By Etan Vlessing
TORONTO – Whether Ontario content creators should go for the glory of making films or TV shows of their own, or the grind of working for Americans in an expanding service sector, is set to be part of a revealing industry debate kicked off Thursday by Lisa MacLeod, Ontario’s Minister of Heritage, Sport and Tourism.
MacLeod, addressing reporters at Ontario Creates in Toronto, unveiled a 15-member Ontario film and TV advisory panel of industry stakeholders to advise and offer recommendations on how the province can continue to “sustain” its film and television and animation industries.
But as…
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OTTAWA – The Québec Association for the Recording, Concert and Video Industries (ADISQ) has asked the Governor-in-Council to send back and force a rehearing of a CRTC decision in December that it says unfairly allows Sirius XM Canada to put more money into an English-language fund over a French-language one for Canadian content contributions.
French-language Musicaction and English-language Factor are two funds that receive annual injections of money as Canadian content development expenditures – in this case, a minimum of four per cent of Sirius’s annual revenues. Since its initial licensing in 2005 and until 2012, Sirius XM had been…
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Panel report targets foreign players, but Murphy urges caution
TORONTO – Doug Murphy said he appreciates the recommendations of the government-appointed panel tasked with reviewing Canada’s communications laws, but the Corus Entertainment president and CEO urged caution about the regulatory pressure it may add to Canadian broadcasters.
“It looks like this report is calling for even more regulation and more regulatory burden,” Murphy said in a phone interview on Friday. “What we cannot have happen here is more regulatory burden on the incumbent actors – that’s not acceptable.”
Murphy, like others, is still sifting through the 235-page report, released Wednesday, which contains…
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By Christopher Guly
OTTAWA – After barely a day to digest, the Broadcast and Telecom Legislative Review panel report claimed centre stage during day one of the Canadian Media Producers Association’s 25th Prime Time conference in Ottawa on Thursday.
One day after releasing their report – 19 months in the making and which resulted in 97 recommendations – chair Janet Yale and fellow panelist Monique Simard provided some insight during a lunchtime appearance.
“Our job was to deliver recommendations on how to modernize the legislative and regulatory framework governing the communication sector in broadcasting and telecommunications,” said Yale. “We really thought about…
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By Christopher Guly
OTTAWA – The much-anticipated report by the federal Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review panel has so far drawn praise from some of the industries it affects, but mainly criticism from the official opposition Conservatives.
At a National Press Theatre news conference following the release of the report on Wednesday, Michelle Rempel Garner, the Conservative shadow minister for industry and economic development (pictured in a cpac.ca screen cap), said that while the 235-page document, entitled Canada’s Communications Future: A Time to Act, is “well-intentioned, was written in one of the most heavily lobbied and regulated spaces in Canadian industry…
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TORONTO — The Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review (BTLR) Panel report released today contains a number of recommendations which Canadian content producers will consider good news — namely that all media content undertakings, including international digital giants not currently covered by legislation, should have obligations to support Canadian content.
As part of its review, the BTLR panel looked at the possibility of creating new financing models and other initiatives to support the creation, production and discoverability of Canadian content. Among its recommendations related to Canadian content are that the functions of the Canada Media Fund and Telefilm Canada be…
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GATINEAU — Canadians will have an additional week to submit their opinions on CBC/Radio-Canada’s programming as the CRTC announced Tuesday it is extending the consultation period that is part of the public broadcaster’s licence renewal process.
The Commission says it wants to hear from Canadians across the country to ensure the content produced and distributed by the public broadcaster reflects the diversity of Canada’s population, while meeting its needs in both official languages.
The deadline extension comes after the Commission posted online Tuesday a recently completed study by Cullen International which examined public broadcasters in other jurisdictions around the world….
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By Lenore Gibson
ON WEDNESDAY, THE BROADCASTING and Telecom Legislative Review panel will deliver its long-awaited final report. Canada’s private broadcasters await that report with interest. The panel’s recommendations will set the stage for new legislation, which the government has promised to introduce by the end of 2020.
As many private broadcasters expressed to the panel, the stakes of this process are monumental. Change is needed more than ever with the arrival of new foreign streaming services in Canada. Canadian broadcasting policy was developed for a closed system. It never contemplated that massive foreign platforms would enter the market “over the…
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By Irene Berkowitz
THE LONG-AWAITED announcement from the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review (BTLR) review panel is upon us.
Charles Falzon, among his many firsts, is founding chair of the CMPA. He also served on the Expert Advisory Group for our last federal media inquiry, the 2016-2017 Department of Canadian Heritage Canadian Content in a Digital World/Creative Canada Policy Framework. Falzon is Dean of Ryerson University Faculty of Communication and Design (FCAD) and former Chair of RTA School of Media. He’s produced more than 2000 hours of TV with Gemini awards and Emmy nominations to his credit.
As…
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OTTAWA – The federal government’s expert panel which has spent 18 months building recommendations on how the various Acts which govern television, radio, broadband and telecom in Canada should, or should not, change, will make its report public early Wednesday afternoon.
Legislation coming from those recommendations will drive the various policies created over the years for the connectivity and cultural sectors and could alter the way Canadians receive electronic media, how Canadian content is made and funded, deliver increased broadband accessibility, change wireless policy, rework the way the federal government treats wireless spectrum and so forth.
Cartt.ca has confirmed with the…
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