Canada’s law to help news outlets is harming them instead

Three years ago journalists took unusual interest in an amendment to Australian competition law. The “news media bargaining code”, passed in 2021, obliged Google and Facebook to pay news outlets when search results or social-media feeds linked to their articles. Some wondered why the tech firms owed publishers money just for linking to their sites. But such doubts were quickly forgotten when the code wrung more than $100m out of the two tech giants in its first year. Other places rushed to copy it: Brazil, Britain, Canada, South Africa and California have explored similar measures.