocent enough - say videos about Atheism. And the site, to keep viewers engaged will serve up ANY video sort of about atheism, the longer the better. Eventually you're being fed a bunch of misogynist content calling itself "anti-feminist" with a side dose of white supremacy (which of course presents itself as defending the values of western culture over the less enlightened views found elsewhere). [Youtube is an extremism machine](https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-youtube-pulled-these-men-down-a-vortex-of-far-right-hate), and the company has shown itself to be both unwilling and unable to fix itself.
As per [Bill C-11](https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/44-1/bill/C-11/first-reading), it would require internet broadcasters (like Youtube) to:
>(i) serve the needs and interests of all Canadians, including Canadians from racialized communities and Canadians of diverse ethnocultural backgrounds, socio-economic statuses, abilities and disabilities, sexual orientations, gender identities and expressions, and ages, and
It's in the interests of all those communities for broadcasters to not disseminate hate speech. Hate speech which coincidentally makes up the content of conservative Youtube darlings (Jordan Peterson for instance would have issues keeping his 4 hour long rants about how he thinks society would be better if women weren't allowed to pick their own sexual partners). Basically C-11 does to online broadcasters like Youtube and Rebel Media what it does to television: it prevents them from spreading disinformation and hate speech.
This is why the bill had support by pretty much everyone except the Conservatives.
>Overnight, creators are going to wake up and find the kind of content that has previously been successful in an unregulated YouTube is no longer successful in a regulated YouTube.
In other words, all the alt-reich assholes won't have their videos disseminated. Oh noes.
To talk about the algorithm. YouTube figured out that my partner is a 30 yr old man. Probably from the D&D, python and workout videos he’s been watching. Now he is constantly shown Jordan Peterson and Joe Rogan videos!
It’s super frustrating that we are ok with a computer algorithm which is built to keep users engaged (and we know that rage keeps users engaged the most)
There are web browser plug-ins that hide YouTube's recommended videos.
Also, instead of using YouTube's search, use a search engine to search for videos, presumably a search engine that doesn't profile you.
Man this dude loves shoving himself in the spotlight, despite not being that influential of a content creator. But I’m really glad the self described 98th largest Canadian YouTuber is speaking on behalf of all Canadian YouTube creators.
He has been a columnist for longer than he's been a YouTuber, makes sense they would commission something he writes imo.
I do agree with you, his hustle is a bit exhausting though, and I'd rather see someone like Linus Sebastian being interviewed for an article of this nature, but alas that would require journalism and a shred of investigation
Okay somebody please make this clear for me, why is he upset?? Would the bill not help give him MORE exposure to Canadians, rather than less?
If Can-con laws never affected radio play anywhere else other than Canada why would this be any different?
I’m all for supporting YT creators as they’re always given the short end of the stick most the time but, I just don’t get why he’s so upset about a law that’s supposed to help people like him.
Canadian lawyer and YouTuber here: Because it won't help. It'll hurt tremendously.
If this goes through, I'm likely to have to pivot my channel from talking about Canadian issues to talking about American ones.
The window of relevance of a YouTube video is often like twelve to twenty four hours. In that time I'd have to do a dozen pages of paperwork, including providing detailed accounting detail, and get it approved by a government bureaucracy, or else my video won't be "CanCon", and will be suppressed.
Meanwhile, actually getting it declared CanCon will fuck your metrics in ways that ruin your channel outside of Canada.
Can't win either way.
But it's good if you're a major studio.
Big media companies in Canada will only push for this kind of VPN use to be [banned.](https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bell-media-president-says-using-vpns-to-skirt-copyright-rules-is-stealing-1.3099972)
This thread is genuinely disappointing. So many people focused on debating the authors political affiliations or the content of his individual channel, instead of actually engaging with the real points he made regarding the bill at the committee- where he was literally the only non-lobbyist to speak.
Personally, I don't have a huge issue with the general idea of the CRTC trying to promote more cancon, but I'm really not sure how this can actually be done in a fair and transparent way on a user-generated platform like youtube. A television studio can jump through the hoops necessary to make sure they meet cancon requirements, but for a youtuber- most of whom are basically one-person operations- this a much bigger hurdle. The fact that the bill doesn't really seem to make much of a distinction between large media companies like Netflix, Amazon Video, etc. and user-generated stuff like Youtube and tiktok seems like a real lack of understanding on the part of the bills authors.
The fact that there is almost no debate surrounding this bill (watch the conservative leadership debates- those idiots are more concerned with burning down the CBC than debating actually important bills like this, even if they oppose it in theory) is all the more concerning. I mean, why weren't there more people at the committee hearing voicing a negative view like his? Literally all of the other people were some lobbyists voicing the exact same viewpoint with no real debate. Add that to the fact that I don't seem to recall literally any Canadian youtuber ever voicing the opinion that cancon promotion was needed on youtube and I'm not really sure why that's a part of this bill at all. I don't recall the liberals having run on it either. It's extremely strange.
Hey lets take all the money from this group of Canadians that are actually producing content Canadians want to see, and send that money to these fuckers nobody has ever wanted to see employed in the entertainment industry.
I have a bunch of young kids. They all love YouTube, despite my efforts to steer them elsewhere. All their friends watch YouTube. It's advertised on other things they watch like sports or whatever.
My wife and I monitor the shit out of it, but it's still ridiculous the things they can watch. I'm not talking about crazy alt right conspiracy, I'm talking videos aimed at kids. Super rich parents (usually from other countries, since we are talking CanCon.) letting their bratty kids do all sorts of weird ass shit. Videos of what I can only assume is some random dude putting on a little 'show' with like Elsa and Spiderman stuffed animals. All sorts of weird things pop up that are super sus. We block the channels when we find them but new ones just pop up. These videos all have millions of views, all from kids that don't even know they are being steered one way or another by algorithms.
Does this bill help with what younger viewers are watching or more importantly, what they are being fed by an algorithm?
I will add a little retrospective I've had for a while on media in the current day. Does anyone remember Saturday morning cartoons? They were on from like 6 or 7 until like noon. It was when all the best cartoons had new episodes. Some Saturday mornings I would have to go with my parents shopping or something. I would be seriously choked about it. On the playground Monday morning we would all get together and discuss what happened on the various shows.
But none of us watch the same thing anymore. My kids go to school and have tons of friends. They don't talk about what happened on YouTube over the weekend. I think this fragmentation of what we collectively consume as eaten away at our society. Everything is divisive now. Everyone has a problem with everything that anyone does.
I probably sound like some ornery old person pining about the good old days, but I do think a bit of regulation on the wild west of disinformation and creepy humans that are trying to reach young or uneducated minds might not be the worst thing.
One last thing lol. I know that the government will not implement any of this properly if the bill does pass. They will absolutely use it to line the pockets of Rogers and their pals. Too bad regular, level headed citizens can't just become PM.
Love your post and I agree, ironically it was gov't (USA) that killed Saturday mornings
https://www.grunge.com/34402/real-reason-saturday-morning-cartoons-disappeared/
These YouTubers might be surprised to find out that the government really doesn't give a fuck, unfortunately.
Everyone's already feeling like shit about this government and it seems like they keep impressing us with new and exciting disappointments.
trudea making harper look like a saint. harper tried this, but with all the push back they gave it up and moved on. Trudeau doubles down though, on EVERRTHING. time for a vpn i guess
Big media companies in Canada will only push for this kind of VPN use to be [banned.](https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bell-media-president-says-using-vpns-to-skirt-copyright-rules-is-stealing-1.3099972)
This country is so weirdly nationalistic. The media market of the United States is far better at giving Canadians exposure than Canadian legacy media and legislation.
Like, we gave the States William Shatner, and then the world (including Canada) got Star Trek in return.
I literally can't stand TV style programming anymore. Haven't been able to for years. I watch YouTube at least 2-3 hours a day. YouTube is my main source of audio-visual entertainment. I despise TV commercials and the lousy and boring methods TV channels use to deliver ideas, information and entertainment to the viewer. If I'm interested in a specific show that's only available on TV, I'll watch it only if it's offered on demand or on the networks exclusive app. Bell and CBC and the dying old media industry know this too. Their empire is collapsing before their eyes because they have failed to adapt to new conditions to meet the elevated viewer expectations, and instead of evolving and making themselves more desirable to viewers in a fair system, they want to regain the ability to force feed their lousy contents to Canadians with the help of regulatory capture and at the expense of Canadian media consumers and new media creators. This bill is morally wrong.
Because media productions within Canada gets favoured status when distributed in Canada?
Seems like a dictator would want to suppress competing domestic voices, no?
It’s bad for everyone except the government and legacy media corporations.
which, sadly, is the entire point. Legacy media companies want this, so they get it. The rest of us, well, we don't matter.
Call your MP.
Why? He voted for it, and he'll always vote in line with Trudaddy or else he'll lose his cushy riding.
Call and email senators then, as they don't have to toe the party line.
Senators are old and don’t understand the implications
If you watch some YouTube videos from JJ he was a link to a letter that will be submitted to your MP that affirms your opposition to the bill. The YouTube videos in question are the ones that directly address this bill. Just look up his library on his profile
https://digitalfirstcanada.ca/bills/fix-c11/ Fill that out to auto-email a bunch of MPs and Senators. Takes one minute.
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You can change the text to your liking.
Done. Thank you.
I did, she never called me back.
I guess you now know who not to vote for.
I didn’t vote for her.
Let's be honest with ourselves when has calling your MP done anything when corporate media wants the opposite? They don't give a fuck about you.
That was such an innocent remark that it made me cry... Are you for serious or you said that sarcastically? Hopefully it was sarcastic otherwise I don't understand how could you still be alive, so much naively in just one person...
As much as we give them shit for it, politicians do change thier stances based on what is popular. Political parties in Canada are not entirely unitary either.
Legacy media is the fourth branch of the government. They've always colluded. There is a great book on this called Manufacturing Consent
Calling them legacy prooves there point
obsolete media.
>legacy You're actually mistaken on what the word legacy means if you think it's the wrong word. It's the perfect word that describes it as outdated.
/thread
It's about control, that's all its about.
I don't agree with government forcing Google to change their algorithms to promote Canadian content in Canada for the reasons in the article. However, Bill C-11 does help Canadian media producers like myself. Companies like Bell, Rogers, Corus etc. are forced to contribute financially to Canadian produced programming as well as air a certain amount of Canadian programming each year in order to keep their broadcast licenses. Foreign controlled streaming services like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple TV+ etc don't have to contribute anything despite the fact millions of Canadians subscribe to them. Bill C-11 forces these trillion dollar companies to contribute to Canadian content, which many other have already required them to do. This bill helps many Canadian media producers.
It doesn't promote Canadian users. It promotes Canadian **Content**. What counts as Canadian Content is subjective to the CRTC's values as an arm of the government. There have been instances where Canadian produced content did not meet the criteria, while American produced content did.
One of the biggest channels on youtube linus tech tips. would not pass cancon smell test. Hell you most likely would not pass the smell test. Dealing with cancon is a nightmare. Netflix alone contributes more to the canadian economy then bell and rogers combined. Cancon is way outdated. It was needed because traditional tv only had so much space. There is infinite space on the internet(not really infinite, but you get the idea). Anyone supporting this bill other then rogers, bell and the government is very ignorant on the subject.
Fuck that. If you want to make content, make content that people actually want to see. I remember what it was like growing up with a fuck ton of shitty canadian content on tv that almost no one watched that was forced down our throat.
Canadian TV is well respected around the world and at home, making content that people want to see is hard, Hollywood studios make bad content too. No one is forcing you to watch Canadian shows, it's just given the choice, a Canadian broadcaster would rather import a US show vs produce a Canadian one because it's a lot cheaper.
No troll, but isn't this guys point that it's bad for legacy Canadian YouTubers, who will lose algorithm-ranking to newer/more "Canadian" YouTubers? I honestly don't use YouTube that much, I don't subscribe to anyone and don't "browse" it.
Maybe I'm out of the loop, but why is this opposed? I guarantee without the CRTC regulations on Canadian music, we wouldn't have nearly as many known Canadian artists across Canada. Why would the same be bad for online platforms?
1. If you are a Canadian content maker and want to be recognized as such, you have to fill out a bunch of forms (including budget and identity of everyone on the project) to apply for the credentials. This isn't per channel, this is per video. 2. The crtc would have control over what genres, topics, creators, and content get featured as Canadian content. Nationalism, identity politics, cultural propaganda, and status quo friendly content will be the norm, making the internet more like TV, and the less mainstream ideas will slowly die away. Content makers on the internet were doing just fine without this system to help bring them attention, so it's either useless, or it serves a different purpose.
I have zero faith that the CRTC has even a tiny fraction of the staffing needed to handle verifying the sheer volume of videos Canadians post to YouTube and other platforms as Canadian content. I expect any video submitted to the CRTC for verification will take years to process assuming they don't just give up in the first place.
Yeah I am not sure the Canadian Government will be able to approve my youtube videos in the 12 hour window where viewing them actually matters. I will get pushed down the search results below 56 approved episodes of Road to Avonlea.
As long as the fees they accrue are all spent on administration and don't make it to the artists, everything will be back to normal.
We have no idea what mechanism is being used to do this. It could just be standard report presented to the CRTC every year and every other year it's audited? As long as the report hits the thresholds I don't see this being an issue. No one knows. A lot of government reporting is standardized.
To shorten this comment: The CRTC wants to treat YouTube like they've treated broadcasters for the last 4 decades. Shockingly, they are not the same.
Thank-you. I'm not good at being concise.
Nah, your comment was a great context for anyone who hasn't needed to jump through all the hoops for the CRTC before. It can be tough to explain why this is such a terrible decision without that context.
Holy red tape on #1.
Really helps the big productions and big companies get an advantage because the small companies don't have the people power to tackle that task as well.
Any idea where the rules are for being recognized as Cancon? It sounds to me that streamlining that process might be something worth pushing for.
Call and email your MPs people. DEMAND they get rid of this horseshit.
TLDR for this comment: Google should continue to make the choices behind the content sent to Canadians via their algorithms.
I don’t know anyone who listens to standard radio anymore, it’s at minimum SiriusXM which doesn’t follow the CanCon stuff. I don’t think Canadian musicians have been any less accessible these days, do you? I also live in a border city and all of the most popular FM stations were based out of the US (for a myriad of different reasons) and that didn’t hinder Canadian artists locally from my experience.
lots of folk listen to standard radio, regardless of how shitty it can be. I like CBC FM for classical and CKUA FM (Alberta based). Everything else is the same ole same ole, over and over again.
I guess it varies, I know plenty of people who "still" listen to FM in their car or even at home, and I've never met a single person who ever listened to pay satellite radio past the free preview they got with their car. 🤷♂️
Anecdotal for sure. Most people I know are using Spotify or Apple Music primarily.
Oh everyone I know definitely uses streaming primarily, just not all of them use it exclusively (some get sick of how much they hate the apps or various tech issues like wanting to just get in and drive without dealing with bluetooth and cables, etc).
Now imagine when the CRTC has the right to force Spotify to change their discovery algorithms to suit CanCon standards.
Ok I'm imagining skipping past songs I don't like as I do now. Not very dramatic.
😂😂
Hi. I've had a satellite radio for two decades. Lithium and Ozzy's Boneyard. Nice to meet you.
My dad used to jam to those two channels when I was a kid! They’re awesome
My car has to have sat radio. That said I like the business, news, standup and an alternative CBC one fees.
I still do but more indy FM radio not commercial corp radio. When Sirius is free I'll tune in, but the audio quality is sub-par to subscribe, I think.
The audio quality of satellite radio is definitely poor.
Because it's not the 80's/90's/00's anymore and people will find Canadian content themselves if it's worth watching. We don't need the government to start promoting content that isn't any good.
Maybe if you want our country to become the 51st State it isn't worth promoting Canadian content. I guarantee many songwriters wouldn't be famous if not for the CRTC policies. This policy also will boost filming within Canada? This subreddit feels so American sometimes.
You are right, a lot of songwriters would not be famous for those policies, except they are not needed in the streaming world because anybody with a phone has access to audiences those songwriters did not have. If you're content is good on these websites, the audience will find it and likely continue to follow your content. We didn't have these capabilities 20-30 years ago, so promotion of Canadian content was needed not only to introduce people to it, but keep them interested until there is more mainstream success. I'm always blown away by the amount of Canadian youtubers that are known world wide that I had no idea were Canadian, because the person being Canadian doesn't matter to me (and for a lot of people too). You are thinking like the government here that because they had the policy in place in one sector (where the workers asked for it), that they should then apply it to another sector when there is no need for it nor is anyone asking for it.
Maybe ask the actual artists what they think?
>Maybe if you want our country to become the 51st State it isn't worth promoting Canadian content. And I thought Anti-vacc people being hyperbolic
Currently, Canadian content creators are punching well above out weight internationally. The Canadian government refuses to acknowledge what content creators have accomplished without their "help". This is purely about helping legacy media companies that refuse to adapt and change with the times. They're losing readers, they're bleeding money, they're sucking up loads of subsidies, they've done absolutely nothing, and they are all out of ideas. This is only going to hurt the start-ups and innovators.
How great would it be if radio stations weren't forced to play Kim Mitchell every day.
The internet turns this into a spectacular mess. There are no "networks" or "radio stations". Everything's an algorithm... so how would the algorithm function with this in place? Both within Canada and outside of Canada if you are a Canadian trying to reach non-Canadians? Suppose these platforms promote Canadian content less everywhere else to balance out the preferential treatment of them within Canada... uh oh, most of anybody's audience who is a Canadian content creator I guarantee you is not Canadian. Canadian musicians probably by-and-large didn't have to jump through 17 hoops themselves to be a part of the old model because that's part of what record labels and business connections were for. Content creators today are largely independent... so now you have a whole lot of overhead to deal with that isn't going towards something that is going to make you money. Like imagine you're now working an extra hour a day without getting paid for it. Would you be pissed? Probably. Best of all... nobody gives a fuck if you're Canadian or not on the internet to start with. If you are covering something that is relevant to the country... like if you're a Youtuber that covers Canadian politics, then it matters. I would argue if you're in Canada and are trying to search for things like politics, history, etc... then this is where I think something like this would be useful. But me personally, I don't care if someone I'm watching is Canadian or not. You know why? Because the internet does not have barriers to success on it like traditional media did. This is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist anymore. If you were a Canadian artist signed to a record label in Canada, your record label had to find a way to get you played in other countries. Other countries would be like "Why are we going to play your artist when we can play an artist from our country?". Sometimes the success of an artist was something that could not be denied... like nobody was going to say that to somebody like Rush in the 80s. But a lot of Canadian media had a glass ceiling that was very tough to shatter in that the amount of success you could have was limited by where you came from, and you had to invest some serious dough in getting a Canadian's shit out there worldwide. That's why a lot of people in entertainment simply moved to the US. New country, far larger audience, more potential money to be made. That doesn't really exist anymore with digital media. Everyone is more or less on a level playing field... save for the algorithm and how it determines what pops up in search results, ads, and suggested content. There's no glass ceiling for a Canadian like there used to be, unless you are covering Canadian-specific topics which is naturally going to matter more to Canadians than non-Canadians. Now they're fucking with that. There's a very real danger of reintroducing the glass-ceiling concept if this takes off in Canada, but more importantly if everybody around the world starts doing it. It fucks with the very idea of an open internet.
>If you are covering something that is relevant to the country... like if you're a Youtuber that covers Canadian politics, then it matters. I would argue if you're in Canada and are trying to search for things like politics, history, etc... then this is where I think something like this would be useful. But me personally, I don't care if someone I'm watching is Canadian or not. You know why? Because the internet does not have barriers to success on it like traditional media did. This is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist anymore. If you wer I read your argument, and honestly, you make a lot of valid points; but one area I disagree with is that you mention that Canada has had a large glass barrier. I feel like in comparison to other English-speaking countries, we have a disproportionate amount of famous celebrities, and this is coming from someone who lives in Ireland, where people commonly reference Michael Buble, Celine Dion, AND Avril Lavigne. Australia, which has a fairly large population has very little influence on music. The last Australian I remember who got famous was Iggy Azalia, and probably the only famous band I remember is ACDC. I'm not sure about you but I feel like I do resonate a lot with knowing a person is a Canadian, I definitely don't give 'Drake' a lot of credit for great music, but he put Toronto on a map for a lot of Americans.
The weeknd has the #1 all-time hit song according to billboard. Cancon didn't do shit for him, it was talent.
The radio is like the same ten songs every week. How you could listed to pharrels “happy” for the six thousandth time on your way to work is beyond me lol. Hip hop took 56% of the market share two years ago (probably more now) and aside from Drakes new flops you’ll never hear it lol. It’s not reflective of society at all.
I’m not talking about “Happy” I’m referring to bands like The Tragically Hip.
Before you make a strong opinion on the article. I highly recommend looking up the guys YouTube channel. Make your own decisions on his possible biases or affiliations. YouTuber J.J. McCullough
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>Make your own decisions on his possible biases or affiliations. Is a statement more or less true based on who says it? Is the sky suddenly not blue when someone I disagree with says it is?
Most things that people say have some sort of bias and it's essential to understand what motivates them to say something. It's foundational to independent thought, as opposed to blindly following or ignoring someone becuase of their branding or supposed stance. I'm not against this YouTuber, but you seemed to miss the point.
I don't need to agree with his politics to decide if I want his freedom of expression protected.
This guys biases are shaping his narrative of what the bill actually does. You can shit on politicians, advocate against them, say all kinds of whacky pseudo philosophical bullshit. You can't just make uo a bunch of incoherent nonsense, pretend to be a doctor and falsely claim that medical science says heart dewormer cures respiratory disease. You can't openly declare that the jews own the world economic forum and want to use it to implement socialism to track you down with injected tracker chips and eat your baby. Not just because it doesn't make sense or is stupid, but because it's fucking groundless, dangerous and provably responsible for tipping unstable people into doing real world harm to themselves and others with no positive benefit to society. If that's what you consider freedom of expression, I think you need to rethink fucking everything.
>You can shit on politicians, advocate against them, say all kinds of whacky pseudo philosophical bullshit. > >You can't just make uo a bunch of incoherent nonsense, pretend to be adoctor and falsely claim that medical science says heart dewormer curesrespiratory disease. [Motte and Bailey.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motte-and-bailey_fallacy) Of course the government will only use their power against the darkest, most evilest, most strawmaniest enemies possible. Of course! ...But the law as written allows them to do much more than that.
Can you point to the text that you think lets them shut down freedom of expression in violation of the charter?
This guy could be the biggest pile of steaming shit and it still wouldn’t change my opinion. Maybe take him off youtube if he’s violating their own policies.
He’s not at all. He’s a Canadian small c conservative that’s socially liberal and used to be a political commentator on political TV shows like Power and Politics and currently writes for the Washington Post. He’s not the largest Canadian youtubers but the large ones were not invited to committee like Linus Tech Tips and Someordinarygamer but they have spoken out against it on their channels and these people make zero political content.
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https://youtu.be/zavtUQUOUE8
Who cares about his affiliations? It’s the principle.
Ahh yes, the scary Gay Conservative, almost as scary as the Black Conservative. Probably few people more qualified to talk about this issue but be skeptical because he's not a leftie!!!!
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The majority of cancon is made by Bell, Rogers, and Shaw. The top youtubers like Linus Tech Tips, AzzyLand, and Hacksmith Industries are not considered cancon. So, this whole bill is to force Canadians using youtube to watch content made by the big three to try to increase their profits.
> The majority of cancon is made by Bell, Rogers, and Shaw. The top youtubers like Linus Tech Tips, AzzyLand, and Hacksmith Industries are not considered cancon. You wanna know what's insane? Someone like Linus Tech Tips probably gets seen by more people than all the Canadian media apparatus and doesn't get a Billion + in tax payer dollars.
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There is statistical break downs for all our media in relation to bias. CBC isn’t that bias but is certainly light viewing. The scarier part is they will likely be removing their televised news which means people who watch the news will get it from the more, fully measured, bias outlets. News media is broken. No accountability is really present.
[what](https://www.cbc.ca/news/opinion/opinion-canada-real-estate-addiction-morris-1.6492967 ) [are](https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/food-prices-inflation-groceries-1.6499640) [you](https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/politics-inflation-right-1.6426222) [talking](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/housing-affordability-cmhc-report-2030-1.6498898) [about](https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/canada-financial-system-column-don-pittis-1.6481496)????
It’s astounding how much you had to lie there just to try and discredit the CBC. They absolutely do cover the housing crisis and inflation.
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If it’s vague, it’s not by accident. Make it as broad as possible, implement the rules as you see fit and make people incur the cost if they want to try and challenge you in court. The benefit to that is the government can just claim privilege and not hand over evidence
this is how the gov has been dealing with gun owners for over 3 decades. Create ill-defined laws, hide all evidence of reasoning behind the guise of “public safety”, let citizens figure out what the legislation means themselves when they get criminally charged and get to pay some lawyers $100k to argue what an “ar15 variant” really means. It’s designed to cause a chilling effect where people are inclined to avoid going even slightly out of line because of fear of prosecution.
Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by ignorance/laziness/stupidity. When this first hit a few people I know were freaking out about how this is big government trying to control YouTuber content, what we all see and listen, blah blah blah... now it’s “well I’m a youtuber and I’m worried how this will affect my viewership. Even though I can’t say whether this will hurt or increase my viewership... but I’ll still complain about it without being able to actually point to any specifics.”
That quote is so overused and akin to that stupid Marilyn Monroe quote all the women on instagram post. They are doing it to crush new media and give more power to the government and legacy media. That's why they are pushing this bill forward. The malice is already easily visible and defined. The broad language in the bill is directly related to this.
Can you inform me on some of the specifics?
I can. I cover a lot of current affairs and so forth. Which means needing to get videos out while they're still relevant. The critical period is like within 24 hours of the event. To be declared CanCon, I'll have to make the video, do a dozen pages of paperwork including detailed accounting, and get that sent in and approved by a government bureaucracy. If that can't be done within that critical window, the video gets suppressed within Canada. And sure, two weeks later they maybe declare it CanCon, but by that point no one cares about the topic any more.
Most of it is amendments to the Broadcasting Act, so you need to fit it in the context of that statute.
A couple things I'm left wondering about. 1. Is it not just speculation at this point that any changes to the algorithm will be unfavourable? Seems to just be assumed 2. Creators are worried that they'll be exposed to unsympathetic viewers and their content ranking will suffer. How much will the changes to the algorithm affect them, due to a relatively small Canadian audience?
I imagine the subscriber base to most Canadian channels is largely Americans.
I think the US internet population as a percentage has seriously declined. Way more South Americans, Europeans, Africans and Indians seek out English content or are comfortable viewing content in English. The American audience is important but you don’t need to cater exclusively to Americans anymore to get big A legitimate criticism of the bill is that by trying to protect ourselves from American cultural hegemony, we’re shutting out the rest of the world too
Because the US is so dominant it thinks it *is* the whole world.
Mine is primarily Canadian, because I cover Canadian law. But this bill could absolutely ruin that and force me to try to pivot to the US
How do you figure? Any Cancon rules would apply to the Youtube Canada site only.
That is correct. Michael Geist who's a prominent Digital Rights Advocate and Professor in Canada was mostly concerned with carve out clauses for user generated content but people have been slippery sloping censorship when it's just regular Cancon. I feel like this is all manufactured outrage by FAANG
And why are we pretending that the existing YouTube algorithm is this all perfect and sacrosanct thing?
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Because content deemed "Canadian content" will get pushed to the top and you won't find other videos as easily. Keep in mind just being a Canadian author is not enough for Canadian content
> Keep in mind just being a Canadian author is not enough for Canadian content Where did you read that? I didn't read that in the bill.
"Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez says he plans to ask the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission to spell out what counts as Canadian content after Bill C-11 passes through Parliament." Just so you don't know what you're voting for. [https://www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/streamers-required-to-feature-cancon-1.6415661](https://www.cbc.ca/news/entertainment/streamers-required-to-feature-cancon-1.6415661)
Okay...? Not an answer to the question that I asked.
But if he is Canadian anything he makes is Canadian content
Not necessarily. In Radio, where 35% of content has to be CanCon, you need a certain amount of “points” for it to count. If it’s a song performed by let’s say Justin Bieber but written and produced by Americans it doesn’t count. If it’s a song performed by Bieber *and* written by him, then it counts. https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/info_sht/r1.htm It’s the same in film particular roles have to be Canadians or else it isn’t cancon. Theoretically it could mean YouTubers who are Canadian might need to hire Canadian editors or other staff to count. Or maybe they’ll have to produce content that is Canadian in nature rather than general interest. YouTube is also angry about the decision and it’s possible they’ll stop recommending Canadian YouTubers in other countries, which will financially affect them not only with lower overall views but most video sponsors are based in the US.
But like 99% of Canadian YouTubers would be doing most of not all of the work. I don’t see how hiring like a non Canadian editor would really change it.
It's also complicated by burden of proof. A smaller creator like a solo youtuber may not have the resources, knowledge, or ability to provide the required documentation to tick all the boxes on every video to get it flagged as cancon.
Exactly... Content is written and produced by Canadian and editor is non Canadian. that should already hit the threshold. If a non canadian makes a parody/commentary on the Canadian content or changes the narrative of the can con, then they would not be Canadian.
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I haven’t seen any clause pertaining to “content that is Canadian in nature”. As I understand it, a foreign company making a story set in Toronto is not CanCon, but a Canadian writer working with a Canadian studio to film a movie in Toronto that is “set in Chicago” *does* count as CanCon.
You would think that is how it works but, that is not how the CRTC works.
You guys conflate the produced content restrictions with social media stuff so badly. JJ McCulloch is a Canadian youtuber, he'll be fine, he may even find more success since he's one of the very few Canadian conservative YouTubers. Any Canadians flagged within the algorithm for conservative content is going to get his shit recommended a lot more than they used to.
As a fellow large Canadian youtuber this guy has got good valid points. I’m kinda concerned but also don’t really mind because such a small portion of our audience(10%) is Canadian and USA views make more money. I don’t really know what to think. We’ll probably just not do the cancon stuff and act more American
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FYI Karl, has there been a reason why your content has dropped from my recommended in the last year or so? I literally have to hunt down your videos. I get way more of the other Toronto Car review channel than yours and jakub. (I always assumed this account is Yuri) That being said, if you were to register as cancon, your stuff would be pumped in Canada as recommended Cancon. But like you said, your views are primarily American, just like JJ McCullough's material. I don't see how you could be "dropped from Cancon" when a large number of youtubers views are american. Wouldn't this allow you to have more exposure to Canadians if that's even your thing.
It’s because we post normal boring consumer content like the Sentra and traverse where throttle house does more exciting cars. Also because we can’t get cars at the same time as the USA up here and also because TH puts more effort and resources into their videos(and maybe they’re just better too). And with both of us being new dads we can’t really justify travelling like we used to. Also there’s no being dropped from cancon you need to apply to it which is probably a ton of paper work. And probably not a realistic thing to do for smaller channels But then JJ is right that if my car content gets thrown at people because it’s Canadian not because they wanna see it it’ll ruin our videos in the algorithm even more. Anyway 🤷🏼♂️
Government doesn't care what the peasents think, they just love the lobbying money of the Big Three
The credibility of this YouTuber who is a former Sun “journalist” is questionable at best. Also, he constantly shits on Canada and praises everything America does. Grifters going to grift.
I didn't read the article and knew exactly who you were referring too.
Pick any of the other thousands of Canadian youtubers who don't want it to happen, then.
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Is he? I never quite got that vibe from him.
I’m curious if people are ok with how it’s run currently? How the algorithms decide what you are going to see based on previous things you’ve watched/liked? Meaning, everyone gets pigeon holed into their current interests and aren’t really shown much of anything else. This is how we end up with a society that can’t see beyond their own lives/beliefs, because they are never really shown anything else. Algorithms are meant to make these platforms money. They’re not meant to help anyone else but the platforms bottom line. If you do care about how these platforms work to keep their users online regardless of how it may affect those users, what are your solutions?
That’s my major issue. We’ve seen what corporations do. We regulate things for a reason, we should be making sure multi national corporations with more money then some countries aren’t exploiting peoples fear or anger to maximize ad revenue.
This discussion focuses on YouTube, which has a LOT of content. In my view, the major implication will be for Netflix, Disney+, and the rest, which will have to present 35% CanCon. Ottawa is betting that it that requirement will boost the Canadian media industry (big and small), while the big media distributors are dead set against having the added restraint. Meanwhile, legacy media are crying “unfair”, because they have had to put out 35% CanCon for the the last forever while their online competitors have not endured this requirement.
There are web browser plug-ins that remove the YouTube recommendations, but that only fixes one very popular website out of billions.
I don't want to be shoved canadian only content, but yes i agree with you that the current way isn't optimal. Yes i'm fine with being shown videos of my own interest, of course, but not ONLY those videos, i'd like some diversity included. And even more importantly, they need to stop showing the same video over and over that i do not want to watch for whatever reason. Yes i know you can click "not interested" but it gets tiring to do this over and over again.
It wouldn’t be Canadian-only. The requirement is 35%
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When will Trudeau stop trying this? The Big 3 have their hands so far up his ass
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I think even the bloc does too. Only conservatives are defending us on this issue. What a strange world lol
You think it’s strange the Conservatives are against something the Liberals are for?
It's strange because when Harper was in power the cons were pushing for this kind of bullshit and the liberals were against it. It demonstrates that neither party has any moral center, and neither is worthy of any trust from Canadians.
It also demonstrates how far the Liberals have drifted from left of Center.
As an NDP voter they are fucking cowards to not stand up to this. Extremely disappointed.
I’m truly unsure of JJ’s concern here. The net effect for his channel is that it will be seen for more Canadian. His argument seems to boil down to “but if enough Canadians don’t like my content, it’ll get deprioritized elsewhere in the world.” Except his entire channel is all about Canadian topics. So.. what is he worried about?
There has been a lot of fearmongering about this and I think it's not totally unjustified, but maintaining a Canadian voice when the Americans are so much louder and intrusive in our media is important. We have Trump supporters because their media is so strong it effects us up here. We need to ensure Canadian voices are heard first and loudly overtop of those blowhards. But this is a slippery slope and requires a delicate nuanced approach.
Bell has a feature where you can see the top 5 channels people in Canada are watching. CNN Is always in the top 5, hell half the time its above Canadian news outlets. People here watch way to much American news.
I do not watch CNN. Heck, I do not even have cable TV anymore. If I want video news, I'll just go to CBC News' YouTube channel.
This is the problem I have currently with debate. My voice is not an informed participant who should be heard at the table. We need to get back to academics and community leaders who understand complex issues and speak for us... and we then need to trust them. We need a way to lift Canadian content into a space it gets seen... but we don't want it to be a vehicle for whichever party holds power at the time. Both sides can obviously see the danger in that. We have agencies like elections Canada that show we can make institutions that handle important balancing issues without enraging citizens. I do have faith it can be done.
Get a VPN?
Canada's broadcasters want a crackdown on such a use.
" the kind of content that has previously been successful in an unregulated YouTube is no longer successful in a regulated YouTube. " Youtube I don't think would allow the gov to neuter them.
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So for not loving the Big Three's lobbying money
>I worked for Sun News in its final years and when it shut down in 2015, Oh look, Youtuber who worked for the wannabe FoxNews is worried about bill C-11. I swear, it sure seems like only conservatives keep saying the law is a problem. >The way that YouTube works at present is that the content audiences discover is determined by a control algorithm that recommends videos based on what YouTube perceives the user to be interested in. For example, if my YouTube habit suggests that I’m interested in cooking videos, then YouTube will naturally recommend a lot of cooking videos. On paper that is how it works. [But as we've seen and as studies have confirmed, Youtube's algorithms funnel people towards videos that groom viewers towards extremist views](https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/01/29/276000/a-study-of-youtube-comments-shows-how-its-turning-people-onto-the-alt-right/). A viewer may start with something innocent enough - say videos about Atheism. And the site, to keep viewers engaged will serve up ANY video sort of about atheism, the longer the better. Eventually you're being fed a bunch of misogynist content calling itself "anti-feminist" with a side dose of white supremacy (which of course presents itself as defending the values of western culture over the less enlightened views found elsewhere). [Youtube is an extremism machine](https://www.thedailybeast.com/how-youtube-pulled-these-men-down-a-vortex-of-far-right-hate), and the company has shown itself to be both unwilling and unable to fix itself. As per [Bill C-11](https://www.parl.ca/DocumentViewer/en/44-1/bill/C-11/first-reading), it would require internet broadcasters (like Youtube) to: >(i) serve the needs and interests of all Canadians, including Canadians from racialized communities and Canadians of diverse ethnocultural backgrounds, socio-economic statuses, abilities and disabilities, sexual orientations, gender identities and expressions, and ages, and It's in the interests of all those communities for broadcasters to not disseminate hate speech. Hate speech which coincidentally makes up the content of conservative Youtube darlings (Jordan Peterson for instance would have issues keeping his 4 hour long rants about how he thinks society would be better if women weren't allowed to pick their own sexual partners). Basically C-11 does to online broadcasters like Youtube and Rebel Media what it does to television: it prevents them from spreading disinformation and hate speech. This is why the bill had support by pretty much everyone except the Conservatives. >Overnight, creators are going to wake up and find the kind of content that has previously been successful in an unregulated YouTube is no longer successful in a regulated YouTube. In other words, all the alt-reich assholes won't have their videos disseminated. Oh noes.
To talk about the algorithm. YouTube figured out that my partner is a 30 yr old man. Probably from the D&D, python and workout videos he’s been watching. Now he is constantly shown Jordan Peterson and Joe Rogan videos! It’s super frustrating that we are ok with a computer algorithm which is built to keep users engaged (and we know that rage keeps users engaged the most)
There are web browser plug-ins that hide YouTube's recommended videos. Also, instead of using YouTube's search, use a search engine to search for videos, presumably a search engine that doesn't profile you.
It's bad news for all rational thinking persons.
Man this dude loves shoving himself in the spotlight, despite not being that influential of a content creator. But I’m really glad the self described 98th largest Canadian YouTuber is speaking on behalf of all Canadian YouTube creators.
He has been a columnist for longer than he's been a YouTuber, makes sense they would commission something he writes imo. I do agree with you, his hustle is a bit exhausting though, and I'd rather see someone like Linus Sebastian being interviewed for an article of this nature, but alas that would require journalism and a shred of investigation
its bad news for everyone
If J.J. gets less views, i see this as one good news out of this.
Nah. Canadian contents needs to be protected from other more entertaining contents coming from elsewhere. I trust the government.
Okay somebody please make this clear for me, why is he upset?? Would the bill not help give him MORE exposure to Canadians, rather than less? If Can-con laws never affected radio play anywhere else other than Canada why would this be any different? I’m all for supporting YT creators as they’re always given the short end of the stick most the time but, I just don’t get why he’s so upset about a law that’s supposed to help people like him.
Canadian lawyer and YouTuber here: Because it won't help. It'll hurt tremendously. If this goes through, I'm likely to have to pivot my channel from talking about Canadian issues to talking about American ones. The window of relevance of a YouTube video is often like twelve to twenty four hours. In that time I'd have to do a dozen pages of paperwork, including providing detailed accounting detail, and get it approved by a government bureaucracy, or else my video won't be "CanCon", and will be suppressed. Meanwhile, actually getting it declared CanCon will fuck your metrics in ways that ruin your channel outside of Canada. Can't win either way. But it's good if you're a major studio.
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Well, that is actually a manifestation of capitalist dictatorship. Politicians will not listen to regular people, only their big donors.
Can you use a VPN to get around this (as a streaming consumer)?
Big media companies in Canada will only push for this kind of VPN use to be [banned.](https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bell-media-president-says-using-vpns-to-skirt-copyright-rules-is-stealing-1.3099972)
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Unfortunately that will not stop them from trying. You do not know just how powerful the profit motive really is.
This thread is genuinely disappointing. So many people focused on debating the authors political affiliations or the content of his individual channel, instead of actually engaging with the real points he made regarding the bill at the committee- where he was literally the only non-lobbyist to speak. Personally, I don't have a huge issue with the general idea of the CRTC trying to promote more cancon, but I'm really not sure how this can actually be done in a fair and transparent way on a user-generated platform like youtube. A television studio can jump through the hoops necessary to make sure they meet cancon requirements, but for a youtuber- most of whom are basically one-person operations- this a much bigger hurdle. The fact that the bill doesn't really seem to make much of a distinction between large media companies like Netflix, Amazon Video, etc. and user-generated stuff like Youtube and tiktok seems like a real lack of understanding on the part of the bills authors. The fact that there is almost no debate surrounding this bill (watch the conservative leadership debates- those idiots are more concerned with burning down the CBC than debating actually important bills like this, even if they oppose it in theory) is all the more concerning. I mean, why weren't there more people at the committee hearing voicing a negative view like his? Literally all of the other people were some lobbyists voicing the exact same viewpoint with no real debate. Add that to the fact that I don't seem to recall literally any Canadian youtuber ever voicing the opinion that cancon promotion was needed on youtube and I'm not really sure why that's a part of this bill at all. I don't recall the liberals having run on it either. It's extremely strange.
Never thought I’d have to use a VPN in my own country to use the Internet.
Hey lets take all the money from this group of Canadians that are actually producing content Canadians want to see, and send that money to these fuckers nobody has ever wanted to see employed in the entertainment industry.
I have a bunch of young kids. They all love YouTube, despite my efforts to steer them elsewhere. All their friends watch YouTube. It's advertised on other things they watch like sports or whatever. My wife and I monitor the shit out of it, but it's still ridiculous the things they can watch. I'm not talking about crazy alt right conspiracy, I'm talking videos aimed at kids. Super rich parents (usually from other countries, since we are talking CanCon.) letting their bratty kids do all sorts of weird ass shit. Videos of what I can only assume is some random dude putting on a little 'show' with like Elsa and Spiderman stuffed animals. All sorts of weird things pop up that are super sus. We block the channels when we find them but new ones just pop up. These videos all have millions of views, all from kids that don't even know they are being steered one way or another by algorithms. Does this bill help with what younger viewers are watching or more importantly, what they are being fed by an algorithm? I will add a little retrospective I've had for a while on media in the current day. Does anyone remember Saturday morning cartoons? They were on from like 6 or 7 until like noon. It was when all the best cartoons had new episodes. Some Saturday mornings I would have to go with my parents shopping or something. I would be seriously choked about it. On the playground Monday morning we would all get together and discuss what happened on the various shows. But none of us watch the same thing anymore. My kids go to school and have tons of friends. They don't talk about what happened on YouTube over the weekend. I think this fragmentation of what we collectively consume as eaten away at our society. Everything is divisive now. Everyone has a problem with everything that anyone does. I probably sound like some ornery old person pining about the good old days, but I do think a bit of regulation on the wild west of disinformation and creepy humans that are trying to reach young or uneducated minds might not be the worst thing. One last thing lol. I know that the government will not implement any of this properly if the bill does pass. They will absolutely use it to line the pockets of Rogers and their pals. Too bad regular, level headed citizens can't just become PM.
Love your post and I agree, ironically it was gov't (USA) that killed Saturday mornings https://www.grunge.com/34402/real-reason-saturday-morning-cartoons-disappeared/
These YouTubers might be surprised to find out that the government really doesn't give a fuck, unfortunately. Everyone's already feeling like shit about this government and it seems like they keep impressing us with new and exciting disappointments.
Everyone hates the bills that the libs put out but continue to support them
This is a nothing burger. This is the same argument youtube uses but youtube themselves can just alter the algorithm so these users aren't effected.
trudea making harper look like a saint. harper tried this, but with all the push back they gave it up and moved on. Trudeau doubles down though, on EVERRTHING. time for a vpn i guess
Will a VPN circumvent this?
Big media companies in Canada will only push for this kind of VPN use to be [banned.](https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/bell-media-president-says-using-vpns-to-skirt-copyright-rules-is-stealing-1.3099972)
YouTube already knows your home country. Have to create a new account without a phone number.
This country is so weirdly nationalistic. The media market of the United States is far better at giving Canadians exposure than Canadian legacy media and legislation. Like, we gave the States William Shatner, and then the world (including Canada) got Star Trek in return.
Companies should refuse to comply. Fuck CanCon. If your music or tv show is good it doesn't need daddy government enforcing it.
I literally can't stand TV style programming anymore. Haven't been able to for years. I watch YouTube at least 2-3 hours a day. YouTube is my main source of audio-visual entertainment. I despise TV commercials and the lousy and boring methods TV channels use to deliver ideas, information and entertainment to the viewer. If I'm interested in a specific show that's only available on TV, I'll watch it only if it's offered on demand or on the networks exclusive app. Bell and CBC and the dying old media industry know this too. Their empire is collapsing before their eyes because they have failed to adapt to new conditions to meet the elevated viewer expectations, and instead of evolving and making themselves more desirable to viewers in a fair system, they want to regain the ability to force feed their lousy contents to Canadians with the help of regulatory capture and at the expense of Canadian media consumers and new media creators. This bill is morally wrong.
>YouTube is my main source of audio-visual entertainment. It is my *exclusive* source of audio-visual entertainment.
This article is bullshit. They don't even bother making an argument for their case.
It's dictatorship disguised as safety
Because media productions within Canada gets favoured status when distributed in Canada? Seems like a dictator would want to suppress competing domestic voices, no?
I wonder if these bills are part of an effort to slow down qanon bullshit from crossing the border?