{"id":217750,"date":"2023-08-30T16:22:37","date_gmt":"2023-08-30T20:22:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lionpublishers.com\/?p=217750"},"modified":"2023-08-30T21:23:55","modified_gmt":"2023-08-31T01:23:55","slug":"canada-oasis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lionpublishers.com\/canada-oasis\/","title":{"rendered":"These 270 independent news businesses are a bright spot in Canada\u2019s local news ecosystem"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Over the past 25 years, the Canadian news market has experienced many exogenous trends similar to those in the United States \u2014 rapid advances and adoption of digital technology and platforms, a decline in advertising revenue, and significant contractions at community newspapers through layoffs and closures. And, as we\u2019re seeing in the U.S., local independent media is trying to fill these gaps and better serve audiences who have often been overlooked.

While we still need more research into Canada\u2019s burgeoning local independent media ecosystem, with help from a partnership with the Google News Initiative<\/a>, LION has started this work by compiling a list of 270 publications that are independent, digitally dominant and serving a geographically-based community or single-subject topic. We\u2019ve added these Canadian publications<\/a> to our Project Oasis database<\/a>, and anticipate updating this list as we identify more. 

We\u2019re also sharing what we\u2019ve learned so far about the country\u2019s local news trends and the challenges these publishers face. It\u2019s our first step to understanding Canada\u2019s ecosystem and how we, and others wanting to support strong democracies in communities across Canada, can support its development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Local news trends in Canada<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Since 2008, 474 local news outlets have closed across Canada, affecting 335 communities, according to The Local News Research Project\u2019s June 2023 report<\/a>. These closures have had a significant impact on rural and smaller communities in particular, where there are already fewer media outlets. Yet in the same timeframe, according to this report, 217 local news outlets opened in 154 communities. More than 42 percent of those new outlets are independently owned.

\u201cThere\u2019s a lower barrier to entry for digital startups,\u201d said April Lindgren, principal investigator at the Local News Research Project. \u201cStarting a digital community publication is cheaper than a printed community newspaper, so most of the new outlets we see are going to be digital.\u201d 

Lindgren said digital first companies are facing major uncertainty and the potential for significant challenges with the fallout of Canada\u2019s Bill C-18<\/a>. The new legislation, which will be implemented later this year, requires technology companies like Google and Meta to compensate news organizations for news links on their platforms.

In response to this legislation, Meta blocked news links on its platforms entirely, resulting in users not being able to post or share Canadian news links on Facebook and Instagram. Google has said<\/a> it will remove Canadian news links once the law is implemented and will continue to meet with the federal government about the bill.

Independent news organizations, particularly those that don\u2019t have the brand recognition of more established news sites, are worried this will dramatically impact their ability to drive traffic to their reporting, which will ultimately hurt their audience growth and financial bottom line. In 2022, more than 100 independent news outlets wrote an open letter<\/a> to the federal government calling for changes to Bill C-18 to support independent media, which ultimately were not incorporated into the law. 

\u201cBefore Bill C-18, we had developed a viable business model,\u201d said Erin Millar, CEO of Indiegraf and founder of Discourse. \u201cThe industry has been experimenting and developing audience channels, but that innovation is still at an early stage. We lost the largest distribution channel, and that breaks the business model,\u201d she said.

She points to independent news publications like The Narwhal and Village Media, which built business models that relied on social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram to build new audiences, drive membership conversions and increase traffic that could be monetized through advertising. 

Millar underscored how the response to Bill C-18 will disproportionately affect communities of colour and the publications who serve them. For example, publications like Cabin Radio now have a diminished ability to distribute news about the wildfires affecting Yellowknife, which has a large Indigenous population. 

\u201cNot all communities use the Internet in the same way,\u201d Miller said. \u201cFacebook is more critical to Indigenous and immigrant communities. People from those communities are able to facilitate and reconnect with others. What\u2019s happening is a real setback.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Insights into Canadian independent news publications <\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

LION identified 270 independent news publications in Canada that are digitally dominant and focus on local news\u2014 which we define<\/a> as geographically-constrained or serving a specific topic\/audience. Here are a few trends we identified from this dataset, and from a more in-depth dataset we collected from 33 publications.

Most publications are based in Ontario.<\/strong>
Ontario has the highest number of publications, with 40 percent of news outlets based in the province. The Prairies have the next highest percentage, with 21 percent of publications based in Alberta and Saskatchewan, along with a few publications in Manitoba. Eighteen percent of publications are based in British Columbia and 12 percent are in Quebec.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Location<\/strong><\/td>Number of Publications<\/strong><\/td>Percentage<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
ON<\/td>107<\/td>40%<\/td><\/tr>
BC<\/td>50<\/td>19%<\/td><\/tr>
AB<\/td>32<\/td>12%<\/td><\/tr>
QC<\/td>33<\/td>12%<\/td><\/tr>
SK<\/td>22<\/td>8%<\/td><\/tr>
NS<\/td>11<\/td>4%<\/td><\/tr>
NB<\/td>4<\/td>1%<\/td><\/tr>
MB<\/td>3<\/td>1%<\/td><\/tr>
NT<\/td>2<\/td>1%<\/td><\/tr>
PE<\/td>2<\/td>1%<\/td><\/tr>
NL<\/td>1<\/td>0.4%<\/td><\/tr>
Total<\/strong><\/td>267*<\/strong><\/td>100%<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

*=Of the 270 publications, we identified location data for 267.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n


There\u2019s a fairly even split between publications serving rural and urban communities.<\/strong>
Of the 224 publications focused on geographically-constrained news, 54 percent report on urban cities and 46 percent on rural communities. (We defined an urban area as having a population of at least 52,000\u2014 the cutoff point for the top 100 largest municipalities in Canada). Twenty publications are located in Montreal and 18 are in Toronto. 

We looked at each publication\u2019s objectives and mission statement and found that the majority are focused on covering local municipality news (rather than provincial or regional news). We identified: <\/p>\n\n\n\n