TORONTO – The Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists (ACTRA) has thrown its support behind the broadcasters’ demands for fee-for-carriage, but only if they promise to put that money back into Canadian programming.
The group said that with “record high profits, cable companies can and should contribute more to Canadian broadcasting”, but should not be allowed to “pass the buck” to consumers.
“Private broadcasters and cable companies have been getting a free ride for too long, and consumers and audiences already aren’t getting what they’ve been paying for through their cable fees and taxes”, said national president Ferne Downey, in a…
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GATINEAU – We could have a story here about the CBC’s plea for a skinny basic.
We could have re-analyzed its re-demands for new revenue in the form of a wholesale fee and how forcefully its executives argued it needs one, despite how detractors point out it already gets a billion dollars from taxpayers and as a public broadcaster an increase from that stream seems more appropriate.
We could have expended more words on Bell’s SD Freesat proposal and how the company re-iterated it will resist new fees to local broadcasters no matter what right to negotiate might be enshrined in…
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HALIFAX – Canada’s communications regulatory regime is in desperate need of repair, says a report by The Atlantic Institute for Market Studies (AIMS).
In the recently released ‘In The End of that ’70’s Show: Rethinking Canada’s Communications Regulatory Institutions for the 21st Century’, report author and former AIMS research director Ian Munro says technological advances have made the existing regime obsolete.
"Long gone are the days when the telecommunications and broadcasting sectors were distinct entities," Munro said in a statement. "Yet the regulatory regime still treats them as such, which creates inefficient duplication and complete disconnects across government agencies and departments with…
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By Michael Janigan, PIAC
THE CURRENT SPECTACLE of Canada’s television networks engaged in a pie-throwing contest with the cable and satellite industry seems as confusing to the viewer as an episode of “Lost”.
For one thing, the mantle of “consumer champion” sits uneasily on the shoulders of the distributors – the cable and satellite companies, whose own offerings are crammed with services owned by them that hoover up ever-increasing subscriber fees. In turn, some Canadians are startled to learn that there still is significant local broadcasting, after over two decades of damaging cuts to such programming.
The facts are that the…
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TORONTO – The new board of the new Canadian Media Fund launching in April is new and much smaller – with a much more prominent voice from the companies which must funnel a piece of their revenue into it – but how, exactly, will the administration of this $300 million money pot change as compared to the old CTF?
The BDUs (Rogers, Shaw, Bell, et al), which have to contribute 5% of their revenues to this fund to create Canadian content challenged the way it was run almost three years ago and said they should have more…
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IT’S TIME FOR CANADA to take a coherent and holistic approach to creating a national digital strategy.
We need an overall vision to guide the current social and economic transformation in the interest of all Canadians, otherwise, debate will be mired in the arcane and fragmented languages of broadcasting regulation, copyright revision, technological innovation, cultural subsidies, and broadband infrastructure.
For Canada to compete in a digital world, we urgently need to integrate these often conflicting narratives, or we risk being left behind.
Digital Britain raises the bar for Canada The release of Digital Britain this past June draws attention to…
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TORONTO – Max Valiquette will fill the seventh and final seat on the Canada Media Fund’s board of directors for 2009-2010.
Appointed by the Canadian Coalition for Cultural Expression (CCCE), Valiquette is founder and president of the youth marketing and research firm Youthography.
A renowned expert and speaker on youth and pop culture, Valiquette was the marketing chair for the AIDS Committee’s 2008 Fashion Cares event, and currently sits on the advisory board for Mediacs, a youth media literacy advocacy group.
He joins fellow CCCE nominees Alison Clayton, Guy Fournier, Ronald W. Osborne, and Louis L. Roquet, and Department of Canadian Heritage…
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TORONTO – Bruce Claassen didn’t want to be the bad guy. He wanted to be the white knight who saved CKX-TV Brandon and used it as a springboard to build another national TV network.
With the market for smaller TV stations set in the $1-range (and with Shaw Communications having backed down from its much-ballyhooed calling-of-CTV’s-“bluff”) Claassen announced in July that his investment vehicle, Bluepoint Investments, would purchase the beleaguered station from owner CTVglobemedia as the start of Bluepoint’s grander plan to become a major media player.
But, after “trying everything to make it work,” Claassen said he made…
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OTTAWA – This morning at 9 a.m., new wireless carrier Globalive will present to the CRTC its new corporate structure, governance, shareholder rights and financing arrangements.
After a two-day hearing last week into the company’s ownership and control, which was spurred on by the incumbent operators’ complaints, Globalive (which does business on the wired side under the Yak brand) has heeded the Commission’s stated fears and believes the alterations will soothe those concerns, allowing its to launch its wireless services under the Wind brand name before Christmas.
“We are confident that these changes will satisfy the CRTC,” said…
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TORONTO – Consultations around the Canada Media Fund (CMF) will be ongoing forever, and any issues not captured in its inaugural guidelines could be incorporated later, Canadian Television Fund (CTF) president and CEO Valerie Creighton noted during a virtual townhall held Thursday.
The guidelines must be finalized and approved by the CMF board by April 1, the date the new fund is set to replace the CTF. The $300-million-plus CMF will have two streams – convergence (TV component with a tie-in to at least one other platform) and experimental (no TV connection needed).
Given the deadline to produce the guidelines, there…
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