Branded as a way for small outlets to get their fair share from social media giants like Facebook, the Online News Act has managed to achieve the complete opposite, obliterating most small or local news outlets’ main source of revenue.

According to the Online News Act’s description, the intent of the Act is to create “a bargaining framework to ensure that platforms compensate news businesses fairly.”

“… The key objective of the Act is to encourage platforms and news businesses to reach voluntary commercial agreements to fairly compensate Canadian news businesses when news content is distributed on those platforms. Failing that, it provides for a mandatory bargaining process, backstopped by final offer arbitration.”

But that hasn’t happened.

Instead, outlets, specifically Facebook, have banned the sharing of news on their platforms, causing the loss of many outlets’ main sources of views and, thus, revenue.

As Iain Burns, the managing editor of Now Media Group, which manages news posts for outlets serving smaller communities, notes, “We lost 70 per cent of our audience when that happened,” in addition to 50% of the company’s revenue.

“We’re not the only ones. Many, many outlets are in this situation,” Burns added.

While proponents of the Act claimed that Facebook would have no choice but to bargain, a study from the Media Ecosystem Observatory has found that Meta’s bottom line has been unaffected.

People are still using Facebook despite the loss of news links, with often unprofitable memes and screenshots of articles filling the void.

And according to the study, the Act and subsequent ban have caused a 90% drop in engagement for Canadian outlets, with small and/or local news outlets (i.e., non-government-funded outlets) being the most affected.

“Meta’s blocking of news in Canada is the culmination of a multiyear trend for the company to get out of the distribution of journalism,” explains co-author Taylor Owen.

“This comes after over a decade of incentivizing and normalizing both Canadian citizens and publishers to using their platforms for news. The loss of journalism on Meta platforms represents a significant decline in the resiliency of the Canadian media ecosystem.”

The types of news links affected are also worth noting. While large outlets with billion-dollar budgets usually get their views from Google or smartphone news feeds, outlets that go against the grain and publish more anti-establishment content do better on social media.

Thus, despite being branded as a way to help the little guy get his fair share from social media giants, the only thing the Online News Act has actually achieved is killing off the competition for state-funded media.