In recent weeks there have been increasing calls for websites (and especially Google and Facebook) to pay news organizations for links to their news content. Recent laws (and actual agreements) in France and Australia have underscored this. Now we have news that "Canadian Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault has called the practice of linking to news articles on social media sites such as Facebook 'immoral' and indicated that he plans to establish a new mandated licensing requirement." But as Michael Geist points out, note only do news publishers "actively encourage their users to post links", they actually post the links themselves. I'm not surprised; I get numerous requests myself, which I review (except for the 'guest articles', which are never going to appear on my site) and post as appropriate. I like getting suggestions, but not if I have to pay for them. I will never pay to quote and comment on a link, and would point out to the Minister that such a law if enforced broadly would destroy teaching and scholarship.
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