Tag: Meta

Erica Stanford needs to give social media review a well-aimed kick

When politicians kick the can down the road it is usually an excuse to do nothing. The Government’s decision to ‘review’ proposals to ban social media for under-16 year olds does not fall into that category. It is the right thing to do, but the can needs to be kicked into next year.

The review was precipitated by a private member’s bill sponsored by National MP Catherine Wedd. By her own admission, that bill “closely mirrors the approach taken in Australia”.

The review must include an assessment of the actual consequences of Australia’s recent federal law banning youngsters from the platforms. That law does not come into force until December.

Canberra’s ban has been widely praised but there are numerous questions over how it will be implemented and how effective it will be. The Australians have a trial underway on an Age Check Certification Scheme, which will assess technology to be used to determine whether people are the age they claim to be when accessing social media. It is due to report next month but, as of now, we don’t know whether it will even work.

Nor do we know whether it will have unintended consequences. For example, there is a proposal by Google that would allow users to store copies of their passport or driver’s licence for age verification purposes. Personally, I would retreat into the analogue world of typewriters, pens and letter paper before entrusting social platforms with such precious proof of identity.

That is just one aspect of the ban that has a question mark hanging over it. Another is how the likes of Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg will react to YouTube carving out an exemption for itself when they have not. During the Australian federal election campaign Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he was expecting “major pressure”.

Albanese indicated his government would not buckle to that pressure and the legislation contains stiff penalties for non-compliance. However, another of the unanswered questions is how effective those measures will be.

And what would be the overall effect of the likes of Trump-emboldened American platform operators simply pulling plug on Australian operations? After all, Canada was subjected to a news ban by Meta, and Australia is an even smaller market. Can Australians live without social media? Would it push users toward security suspect TikTok if its Chinese owners opted not to join any boycott?

As I say, Australia attracted widespread international praise for tackling the problem of young people’s use of social media. However, that praise was not universal. Leaving aside 12 year olds who think it is “crazy”, opposition to the ban included an open letter signed by 140 international academics and mental health groups. They argued the ban was too simplistic and that systemic regulation (covering social media across the board) was needed. Human rights advocates claimed it infringed on young people’s rights, including access to information and privacy.

The technical, legal, and social fallout from the law will not be resolved in advance of its implementation. Court challenges, for example, may rely on actual evidence of unacceptable inroads or consequences.

In other words, there is much to play out before the Australian blueprint is proven fit for purpose. It would be folly for this country to “closely mirror” it until that fitness test has been passed.

I don’t much care whether the National Party’s motive in usurping Catherine Wedd’s private member’s bill was to take the credit for attacking a serious social issue, or to simply kick the can down the road when it had ‘more important things’ to worry about. Importantly, our solution will no longer turn on Wedd’s Bill.

The review has been placed in a very competent pair of hands – Education Minister Erica Stanford. She is a better choice than Media and Communications Minister Paul Goldsmith, whose preoccupation with other weighty portfolios has seen media issues placed on a back burner this year. Continue reading “Erica Stanford needs to give social media review a well-aimed kick” →

Submission: Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill

Yesterday the Economic Development, Science and Innovation Select Committee heard submissions on the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill. I made a written submission on the bill, which proposes a system under which New Zealand news organisations could negotiate with social media and search platforms for compensation for the use of news content. Here is my submission:

My name is Gavin Peter Ellis. I am a media researcher and consultant. I hold a doctorate in political studies and am an honorary research fellow at Koi Tū: Centre for Informed Futures at the University of Auckland. I have a background in news media stretching back more than fifty years.

I wish to make the following submission on the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill.

The introduction of the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill follows the adoption of measures by Australia and Canada to bring some balance to a playing field tipped on its end by the immense power of Alphabet (Google) and Meta (Facebook).

A Cabinet Paper on the New Zealand proposal stated: “The overwhelming feedback from the New Zealand media sector has been that in all respects of their commercial dealings with Google and Meta, news media organisations must accept ‘take in or leave it’ terms that are weighted in favour of the platforms. This inherently limits news media companies’ ability to negotiate about what is a fair return for their investment in news content.”

From my knowledge of the relationship between the platforms and New Zealand media, I would endorse this assessment but would add that there are some media entities with which the platforms simply refuse to engage. This is in spite of the fact that material produced and paid for by these entities is appropriated for use on the platforms.

The Cabinet paper also noted New Zealand companies had no ability to negotiate over issues such as changes to algorithms that affect the distribution of content. Since the paper was tabled, Facebook has, in fact, changed its algorithm affecting New Zealand news, resulting in a drop in page views across our news media.

The Bill proposes a bargaining code but there are alternatives that would be both more robust and would more accurately reflect the impact that search and social media platforms have had, and will continue to have, on vital news media services here.

Those alternatives include a levy on the New Zealand revenue of multinational digital platforms to produce a pool of funds to be distributed equitably to news media.  A ring-fenced revenue tax would nullify the platforms’ profit-minimising strategies in selected jurisdictions, such as New Zealand.

I submit that the alternatives should be preferred above attempts to strengthen the bargaining position of New Zealand media, simply because the power imbalance between the parties is too great and no agreements will reflect the relative impact on each party.

Search and social media platforms have gained such power that anything less than an impost on their commercial activity is unlikely to benefit the diverse forms of New Zealand news media, either sufficiently or equitably.

At the core of the proposed law is a framework for negotiation between the digital platforms and news media entities. The framework sets out timelines on negotiation, mediation, and final offer arbitration if required. There are definitions of what types of digital platform would be captured by the legislation. Unlike the Australian law, where a government minister designates which platforms will be included, the New Zealand proposal (and the similar Canadian law) adopts a catch-all approach from which a platform could be exempted if it meets conditions showing it has already significantly benefitted the New Zealand news media sector.

These conditions appear to be subjective, and provide the means by which Alphabet and Meta could seek exemptions despite the fact that, relative to their levels of commercial activity in this country, their settlements have been minimal.

The Bill provides little or no redress for those companies that have already negotiated with the multinationals – from a position of weakness. The proposed law  cannot be used to over-ride existing agreements between the digital platforms and New Zealand news media entities. Nor can it be used to renegotiate the terms of those agreements. The net effect of such provisions is to make the principal powers of the Bill a nullity in respect of some of our most significant media entities.

In my view, while the Bill has good intentions – making digital platforms pay for news content produced by others – it fails in providing adequate means for achieving that goal. Nor does it reflect in any way the need for a form of reparation. For years, these platforms have benefitted from content without payment and have decimated the business models of news producers performing civic and social functions that the platforms do not. They have both an obligation and the means to make reparations.

Neither goal will be met by a ‘bargaining framework’.  Implicit in such an arrangement is good corporate citizenship but that has not always been evident in the actions of the platforms. When Canada passed its C-18 Law, Facebook responded by blocking Canadian news links, an act that Canadian Minister of Heritage, Pascale St-Onge, called “irresponsible and unreasonable”. A review of the Australian law after the first year of operation included a request that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission investigate whether bargaining power imbalances still exist.

Nothing in the Bill relates to a newer threat to the ownership of news content. Generative AI depends on existing data from which to construct its new ‘realities’. A significant element of that data is found on the websites and in the archives of news media. Nothing in the Bill provides redress for news media for the ‘scraping’ of their content by AI engines, the most powerful of which are likely to be owned by the platforms at which the Bill is aimed. It is a serious omission, although I acknowledge it is one that may be redressed through other legislation.

The financial state of the New Zealand news media gives cause for serious concern. That state is due in no small part to the actions and attitudes of multinational digital platforms that are immensely powerful and immensely wealthy.

The only way in which that power and wealth can be met on anything approaching equal terms is to employ undeniable sovereign power – in this case, the right of an elected government to impose taxes on business activities within its jurisdiction.

I submit that the Bill should be rewritten to reflect such determination, or that it be replaced by a new Bill that does so. The result – a sovereign fund to sustain democratically and socially significant journalism – could be the difference between a healthy civic environment and democratic deficit.

There’s a kind of hush all over the Digital News Bargaining Bill

New Zealanders can be forgiven for being unaware that their government had made good on its plan to make social media and search platforms pay for the news they use. The proposed legislation caused hardly a stir when broadcasting minister Willie Jackson introduced it to Parliament last Thursday.

Only Businessdesk’s media writer, Daniel Dunkley, provided a summary of the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill. His story rated a brief in Shayne Currie’s Media Insider column in the Weekend Herald and the same day The Post acknowledged the Bill with a highly critical commentary by Dr Eric Crampton, chief economist at the free-market thinktank The New Zealand Initiative, who called it a “shakedown racket”.

The subdued reaction may reflect a view that the Bill will die with the current Labour-led government. That was the view of Newsroom co-founder Tim Murphy when I polled media leaders on the introduction of the proposed legislation. The only other media boss to respond was Radio New Zealand CEO Paul Thompson, who sees the Bill as a sound approach that will benefit a number of outlets. However, he doesn’t see it becoming law “any time soon”, nor as a panacea for all the news industry’s problems.

For all that, the Bill deserved a far better public airing than it has so far received, not least because it also announced an end to direct public funding of private sector news operations. Continue reading “There’s a kind of hush all over the Digital News Bargaining Bill” →

Feathers will fly as Willie puts the cat among the kiwis

Some time this week Broadcasting Minister Willie Jackson will set the cat among the kiwis. He will introduce the Digital Bargaining Bill to Parliament.

The Bill is expected to mirror legislation passed in Australia and Canada that forces digital platforms to negotiate fairly, and in good faith, with news organisations for the use of their news content.

The passage of legislation in those countries prompted immediate strong-arm reactions from Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, and ominous rumblings from Alphabet, the owner of Google.

Days before Australia’s News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code came into force in 2021, Facebook cut access to all news content for Australian users. It flailed around and banned everything it thought was Australian news. That included some government pages and even a page of advice on bike trails.

The total news ban lasted only a few days. It was lifted after a sizeable negative worldwide public reaction and assurances to Meta that the code would not be invoked by the Australian Government if the platform owners negotiated in good faith. Google had already blinked and had done deals with Australian media companies.

Canada’s Online News Act was given the Royal Assent in July and at the beginning of August Meta blocked Canadians’ access to news on Facebook and Instagram. Google has warned it could remove Canadian news from its platforms in Canada when the law takes effect (up to 180 days from the Royal Assent). However, Google’s owner is still negotiating with the Canadian Government over the regulations that would flow from the law. Meta has not joined those discussions.

A coalition of the country’s broadcasters and publishers last week asked the Competition Bureau to investigate the ban and use its powers to force Meta to reverse course. Continue reading “Feathers will fly as Willie puts the cat among the kiwis” →