The Buzz June 13th 2026: A Year Later, Is Australia's Social Media…

The Buzz June 13th 2026: A Year Later, Is Australia's Social Media Ban Working?

Welcome to the weekend and welcome to The Buzz.

A year ago, Australia made headlines around the world by announcing it would introduce legislation restricting 16-year-olds and under from accessing social media. It was seen as the right thing to do, and countries around the world initiated new studies to determine whether they should do the same. Canada was one of those countries.

Which brings us to this week, where two things have happened. Canada, in fact, announced that it is looking at something not the same, but similar. And Australia, well, Australia has had the ban for three months and is now assessing how well things are working. They’re not backing away, but they, especially young people, are checking things out.

Let’s start here at home with how the Canadian Press reported the Canadian story on Thursday:

Ottawa moves to bar kids under 16 from social media, regulate chatbots

Now to Australia, where the BBC has been talking to young people most affected by their country’s ban.

Some of their answers give pause:

Did Australia's under-16s social media ban work?

The social media strategy comes to Canada a week after Ottawa’s new AI strategy.

There are some mixed feelings about how well that’s landed. The Globe’s Andrew Coyne looked at things this way:

🔒 Canada’s AI strategy misses the mark

Meanwhile, Good Talk’s Bruce Anderson used his Substack to take a different view:

Will it be AI vs the people? Or AI for all? Companies must build the social license they'll need.

Speaking of Bruce, let’s promote our two YouTube podcasts for this week.

Friday’s Good Talk with Bruce and Chantal Hebert can be found here.

And Tuesday’s Moore Butts conversation is available at this link.

With Canadian Rangers, August 2021, Pond Inlet, Nunavut

A few years ago, I was travelling in the Arctic doing a documentary on how Canada was trying to protect its claim to sovereignty.

Like every trip I’ve taken in the Arctic over the past sixty years, it was fantastic. The people, the changing climate, the rugged, vast areas of unexplored landscape, all combined to make it another breathtaking journey.

Near Pond Inlet, I spent some time with some Canadian Rangers; in many ways, they are Canada’s front line of defence in the Arctic. There’s a fabulous piece on the Rangers in the latest edition of Canadian Geographic. It's a fifteen-minute read, so get comfortable and enjoy (there is a paywall).

🔒 With more eyes on the Arctic, the Canadian Rangers embark on their longest patrol in recent history, a path forward for Canada's defence and its deepening relationship with the north

Now there is also a short, little BBC mini-doc on part of the same story. You can see it for nothing right here:

Go on patrol with the Canadian Rangers across the frozen Arctic

If you want more, this is the documentary I was involved in, which was nominated for a Canadian Screen Award. It’s still running on CBC Gem:

Arctic Blue

So, guess who wrote a positive column on Mark Carney this week?

Are you sitting down? Even the writer had to start his piece by admitting that Carney flattery does not come easily for him. But it sure seemed to this week.

I’ll let him make the case himself. Ladies and gentlemen, Conrad Black in the National Post:

Opinion | Conrad Black: Mark Carney notches some wins

If you go to your local bookstore, or better still, go to your local library and find the section that highlights political memoirs, chances are you will see a fair number where the pages don’t look like they’ve been turned too often.

Instant best sellers are not too common in that section. However, could this future one have a few surprises that make it fly off the shelves? The author, the publisher, and the booksellers sure hope so:

Chrystia Freeland to publish political memoir, 'Unreliable Boyfriend'

For some, it's the getting there, not winning it all, that means everything.

When you put aside all the bad stuff - corruption, outrageous ticket and hotel prices, and overcrowded host cities - that’s what the World Cup should be all about. Being there. Participating. Canada falls into that category, and so does Bosnia-Herzegovina. And as it turned out, they played each other in what was yesterday’s opening game for both. The Canada story is well known, but the Bosnia story has its own history. Shireen Ahmed of CBC TV put this piece together.

Bosnia is amped for this World Cup. These fans explain why

Oh, and the score? The game ended in a draw, 1-1.

That’s going to do it for The Buzz this week. We’ll be back in seven days. Stay safe.

The Buzz is a weekly publication from National Newswatch that shares insights and commentary on the week’s developments in politics, news and current affairs.