TikTok is taking the Canadian government to court.
Last month, the popular social networking app was ordered by the federal government to “shut down” its operations in Canada following a national security review.
“We will challenge this order in court,” TikTok said at the time.
Now, the company is following through on the promise. TikTok Canada has filed a notice of application for judicial review, which is a formal legal challenge to the decision.
“This order will eliminate the jobs and livelihoods of our hundreds of dedicated local employees – who support the community of more than 14 million Canadian users on TikTok, including businesses, advertisers, creators and initiatives developed specifically for Canada.” , the company wrote. on its official website. “We believe it is in the best interest of Canadians to find a meaningful solution and ensure that a local team remains in place alongside the TikTok platform.”
TikTok has posted the entire legal filing on its website, which you can read here. The document details the sequence of events, suggesting that TikTok cooperated with the security review but was surprised by the abrupt announcement.
The company is seeking a court date to challenge the decision in Vancouver, BC, one of its two office locations. The other is in Toronto.
The filing calls the order “grossly disproportionate” and says it “will result in the termination of hundreds of Canadian workers and the potential termination of more than 250,000 contracts with Canadian-based advertisers.”
The legal filing also focuses on the impact on those creators who use the platform, stating that the order “will cause the destruction of significant economic opportunities and intangible benefits to Canadian creators, artists and businesses and the Canadian cultural community at large.”
The federal government made the decision to shut down TikTok's operations in Canada after an audit of Chinese parent company ByteDance Ltd., calling the business “harmful to national security.” Canadian users would still be able to use and access TikTok, but the company would be forced to close its Canadian offices.
The filing follows a new law in the United States that would require ByteDance to divest TikTok by January 19, 2025 or face a ban in the country. – Richard Trapunsky
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Charlotte Day Wilson will play a special orchestral concert in Toronto in 2025
Charlotte Day Wilson is preparing for a concert in her hometown that she calls “a dream opportunity.”
On February 28, 2025, the Grammy-nominated R&B/soul singer-songwriter will play a Red Bull Symphonic concert with members of the Symphony Orchestra at Roy Thomson Hall, home of the acclaimed Toronto Symphony Orchestra.
Charlotte's Day
Emily Lipson
Tickets go on sale Friday, December 13, 2024 at redbull.ca/symphonic.
Previous editions of Red Bull Symphonic in Atlanta and Los Angeles have featured Rick Ross and Metro Boomin, as well as special guests such as John Legend, Swae Lee and more.
It will be the first orchestral concert for Wilson, and she approaches it as a complete vision of her current state as a musician.
“I want people to come away from this understanding the musical makeup that I have and my sense of self within music,” says Charlotte Day Wilson. Billboard Canada over Zoom from her Toronto apartment.
She's still in her 30s, but Wilson has been recording and performing for over a decade. With two albums and several EPs under her belt, she has a whole body of work to play and is excited to rethink it in a new context.
Her 2024 album, Cyan Bluehas been nominated for a Grammy for Best Engineered Album, and although Jack Rochon was the primary engineer, Wilson says the two did everything in the room together as “an exchange of two people producing, designing and writing everything together.”
Charlotte Day Wilson's soulful voice and songs have become a secret weapon for many famous musicians. She has performed and collaborated with Kaytranada, Daniel Caesar, Mustafa, BadBadNotGood and Nelly Furtado, while one of her songs was sampled by Drake.
Grammy recognition and the ability to do a full-scale orchestral concert is a sign of wider recognition in a field that can often involve a lot of isolation. It also feels like a “coming of age moment,” she says, which fits with her mindset right now.
“It's something I think about a lot as an artist,” he says. “In an industry that is ruthlessly obsessed with youth, how do we graduate to a next chapter of life and maintain our integrity and relevance. That's something I think about all the time and it's something I want to approach really deliberately.” – RT
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Patrick Watson's 'Je te laisserai des mots' becomes first French-language song to reach one billion Spotify streams
Canadian singer and songwriter Patrick Watson made history on Spotify.
His 2010 song “Je te laisserai des mots” is now the first French-language song to reach one billion streams on the platform.
The song, a haunting composition with piano and strings, was first written for the 2009 film Mères et Filles.
Listeners clearly agreed that the song has a cinematic quality: it went viral in 2021 and 2022, and was used by thousands of TikTokers – including Justin Bieber – to track peaceful or sad moments in their lives during the Covid restrictions.
Watson joins Bieber and other Canadian artists like Drake, Tate McRae, Alessia Cara and Shawn Mendes in Spotify's Billions Club. Most of the other Canadian members are major-label signees with a pop-oriented sound, which makes Watson — an acclaimed indie singer-songwriter represented by Montreal's Secret City Records — a more unusual entry into the club.
“Je te laisserai des mots” was the most streamed French-language song both in Canada and globally this year on Spotify, while the veteran songwriter and producer is the No. 6 most popular Cebuano artist on Spotify this year in Canada. He ends up alongside Quebec legends Les Cowboys Fringants and Celine Dion, pop star Charlotte Cardin and rappers Souldia and Enima.
Spotify notes that since 2019, listening to music in French has increased by 94% on the app – meaning that after Watson, another French-language Billions Club song could only be a matter of time. – Rosie Long Decter
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Music Business Year in Review
