OTTAWA – The Copyright Board of Canada was all set to hear from nine different groups on Tuesday in order to decide how a fund of more than $100 million annually would be divided up among various content creators. However, over the weekend, the matter was settled between the parties.
As some may know, there is a tariff paid by Canadian television distributors for the retransmission of distant broadcast TV signals and while the rate those carriers would be paying for the next five years had already been accepted, the way the pie would be sliced was not and the Copyright Board was to hear from all sides starting Tuesday morning.
All cable, satellite, telco TV and other subscription TV services with more than 2,000 subscribers must pay $0.96 per subscriber per month this year (rising to $0.98 in 2013, sources have told us) into the fund if they offer at least one distant TV signal to their customers. The rate is not per signal. Carriers pay the same whether they offer one or 21.
There are nine content collectives of American film and TV producers, Canadian film and TV producers, broadcasters, sports leagues and others vying for a chunk of the money. They are: American border broadcasters; Infomercial makers; the Copyright Collective of Canada; the Canadian Retransmission Right Association; the Canadian Retransmission Collective; the Canadian Broadcasters Rights Agency; Major League Baseball; the Joint Sports Claimants (other leagues); and the Society of Composers, Authors and Music Publishers of Canada (SOCAN).
It is not known what the terms of the settlement are at this point, but in the past, about half of the money went to American TV and film producers included in the collectives and remainder is split among the remaining groups (we had previously reported a different percentage split here, allocating a larger portion to the sports leagues, but that information was erroneous.)
Cartt.ca will have more on this story when it becomes available.
– Greg O’Brien
