this post was submitted on 19 Aug 2023
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Canada wildfire evacuees say Facebook's news ban 'dangerous' in emergency situation (www.cbc.ca)
submitted 1 year ago by L4s to c/technology
12 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Canada wildfire evacuees say Facebook's news ban 'dangerous' in emergency situation::The ongoing fight between tech company Meta and the federal government over subsidizing news publishers means links to news sources are being blocked on sites like Facebook and Instagram. Wildfire evacuees in the Northwest Territories say that's making it harder to share life-saving information during an emergency.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It's not really relying on 3rd party private companies exclusively, since all the other methods of communicating are also running. The wider conversation is around reaching the subset of the population that only use that 3rd party private company to communicate. The government is still responsible for reaching those people, and it's also responsible for keeping the 3rd party private company regulated.

Also this particular story isn't as worrisome because only Canadian news organizations were removed. Wildfire coverage from other countries should still show up.

Copying another comment I saw:

Not really emergency notifications but news, which tbh isn’t as important in this case because non-Canadian news orgs aren’t affected and are covering it too. So there isn’t an immediate risk I don’t think.

As for the main point: The problem is that a subset of the population ONLY gets information through one platform. The only way to reach them is through that platform, and not reaching them means excess costs when you have to rescue/treat/otherwise deal with the fallout. It’s also the government’s job to inform people and keep them safe.

At the same time, the companies need to be regulated by the government. Can’t just let them have free reign because they seized control