For the past ten years, I’ve been trying, in every way I know, to get good Canadian content in front a large Web audience.AOL Canada, CANOE, @Home Canada, MSN, Bell Emergis and Sympatico-Lycos — I’ve developed content for all of them. That was long after I’d spent years as a print journalist. I’m an ink- and bit-stained wretch if ever there was one.

Let me tell you the dirty secrets I’ve learned in the last few years.

First, almost nobody in Canada wants to pay for original Canadian content designed for the Web. Worst offenders? The companies most able to afford it.

Second, when the top executives at major websites in Canada use the word “content,” they don’t know what they’re talking about.

In print media, content is the words and pictures that tell stories, inform or rattle cages and sensibilities. That’s journalistic content at any rate — fair words that put readers’ interests first.

The economic model for this sort of content is simple. Scribes write, publishers pay.

In the print world, advertising content has an equally simple economic model. If a company wants to promote its product or service, it can buy an ad. In print products of worth, those ads don’t influence the editorial.

The economics of Internet content pervert all these relationships. Just try and get major Websites in Canada to actually pay you to create content for them.

In Canada, content providers often don’t get paid for their content on the most popular sites. They are expected to pay, or at least provide the content for free, in exchange for a percentage of ad revenue (which often never materializes) or for the Web traffic and exposure for a content provider’s home site.

In the cases of major websites that actually do pay for content, the fees are generally about a quarter of Canadian magazine rates. For a 500-word article you’d receive about $150, a rate that forces freelancers to either repurpose existing material or pitch only fluff. You can’t eat and do serious journalism for thirty cents a word. And, reading most Canadian Websites, it’s clear they get what they pay for, if they pay. You rarely see original content from freelancers and you rarely see depth.

Over the years I’ve learned that major Web companies don’t really believe content has any inherent value. It is not seen as a tradable commodity. Well, that’s not true, it’s tradable at less than par for “eyeballs,” the delicate term used in the business for the people who look at Web advertising or content.

That transaction is called monetization. If content can’t be monetized it has no value whatsoever. The corollary of this truth is another truth: the most valuable content is the content that is most easily monetized.

That’s why, when Web executives use “content” in phrases like “content is king” or “we have great content,” they’re just talking about content deals.But, content deals aren’t content, they’re just deals. They almost never serve the audience first and they turn highly trafficked websites into digital advertorial sections.

This economic equation turns online “content” producers into eyeball pimps for advertisers. The thin, underfed content itself is pushed out onto the site in spike heels and a red dress in hopes of attracting wolf whistles and mouse clicks.

Why does this matter? Because of what’s lost. Here’s the irony of Web content creation in Canada. The Web destinations that get the most traffic are providing the least interesting stuff.

Major Websites in Canada are serving Web users the equivalent of airplane food — neither offensive nor exciting to anyone. This is seen as a virtue. It keeps advertisers and Bay Street happy.

Sometimes that desire for blandness blocks content that is not deemed appropriate for family viewing. That’s certainly true of Bell Web properties which appear to be targeted at the mythical Cleaver family despite being in media competition with the Simpsons and Sex in the City. And, in some cases, the desire for blandness censors legitimate voices on the political spectrum.

Last October, when I was the shortlived director of content for Sympatico-Lycos I launched a feature called InSite, six columnists from across Canada — all with fresh, lively voices I wanted Canadians to hear.

I was forced to kill those columns because my superiors, none of whom had any journalism experience, felt that a couple of the writers were too left-wing.

But those aren’t the only muted voices. Across the Web there are dozens of Canadian websites looking for audience, startup money or just to be paid fairly to create good Canadian content unique to the web.It’s a nice thought, but they’re working in the wrong medium, in the wrong country.

This is the first article of a two-part series by Wayne MacPhail. Next week, part two: “Missing the Medium.”

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Wayne MacPhail

Wayne MacPhail has been a print and online journalist for 25 years. He was the managing editor of Hamilton Magazine and was a reporter and editor at The Hamilton Spectator until he founded Southam InfoLab,...