OTTAWA – Canada’s move to take on the presidency of international French-language television network TV5 could prove to be a boon for Canadian content creators.
Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly said Friday that Canada is taking over the presidency of TV5 from Switzerland and will hold it for the next two years, starting in January 2018. Canada will also host the conference of responsible ministers and the annual meeting of senior officials.
Managed by two television channel providers, TV5Monde and TV5 Québec Canada, TV5 is the largest French-language television network in the world. TV5Monde operates TV5 signals worldwide (with the exception…
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Former Google exec is accelerating weather company’s transition, expansion
WHEN PELMOREX FOUNDER Pierre Morrissette trolled the executive ranks for someone new to take his place atop the company which owns and operates The Weather Network and MétéoMédia, he cast a far longer line than into the pool of TV people.
This past summer, Pelmorex surprised many by hiring Sam Sebastian away from his gig as vice-president and managing director of Google’s Canadian operations. The official announcement of his hiring, however, wasn’t a simple “welcome aboard”, but instead made it clear he will be driving an aggressive company aimed towards international expansion…
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OTTAWA – New CRTC chair Ian Scott formally returned the welcome that he received last month from the two ministers who oversee the Commission, Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly and Innovation, Science and Economic Development Minister Navdeep Bains.
In his own letter on Tuesday, Scott said that he looked forward to “fostering an open and transparent relationship” with the duo, and reiterated the CRTC’s focus on ensuring that Canadians have fast, affordable and reliable Internet access and wireless services; high-quality and diverse content; the option to use applications and services on the networks and devices of their choice; and…
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OTTAWA – Bell Canada and Rogers Communications showed off some different philosophies when it came to the federal government’s NAFTA negotiations when they appeared recently in front of a recent meeting of the Standing Committee on International Trade.
Rogers Cable vice-president, regulatory, Pam Dinsmore said in her opening remarks on September 20th that her company is concerned the trade talks will wander too far from its prior mandate and into copyright, which includes such issues as retransmitting U.S. over-the-air TV signals, Canada’s notice-and-notice regime for pirated online content, and our Copyright Modernization Act’s provisions for personal use and its…
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WHILE WE’VE MENTIONED it a couple of times during the 12 days (only 12!?) since Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly announced her Creative Canada vision, it seems the news that the federal government has decided to see if it can levy a tax on Internet service providers in order to help fund the production of Canadian content has been overlooked.
The initial proof of this came when the Governor-in-Council directed the CRTC to get cracking on a new report that will reveal: “a) the distribution model or models of programming that are likely…
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THE NINE MOST FRIGHTENING words in the English language are “I’m from the government and I’m here to help,” according to an old joke popularized by former U.S. president Ronald Reagan. It’s funny ’cause it’s true.
Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly and her communications team must have forgotten this as they prepared for the announcement last week of her new Creative Canada policy framework (which offers some vision but punts many details down the field) – and augmented it with a shiny headline – the announcement Netflix will invest $500 million in Canada over the next five years.
Beyond her speech and…
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Netflix has said it would, if asked
QUEBEC CITY – Both the Quebec Minister of Culture, Luc Fortin, and Finance Minister Carlos Leitao, told reporters Tuesday they want to force Netflix to collect sales tax from users in the province, according to several reports.
While one immediately wonders why, if they’re worried about fairness, they wouldn’t just allow competing Canadian services to drop the provincial sales taxes they are currently collecting, the issue has been a serious hot button since federal Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly announced her new vision for Canadian content –…
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OTTAWA – Netflix is building a permanent film and television production company in Canada that will invest at least $500 million in original content in both official languages over the next five years.
Folded in to Heritage Minister Joly’s new Investment Canada Act, the agreement is the first of its kind outside the United States for the streaming giant, who pledged to be “a meaningful partner in supporting Canadian creators, producers and the Canadian creative expression.”
Netflix also agreed to highlight and promote the new Canadian content to its subscribers in Canada and internationally, plus create a "market development strategy" to support Canadian French-language content on its platform. Centered…
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Like, will broadcaster rules now apply to the streamer?
REPORTS LATE MONDAY said that the centrepiece of Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly’s 17-months-in-the-making strategy to energize, or backstop, the production of Canadian content in our always-on-and-everywhere digital age is that she has secured a commitment from Netflix to spend $500 million over five years “on the production and distribution” of Canadian content.
On the face of it, this is welcome news. Who in the creative industries wouldn’t like to see another $100 million spent annually on Cancon?
However, I hope this plan, which Minister Joly will officially announce in Ottawa today, has a…
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MONTREAL – More than 270 members of Canada’s film and television industry are demanding that U.S. web-based media giants like Google, Facebook, Netflix and Amazon play by the same rules as Canadian media.
In an open letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Heritage Minister Melanie Joly and Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland dated September 26, the groups ask that the multinational media companies be regulated and taxed like their Canadian competitors.
“Unlike regulated Canadian companies, these foreign companies do not provide any information on their activities in Canada as required by CRTC regulations. They do not pay taxes. They do not pay…
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