The accountable media era: Canada’s moment to lead

Canada doesn’t get enough credit for the role it plays in shaping media. We tend to frame ourselves as a smaller version of larger markets, reacting to trends as they arrive. But that framing misses what’s happening right now.

After five years in globally focused roles, working across markets and seeing firsthand what good looks like, I can tell you: Canada isn’t behind. It’s ready. The speed at which this market can move when it decides to is exactly what makes this moment worth paying attention to.

This is a moment where Canada can lead.

We are in the middle of a structural shift in how media works. Consumer attention has already moved. Canadians are spending 79% of their total media time in digital environments, according to GWI. The open internet alone accounts for 60% of that digital time. And increasingly, those experiences are being shaped by AI, not just in how content is delivered, but in how decisions are made.

But investment hasn’t kept up.

The gap between where people spend their time and where dollars flow is no longer a planning inefficiency. It’s a growth constraint. When two-thirds of digital time happens in environments that receive just one-fifth of spend, it raises a fundamental question: What’s guiding our decisions? The answer, for too long, has been convenience, legacy habits and opaque systems that don’t invite scrutiny.

That era is ending. What comes next is the accountable media era, defined not by where you buy, but by how and why you invest.

Capturing premium, Canadian moments

Accountability in media isn’t a vague ideal. It’s practical. It means understanding what you’re paying for. It means knowing how decisions are being made, especially when AI is involved. It means measuring outcomes independently, not through the same platforms that sell the media. And it means using data responsibly, in ways that build trust rather than erode it.

This matters everywhere. But it matters more in Canada.

Ours is a smaller, more interconnected market. The distance between advertiser, agency, publisher and platform is shorter here. The ripple effects of decisions are more immediate. Collaboration isn’t a talking point; it’s how the ecosystem functions. And when Canadians show up for a moment, whether that’s the Blue Jays’ recent World Series run or the national energy of a World Cup on home soil, the brands and publishers that invest in premium, accountable environments are the ones that will capture it. Not because they got lucky. Because they were positioned to. That interconnectedness is an advantage — but only if we choose to use it.

We’re already seeing what that looks like. Canadian retailers are building media networks that connect commerce and advertising in new ways. Retail media in Canada is projected to reach $3.8 billion this year, according to EMarketer, growing five times over this decade. Building pathways with national retail media networks like Loblaw Advance and Walmart Connect is becoming foundational to understanding modern shopping behavior. Broadcasters and premium publishers are investing in high-quality content that commands attention in a fragmented landscape. Just look at the cultural phenomenon of the Canadian TV series Heated Rivalry.

Media and creative agencies are rethinking how they plan and measure across channels. Marketers are asking harder questions about performance, transparency, control and how to use intelligence to remove complexity while keeping humans firmly in charge of strategy, governance and outcomes. These are not isolated efforts. They are signals of a market aligning around a new standard.

But alignment doesn’t happen on its own. It requires shared frameworks and clear expectations. Organizations across Canada are stepping into that role, helping define what transparency looks like in practice, how data should be used responsibly and how outcomes should be measured consistently. Standards are not about slowing innovation. They are what make innovation scalable. In a fragmented ecosystem, they are what allow different players to operate with confidence and trust.

AI in the accountable media era

That foundation matters now more than ever because AI is accelerating everything.

Eighty-five percent of Canadians say they have used AI in the past 12 months, according to EMarketer. More than half are using it to research what they buy. In marketing, AI is making decisions about where dollars go, how audiences are defined and how campaigns are optimized. That creates real opportunity, but it raises a critical question: Whose interest is that AI serving?

The answer can’t be “we don’t know.”

The accountable media era demands that AI operates with transparency and objectivity. That marketers maintain control and that the systems making decisions on your behalf are designed to serve your outcomes, not the inventory of the platform running them. Independent measurement is structurally impossible when the platform doing the measuring is also selling you the media. That’s not a philosophy. It’s infrastructure.

The open internet is the only environment where that independence can exist at scale, and it’s where Canadian companies are already proving what’s possible. Brands, agencies, publishers and retail partners are choosing to invest with intention, prioritize transparency over opacity and build systems that prove what they claim. They are seeing better performance, more efficient reach and stronger connections with consumers.

More importantly, they are helping build a more trusted and sustainable Canadian media ecosystem. One that the rest of the world will look to as a model.

That is the real opportunity for Canada. Not just to adapt to the accountable media era, but to define it.

In a market like ours, leadership doesn’t come from scale or agility alone. It comes from alignment; from clarity; from a willingness to ask harder questions and expect better answers (but with tried-and-true Canadian politeness). Canada has always punched above its weight in media, in creativity, in talent and in ideas — ranking among the top five countries at Cannes Lions every year since 2023. This is the moment to do it again, with accountability as the edge.

The shift is already underway. Canada has everything it needs to lead. Now we must decide to.

The Current is owned and operated by The Trade Desk Inc.