TORONTO – Almost half of Canadian households (49%) are now connected to the Internet via high-speed broadband – and young surfers are using those fat connections to access more and more video, according to new research being released today by Toronto-based Solutions Research Group.
The U.S., it found, lags significantly behind – where only 34% of U.S. households have a high-speed Internet connection. These are among the key findings of two reports of among more than 2,800 randomly-selected Canadians and Americans in May-June 2005.
“Broadband penetration is a significant marker for the delivery of on-demand video content and entertainment…
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OTTAWA – A collection of Canada’s leading cultural organizations emerged from a meeting with the federal culture minister and several of her provincial/territorial counterparts Monday, united in their determination to see a Canadian-originated treaty on cultural protection enshrined in international law.
While free trade deals and WTO wrangling sort out how countries sell each other commercial goods and services, few international statutes define the treatment of cultural products such as TV programs, films, music, books and magazines.
The UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) convention on cultural diversity – recognizing every sovereign state’s right to create, support…
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GATINEAU – Using SAP for CPAC is not good enough for the federal government.
Earlier this year, the feds directed the CRTC to change its exemption policy when it came to the Cable Public Affairs Channel so that most systems will now be forced to carry both the English and French channels.
Friday, the Commission issued a Public Notice, calling for comments on the revised distribution order for CPAC (which carries House of Commons and Senate proceedings as well as other public affairs programming), reflecting the government’s order.
Currently, most cable systems carry one video feed of CPAC, with…
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TORONTO – Rogers Cable must be juiced about its next new TV channel because ads touting it are already in rotation among its parent company’s Toronto radio stations, despite the fact it doesn’t launch for another 12 days.
The channel is RETV, a brand new digital real estate channel platform for cable operators, from Capital Networks. Officially, Rogers will launch it on July 19th in York Region, with the rest of the company’s Ontario systems adding it later this year.
Customers of Aurora Cable already know RETV since the company has been offering the service to its 14,000 customers…
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TORONTO – Virgin Mobile today launched its Top Ten Ringtones chart featuring the ten most popular downloaded ringtones downloaded.
The Virgin Mobile Top Ten Ringtones list is the first of its kind available in Canada and debuts this week in 18 major urban dailies and weeklies across Canada.
The premier Virgin Mobile Top 10 Ringtones chart will list the top 10 ringtones and musictones sold each week, including song title, artist and position number. The launch chart features:
1. Don’t Phunk With My Heart – Black Eyed Peas 2. Candy Shop – 50 Cent 3. Hollaback Girl – Gwen…
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BANFF – Mountains, cocktails, double espressos and screenings with senators and stars, sure. But the Banff World Television Festival, as with almost every major international entertainment confab, is all about l’argent. Dollars for deals and creators hopes running as high as the bar bills at the Banff Springs Hotel.
The biggest rightnow payoff for those high hopes is the CTV Documart pitch session where a total of $100,000 worth of program development cheques is handed out to three teams of documentary pitchers. Walking away with the top prize of $50,000 Wednesday morning was Brett Gaylor, a producer at Montreal’s…
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BANFF – The federal government is promising better governance and more stable funding for the Canadian Television Fund and has begun addressing those needs with an announcement of $100 million worth of support to the CTF for 2006-07.
Heritage Minister Liza Frulla announced the news as part of a speedy visit to the Banff World Television Festival today.
In a speech moved back one day to Sunday, to allow the politician to be in parliament for Monday morning (never know when those pesky votes might happen…), Frulla hit four main points. First, an oft-heard pledge to secure stable funding…
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PARIS – On Friday, a bunch of international government types signed off on something called the Preliminary Draft Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions.
The statement from Heritage Minister Liza Frulla’s on Friday called the draft convention – which would make sure the rights of national governments to take measures to protect its culture (such as our Canadian content rules in our broadcast policies) supersede any other international agreements – “a victory for Canada and cultural diversity.”
However, one wonders about the strength of such a claim of victory given the world’s largest…
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TORONTO – Telecom lawyer Lorne Abugov used this week’s Canadian Telecom Summit to launch Canada’s Telecommunications Hall of Fame.
While other industries have their own way to recognize their pioneers and leaders, the 160-year-old Canadian telecom industry has been lacking, says Abugov.
“The Canadian telecommunications industry has a rich heritage of achievement, invention and innovation that predates confederation,” says Abugov, the hall’s founder and senior telecom law partner with Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt, pointing to Canadian success stories like Alexander Graham Bell and Waterloo’s Research In Motion, makers of the Blackberry.
“There are few industries in Canada, or even…
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TORONTO – In a move designed to give it a huge jump-start into the local telephony market, Rogers Communications announced today a friendly takeover of Call-Net Enterprises, whose brand is Sprint Canada.
The all-stock deal has been recommended by the Call-Net board. Surf back to www.cartt.ca for more on this deal once the principals meet the media.
“Under the terms of the agreement, Call-Net Common and Class B shareholders will receive a fixed exchange ratio of one RCI Class B Non-voting share for each 4.25 outstanding shares of Call-Net, representing a fully diluted equity value of approximately $330 million,”…
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