MANY TAKE IT AS GOSPEL in this business that without rules to force Canadian broadcasters to make (or at least pay for) and air Canadian content, they just wouldn’t. Instead, they’d more cheaply buy foreign (i.e. U.S.) television shows to fill out their entire schedule.
Go ahead. Ask anyone. We’ve all said it.
The record of regulatory resistance over the years mostly bears that opinion out – as do the prime time schedules of the major private conventional broadcasters. What I’m not sure about is whether that will continue to hold true in the future.
Now, the only prognosticating I’ll allow myself is to say that most companies, no matter if they make cars, cupcakes or culture, will most often do whatever is least expensive/most efficient/most profitable. That’s always been true and will not change.
So, given that buying hours of content made elsewhere will almost always be cheaper than making our own TV shows, what if we were suddenly without all the rules and the funding mechanisms we have now to protect the Canadian content industry? Would next to no Cancon be made and aired beyond what’s on the CBC?
The simultaneous substitution rules (a cable creation, by the way) helps make the U.S. programming purchase as lucrative as it is. Canadian ads are inserted over top of the American channels’ signals, maximizing what would be a fragmented audience. Consumers regularly complain loudly about this little regulatory bargain the first week of every February.
Some believe that if the simsub rules were eliminated, Canadian broadcasters would HAVE to make more of their own content in order to compete because buying U.S. shows and not being able to insert Canadian advertising atop the U.S. feeds would no longer pay off the same way it does now.
Some also believe that with so many ways to get popular U.S. programming, it will become less and less valuable to buy those rights and more valuable to make exclusive content for your own channel or channels..
Then again, if there’s all of a sudden fewer dollars coming in, there’s less money to make our own content, including news, goes the old saw.
I’ve often wondered though where the advertisers would suddenly flee to. U.S. channels? The broadcast stations along the borders in Buffalo and Seattle, for example, don’t have the inventory to handle a bunch of Canadian ads, too. As well, a spend with a U.S. ‘caster isn’t tax deductable like it is when agencies buy time with a Canadian broadcaster. Would they sink more money into new media? If so, what’s wrong with that? Maybe such funding could launch our own Hulu.com-like service.
If the advertisers flee to specialty, as was often a past complaint from conventional broadcasters, well, so what? Most of the specialties are owned by the big broadcasters anyway and those that aren’t could use some more cash.
Still today, Canadian content is still too-often treated as a quota which broadcasters must hit, stuff the CRTC is making them do, rather than something they see as necessary for profitable success. There are funding and other hoops that must be leapt through, and quality, as we know, has suffered because of that.
But will that change? Is it changing now? What is the health of the Cancon industry? Is the CMF better off now than two years ago when it looked as though it may buckle?
And just what is Canadian content, anyway? Is it just shows made here by Canadians? Or, do they need to be about Canada or something Canadian? Some think “North of 60” and “Corner Gas” are more “Canadian” than, say “Flashpoint,” because the first two were both overtly Canadian and Flashpoint is more of a formula cop show that happens to be made in Canada.
One more thing. All this argument is moot in Quebec, where content made by and for Quebeckers is the highest rated. Is language the only reason that can’t be replicated in the rest of Canada?
These are just some of the questions and angles we are going to examine and we know there are sure to be some passionate viewpoints when Cartt.ca INVESTIGATES next week kicks off a four-week look at the state of Canadian content.
Have anything you want to say about Cancon? Drop us a line at editorial@cartt.ca. And if you want your comments to remain confidential, we will respect that request.
