The Guiding Principles are creepily totalitarian, and yet one imagines the authors of this document think of themselves as being great public benefactors
The new Broadcasting Act, Bill C-10, may have been stymied in the Senate, but the actual content of its policy objectives has just been released, in the form of Heritage Canada’s “Guiding Principles on Diversity of Content Online.” For a government intent on control, the Guiding Principles have several advantages: they are not legislated; they can be revised and adapted according to how technology or society evolves; and they have no legally binding force. They have only the force of the large platforms to back them — if they sign on, as they are enjoined to do.
