The Canada Media Fund (CMF) told Senators that they want to help Canadian creators. We contacted them directly. Apparently, they are not interested in helping Canadian creators.
During the second segment of hearing 13, the Canada Media Fund (CMF) told Senators that they are out there trying to help fund Canadian media projects of all kinds. Whether those projects are by a large broadcaster or a small “experimental” digital only creator, they boldly claimed that they are helping everyone achieve success by assisting with the funding of their projects.
In fact, they were so bold with their claims, they straight up told senators that they have contacted TikTok and YouTube, saying that they are looking for Canadian creators so they can help fund their projects and reach success.
Naturally, we were highly suspicious of these claims. After all, as the old saying goes, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. In this case, we strongly suspected that the funds were going to those with high level connections or are already part of the establishment. This especially after some of the comments from other creators that such funds are basically off limits to independent creators such as myself. Throughout the hearing, the president almost gave off the vibe of a fairy godmother going to all of these projects and tapping her magic wand over creative projects and magically making funding appear.
So, we put the CMF claims to the test. We basically cut out the middleman (namely TikTok and YouTube) and directly contacted the CMF. Rather than go through the work intensive process of signing up, submitting forms, and the like, we simply sent them a message asking the organization a simple question. We laid out who we are, what we create, the nature of our operation, what we would do with any money we were granted, and asked them if this sounds like something that the CMF would fund. In short, does this sound like a project that they would actively encourage to go through their application process?
Obviously, we wanted to be transparent about our thoughts, so we also commented that we were unsure if the organization really helps content creators of all sorts as wildly claimed during the hearing. However, as we plainly said in our message, we are totally open to being proven wrong with our assumption. So, the ball was in their court. Are they genuine with the claims that they want to help Canadian creators or was this just a front to make themselves look good in front of lawmakers? Ultimately, the ball was in their court.
The e-mail message was sent on November 1st, the same day we wrote our analysis. It is now the 9th, so more than a week later and well within a reasonable time limit of at least getting a response of some sort. After checking both our inbox and our spam basket, we got absolutely no response. So, suffice to say, the CMF pretty much ghosted us.
Ultimately, we are completely not surprised by this. The claims were highly suspicious from the beginning. After all, the CMF also testified that their programs are over-subscribed. So, it was pretty suspicious from the get go that they are out there looking for Canadian creators to help fund. On the one hand, the CMF is saying that you are actively looking for Canadian creators to throw money at. At the same time, the CMF is also saying that they already have a wait list of too many people trying to receive funding. So, it was pretty clear to us that something was not adding up with these comments.
At the end of the day, we gave the CMF the chance to prove our suspicions wrong. We called their bluff and they ended up behaving exactly as we expected they would. Although they claim that they are helping Canadian creators of all shapes and sizes, it appears that, in practice, that really isn’t the case. The CMF never even gave the courtesy response that this doesn’t look like something that they would fund. Instead, we are left to simply run our own conclusions. If they were truly chomping at the bit to help Canadian creators, the lack of a response wouldn’t have happened. If anything, you’d think their offices would light up as they excitedly say, “Hey! One of those YouTuber’s contacted us! We can showcase our programs with someone like him!” Clearly, that never happened. If anything, our message was probably sent straight to the trash.
If anything, I’ll be happy to claim responsibility for killing the myth that there are programs out there in the Canadian system just waiting to help creators like us out. Someone like me represents a perfect analogue of what a typical digital first creator is like who could use the funding. Instead, we got the implied “pound sand” response. Not surprising, but we successfully proved the point. While they say they are there to help Canadian creators, people like YouTubers can die in a fire for all they care. So, if you got some false hope that the help is out there, hopefully I spared you from that false hope and subsequent disappointment. Don’t believe everything you hear from a Bill C-11 supporter.
Drew Wilson on Twitter: @icecube85 and Facebook.
