TORONTO – The Canada Media Fund (CMF) has added two new members to its board of directors following its annual meeting of members held earlier this week in Montreal.
Lori DeGraw and Michael Schmalz succeed outgoing directors Cheryl Barker and Glenn Wong. They join current BoD chair Alain Cousineau and directors Alison Clayton, Guy Fournier, David McLennan, and Rob Scarth.
DeGraw is executive director of the Ontario Land Trust Alliance, and brings 25 years’ experience in the audiovisual industry plus extensive corporate governance experience to the role. She held the role of VP media operations at Blue Ant Media for 10…
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OTTAWA – Aboriginal broadcaster Wawatay Native Communications Society wants the CRTC’s recent Aboriginal radio licences decision to be overturned, and that it be granted the FM licences for the Ottawa and Toronto markets instead.
The Commission's June 14 decision awarded the broadcasting licences in those markets to First Peoples Radio Inc., an affiliate of Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN), for stations at 95.7 FM in Ottawa and 106.5 FM in Toronto.
But Wawatay said in a statement that it is the only broadcaster to have “consulted and received consent from Chiefs of Ontario and all representative Indigenous nations” for those licences.
"We have a letter…
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Rights, diversity and the need for a strong, sustainable Canadian production sector
LAST WEEK, HUNDREDS OF independent producers, broadcast executives, government officials and countless other industry stakeholders made their annual pilgrimage to the heart of the Rocky Mountains for the Banff World Media Festival.
Although this year’s conference was similar to previous years in many ways – projects were pitched, deals were made, and drinks flowed freely – this year’s event felt different. Over the course of the conference there seemed to be a collective realization that the future of our industry, which has been endlessly discussed at Banff for years,…
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OTTAWA – Canadian Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly has created an advisory committee tasked with compiling and submitting a list of potential candidates for the Board of Directors at CBC/Radio-Canada.
The independent, non-partisan committee, announced Tuesday, consists of experts in broadcasting and digital technology, representatives of cultural sectors from across Canada, Indigenous Peoples, official-language communities and youth, reads the announcement.
The committee, who will serve a six month term with the possibility of extension, will provide the Minister with the names of qualified candidates for each vacant position, as well as supplementary qualified candidates to create a pool to fill posts in the…
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GATINEAU – As Cartt.ca reported, Judith LaRocque has been appointed acting chair of the CRTC for the next four months effective immediately, Canadian Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly confirmed Monday.
LaRocque (pictured) recently filled in at the Commission as acting vice-chair of broadcasting from November 2016 to May 2017. In addition to "extensive experience in the broadcasting field", she has been Secretary to the Governor General, Deputy Minister of Canadian Heritage, and Canada’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative at the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development in Paris.
This interim appointment will ensure the continuous and efficient operation of the CRTC, reads the news release, which also thanked former…
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MONTREAL – Stingray celebrated 10 years of growth by announcing Friday that it is expanding its Montreal head office and hiring 400 new employees over the next five years.
Stingray president,co-founder, and CEO Eric Boyko (pictured centre, between Montreal mayor Denis Coderre and Canadian Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly), said that the company’s headquarters in Old Montreal requires an additional 30,000 square feet to accommodate the new employees that are needed “to keep pace with our growth".
"We recently announced unprecedented annual results for fiscal 2017”, Boyko said in the news release. “Our revenues have surpassed the $100 million mark. Recent acquisitions…
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OTTAWA – The Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage is apparently going to call for a 5% levy on ISPs in order to pay for Canadian content in a new report to be published Thursday, says a story in the Globe and Mail.
The committee has been studying the Canadian media landscape for a year and the report, dubbed Change and Churning in Canadian Media calls for the new money to be directed towards the paying for Canadian media creation.
This is where it’s worth noting the Supreme Court already said no to this in 2012, that broadband…
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WELL, GIVEN THAT WE'RE celebrating media in Alberta, let's just start by saying that CRTC chairman Jean-Pierre Blais demurred from simply mumbling "adios" and riding quietly into a western sunset.
This was his final Banff rodeo as CRTC chair and he went out with hot guns a blazing. (At right is an artist’s conception of the CRTC chair and his speechwriter leaving Banff for the Calgary airport Tuesday…)
To put it mildly, some of the delegate chattering classes were upset with the bullets, many of which – they winced – were dipped in venom.
In my view, there was nothing conceptual in…
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“I will be presenting my vision for the creative sector in September”
OKAY, FULL TRANSPARENCY, I wasn't going to scribble about this.
I went to the advertised keynote partly to hear the Minister of Canadian Heritage "discuss how digital technology is transforming our world, and explore the role of government in supporting innovation and creativity to create new opportunities to bring the best of Canada to the world.”
Yikes there's a mouthful.
Also partly because the smart money at Banff was betting that she wouldn't have anything new to say, that we would get the same old drone we've been hearing for…
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TORONTO – ACTRA and its recording artists’ collecting society, known as ACTRA RACS, have joined a coalition of Canadian writers, performers and songwriters aiming to draw government attention to the challenges facing cultural creators in the digital age.
The coalition, known as Focus On Creators, is seeking signatures on a call to action asking Canadian Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly to put creators at the centre of cultural policy decisions.
“ACTRA is proud to join other members of Canada’s creative class to ensure the government hears the voice of creators when it comes to federal policy,” said ACTRA National president David…
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