August 15, 2026 Canadians, it seems, are not looking for a national moment of humiliation in the face of US trade aggression. Public polling tell us so and hats off to The Line’s Jen Gerson for spelling it out. “Canada is working to secure some kind of interim deal, and if the leaks are to Continue reading Catching up on MediaPolicy Film industry throws down on Carney ambitions for Canadian media…
(satiric AI photo illustration) August 9, 2026 It’s likely that the standout moments of the Mark Carney chapter in Canadian history books will include the Gordie Howe Bridge and his repeal of the digital services tax. I’m not 100% sure how the Prime Minister will be remembered in English speaking Canada for his duck-and-cover on Continue reading Catching up on MediaPolicy Will Carney s Netflix tax…
August 7, 2026 “I don’t know what you mean by ‘glory, ” Alice said. Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. “Of course you don’t—till I tell you. I meant ‘there’s a nice knock-down argument for you! ” “But ‘glory’ doesn’t mean ‘a nice knock-down argument, ” Alice objected. “When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful Continue reading Letter from a Canadian: On the meaning of trade…
August 1, 2026 On July 28th the Toronto Blue Jays suited up for nine innings against the Washington Nationals on “Canada-US Friendship Day.” The game was played in the US capital, home to the Nationals, the onetime franchise of the Montreal Expos. The friendship day was sponsored by the Canadian embassy in Washington, partnering with Continue reading On Canada-US Friendship Day
Facebook post, Narcity Canada July 25, 2026 The late and first Lord Thomson of Fleet, Canada’s Roy Thomson, built the ground floor of his media empire on home turf in northern Ontario. During the 1930s and 1940s he expanded into a string of radio stations and 20 daily Canadian newspapers, most of them in mid Continue reading Catching up on MediaPolicy Village Media expands to middle America Meta…
July 18, 2026 News publishers around the world are about to get their asses handed to them by AI companies. And they know it. What to do? Well there’s Plan A and there s Plan B. Plan A is for news publishers to combat the AI chatbots’ illegal scraping of digital news content by filing lawsuits Continue reading Catching Up on MediaPolicy Plan B for AI s content theft AI scorecards of news…
July 12, 2026 Canadians are familiar with the story of the Online News Act. True policy nerds know that it’s part of a bigger story in which Google and Meta grappled with mandatory news licensing in the European Union, Australia, Canada and the United States. Something similar might be playing out again between digital news publishers and Continue reading Catching up on MediaPolicy AI news…
July 5, 2026 Of the gamut of emotions that supporters of the Online Streaming Act ran through when Prime Minister Mark Carney overruled the CRTC’s 15% contribution scheme for Netflix and the foreign streamers, the most gut wrenching was betrayal. Who could forget only 125 days earlier Carney horsing around with Hudson Williams at the Continue reading Catching up on MediaPolicy Carney s Fleecing…
July 1, 2026 In my last post, I spent time teasing out the nuances of how the Reuters Oxford 2026 report on digital news analyzes “trust in news.” The gist of the post was: look at the right “trust” numbers before rushing to judgment against Canadian news media in general and CBC/Radio Canada in particular. Continue reading Admit it. CBC News is the best.
(AI illustration) June 27, 2026 Every year the Reuters Oxford Digital News conducts a global survey of online news journalism. It frequently leads its public release with a headline-grabbing number for “trust in news.” Every year, the number goes down. It sunk by 3% this year to 37%. A further 34% of respondents neither trust Continue reading Catching up on MediaPolicy Your trust in news…