Why advertisers in Canada are pulling out of Instagram and Facebook
Canadian advertisers are leaving Meta to boycott the company's ban on news posts.
Stingray Group announced on Tuesday that it will "immediately suspend" all advertising on Facebook and Instagram in Canada. Stingray, which is a Montreal-based music and video content company, said the move is in response to Meta blocking news content in Canada.
"We cannot tolerate Meta’s recent decision to block news from Canadian news media publishers and their potential implications for Canadian news content," Eric Boyko, co-founder and chief executive officer of Stingray, told MarketWatch. "As a result, we have decided to pause our advertising on Facebook and Instagram."
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Stingray is just the most recent company in Canada to pull advertising from Meta. It follows the British Columbia government, the Canadian federal government, the Quebec and Ottawa governments, and other governments in Canada that also pulled advertising from Meta. Quebec worker's union also suspended all advertising, along with Canadian telecoms operator Quebecor and Cogeco, which runs radio stations in Quebec, according to Reuters.
Meta's decision to remove news from its platforms is in response to Canada's Online News Act, which passed through Canada's Parliament in June. The act requires tech giants like Meta and Google to pay Canadian news outlets for the content those outlets put on Meta's platforms. News was officially removed from Facebook and Instagram in Canada on August 1.
Christianna Silva is a senior culture reporter covering social platforms and the creator economy, with a focus on the intersection of social media, politics, and the economic systems that govern us. Since joining Mashable in 2021, they have reported extensively on meme creators, content moderation, and the nature of online creation under capitalism.
Before joining Mashable, they worked as an editor at NPR and MTV News, a reporter at Teen Vogue and VICE News, and as a stablehand at a mini-horse farm. You can follow her on Bluesky @christiannaj.bsky.social and Instagram @christianna_j.
