WITH THE FEDERAL ELECTION done, Canadians can go back to really important matters: will the Montreal Canadian make the playoffs.
In all seriousness, we know the Liberals will be forming the next government but from a minority standpoint. This means they will need the support (or the abstention) of only one of the Bloc Quebecois or NDP, but not both. So, there’s a little room to manoeuvre. Both of those parties are reported to be utterly broke, so they will have little interest to drive everyone back to the polls for now.
The ideological positioning of those parties looks to bring…
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TORONTO — Media consumers of all ages are getting help to critically assess online news and information thanks to a new media literacy tool — SPOT Fake News Online — launched today by News Media Canada.
News Media Canada is the national association of the Canadian news media industry, serving print and digital news media members in every province and territory. Having been awarded earlier this year $484,300 in funding from the federal government as part of the Ministry of Canadian Heritage’s Digital Citizen Initiative, News Media Canada has designed and developed a new public awareness program to provide…
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OTTAWA – The Canadian Association of Community Television Users and Stations (CACTUS) and the Fédération des télévisions communautaires autonomes du Québec are now taking applications from community television organizations to hire a journalist under the Local Journalism Initiative.
The LJI was announced by Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez on May 22 (when he announced the government bailout of large newspapers) and is meant to fund “civic journalism” in “underserved communities”, to address the gaps in local news coverage that have arisen in the wake of community newspaper closures, and the outflow of local ad dollars onto international platforms such…
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ON AUGUST 7, THE Globe and Mail published an opinion piece by the University of Ottawa’s Michael Geist, entitled “Election 2019: Return of the Netflix tax debate”. The Writers Guild of Canada has long differed with professor Geist on the subject of cultural policy, but in this case he not only reaches conclusions with which we strongly disagree, but gets a number of his facts wrong in the process.
First, Geist implies that the government convened the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review panel because a $500-million commitment from Netflix for production in Canada “failed to stem…
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TORONTO – The Canada Media Fund today announced it has hired Kelly Wilhelm to fill the newly created role of chief strategy officer.
Reporting directly and acting in an advisory capacity to CMMF president and CEO Valerie Creighton, Wilhelm is tasked with “contributing to setting the future trajectory of the CMF, with a specific focus on innovation through the lens of industry-wide disruption and opportunities for growth,” reads the press release.
“I had the pleasure of working closely with her during her time as senior policy advisor to the Minister of Canadian Heritage,” said Creighton in the release. “As we…
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GATINEAU – A program Shaw Communications offered a decade ago to grease the wheels of its acquisition of Canwest's television assets will end before the CRTC makes an official final decision on demands that it be renewed.
It's called the Local Television Satellite Solution, a free basic satellite subscription that was provided to people in areas that would have lost over-the-air TV service as a result of the digital television transition in 2011. It was funded with $15 million from the $180 million in tangible benefits Shaw proposed as part of its $2 billion acquisition of Canwest back in 2010.
The…
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Lawyer Claire Anderson starts next month
GATINEAU – Yukon lawyer Claire Anderson has been hired as CRTC commissioner for British Columbia and Yukon, Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez announced today.
She is the first Indigenous woman and first Yukon resident to be appointed as a CRTC commissioner and will fill a position which has been vacant since June 2018 when former commissioner Stephen Simpson left. While we don’t know her age, judging from her CV, she is likely one of the youngest ever hired, too. She starts August 26th.
Anderson (pictured in a photo from her LinkedIn profile) is a citizen of…
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OTTAWA – Minister of Canadian Heritage Pablo Rodriguez has mostly been silent on the Canadian TV business since being appointed last July.
We know he’s met with a number of stakeholders during his year on the job (the first anniversary is July 18) and he did make a short appearance on stage at the Canadian Media Producers Association Prime Time gathering in February, but Rodriguez has spent his first year well out of the spotlights which seemed constantly on his predecessor Mélanie Joly.
Wednesday however, Rodriguez issued a statement outlining his thoughts far more definitively on the…
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TORONTO – The Canada Media Fund (CMF) has added two new members to its Board of Directors following its recent AGM in Montreal.
Barry Chapman and Gary Pizante succeed outgoing directors Dave McLennan and Rob Scarth, joining current directors Alain Cousineau; Alison Clayton; Lori DeGraw; Guy Fournier; and Michael Schmalz.
Chapman has over 30 years’ experience in the telecommunications industry at the executive level, extensive knowledge in regulatory affairs, mergers and acquisitions, as well as strategic and financial planning. He also brings extensive corporate governance experience, having sat on numerous boards. Chapman held the role of vice-president, regulatory affairs at Bell Canada…
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OTTAWA – Corriere Canadese has formally appealed to federal Cabinet the CRTC decision to grant a multilingual national multi-ethnic discretionary service with mandatory 9(1)(h) distribution to Rogers, as Cartt.ca had previously reported.
“In the Decision’s relegation and monopoly granted to a single corporate entity, to purportedly speak for all other linguistic and ‘ethnic’ Canadians, who are non-Anglo and non-Franco, the Decision violates the very essence of sections 2,7,15 and 27 of the Charter, as well as the underlying constitutional imperative to Federalism and Respect for Minorities as enunciated by the SCC, in…
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