Happy New Year! Presenting the top 30 stories from the 2010 broadcast year

EVERY TUESDAY AFTER Labour Day, because it’s a fun analysis of our year and lets us have the weekend off… we re-publish the top stories from the last 12 months.

Why a “Happy New Year” now? Simple. September is the “new year” for broadcasters. The new fall shows are coming out and speaking from a regulatory perspective, the 2010 broadcast year ended August 31st and we are into a new year for them.

(Ed. Note: Not so incidentally, we’re now less than a year away from the analog shut off – which was a popular topic this year – and there’s still no action from the industry on the consumer education front.)

After poring over our analytics to identify the top stories from each month, I can say it has been a very busy 12 months, the busiest year we remember.

We have published just about 2,000 stories since the beginning of September 2009. So much has happened in that time and not surprisingly, the number one topic – by far – which readers consumed were our dozens of stories from the two fee-for-carriage/value for signal hearings last fall. We pulled out only the top handful here because if we put them all in, they’d dominate the list.

Shaw’s move to buy Canwest has, of course, also been a top running story, as was Globalive’s struggle to get Wind Mobile to market – not to mention the various people moves and other corporate manoeuvring that happened through 2009-10.

However, the top-read single story by far was our October report on Rogers and Bragg Communications system swap negotiations. We stand by that piece, by the way. Those talks happened, and while they may have cooled for now, if you ask around, most believe more consolidation is just a matter of time.

Somewhat surprisingly, readers weren’t as interested as we had thought about the community TV proceeding, which we covered from beginning to end.

As usual, however, all of the top-read stories were our scoops, breaking news and original features, such as our interviews with Leslie Sole, Tony Clement and our opinion and analysis pieces. We plan to re-double our efforts into stories of this type in the “new year.”

And as we always say, the year ahead looks just as busy, if not busier than the last 12 months. We hope you continue to find Cartt.ca good value and we look forward to providing readers with the news and views they can use.

And as always, please send any comments, criticism or kudos my way at greg.obrien@cartt.ca or use our comments box below.

So please enjoy our top-30 list, which we’ve arranged in chronological order from oldest to newest, and have an excellent new year.

Greg O’Brien, editor and publisher

Rogers wants hearing into ownership of wireless newcomers Dave, Public

Court sides with Shaw on Mountain Cable purchase

UPDATE: Shaw overbuilding Delta B.C.

Fun with TV numbers as Commission releases BDUs’ and broadcasters’ aggregate financial data

Corus shuttering Discovery Kids, will re-brand Sex TV and Drive-In Classics channels

New net will bring more than iPhone, says Bell’s Oosterman

Memo to Broadcasters: You need a number, and a concept, to fight with

UPDATE: McKeen, EastLink, part ways

Bragg, Rogers, talking system-swap