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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Quebec’s TV lords are upset
I RECALL THE DELEGATION of the Quebec media production types appearing before us – a panel of CRTC commissioners – when we were considering the extension of the Broadcasting Act to the Internet.
The issue was whether every Canadian website should be licenced by the state, and taxed, to supply funds for Canadian video programming. When asked whether they understood of the scale of government intrusion into communications, one of the panelists slammed her fist on the table and said "regulate it first, then we'll figure out what it means!".
Ah, the true descendants of Louis XIV…
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MONTREAL – Construction on CBC/Radio-Canada’s new home in Montreal is officially underway after a ground breaking ceremony held Sunday.
Canadian Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly, CBC/Radio-Canada president and CEO Hubert Lacroix, Broccolini Real Estate Group president Roger Plamondon, and Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre (all pictured) took part in the ceremony which also featured the release of dozens of butterflies in a symbolic guesture of transformation and innovation.
The new Maison de Radio-Canada (MRC) will have a total footprint of over 418,000 square feet and consist of a seven-storey tower and a four-storey tower connected by an atrium that is open to the…
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Looks like Netflix is chilling with Ottawa
OTTAWA – The Canadian TV biz held a three-hour, industry-wide affair in Ottawa on Wednesday evening, where the Canada Media Fund showcased internationally competitive primetime broadcast TV series to local bureaucrats and politicians (and juuust before Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly outlined her vision to change a bunch of things.)
Netflix and other foreign Internet players, and their impact on local producers and broadcasters, loomed large at the National Press Center event and Joly only sent along her Parliamentary Secretary, Sean Casey, to address the industry gathering and praise Canadian TV producers.
In stage-side comments to…
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OTTAWA – In a speech today at an Economic Club of Canada event, Minister of Canadian Heritage Melanie Joly officially unveiled the federal government’s long awaited digital content strategy. Dubbed 'Creative Canada', the plan has angered some and sated others and calls for increased investments to support both domestic production as well as the promotion of Canadian content abroad.
The release of the strategy comes a day after news leaked that the federal government had inked an agreement with Netflix that would see the online broadcaster and distributor invest a minimum of $500 million in Canadian productions over the next…
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CBC/Radio-Canada explores credibility, democracy and public values at Annual General Meeting
OTTAWA – Despite “serious financial challenges, a fragmented ecosystem, the appearance of the global Facebooks and Netflixes of the world who have absolutely weakened the broadcasting model that used to support our industry,” CBC/Radio-Canada remains relevant and is thriving in a digital world, according to Hubert Lacroix, president and CEO.
In a presentation to the corporation’s Annual General Meeting on Tuesday, the chief executive, who’s nearing the end of his term, noted that when he took the reins in November 2007, digital mainstays like the iPad and Netflix didn’t exist,…
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TORONTO – The Canadian music industry has lost a major source of funding after Bell Media confirmed that it has pulled the plug on its MuchFACT program.
MuchFACT has supported the Canadian music community through funding and promotion of music videos and related music content for media platforms since 1984. The company has also dropped BravoFACT, a similar fund for short-form scripted projects.
A CBC report says that MuchFACT spent approximately $2 million a year, funding videos by Arcade Fire, Carly Rae Jepsen and emerging acts like Halifax psych rock band Walrus and Mississauga rapper John River. It also quotes Bell Media president…
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TORONTO – Comedian and political satirist Rick Mercer said Monday that his comedy series Rick Mercer Report will launch its 15th and final season Tuesday on CBC.
In a rant shared on Twitter, Mercer (pictured) said that he has “always known that I have the best job in the country” and that he has “no idea” what he’ll do next. He also promised that the upcoming season will be the best yet with highlights such as his time painting a grain elevator on the prairies and dangling off the Confederation Bridge to PEI.
When season 15 wraps next spring, 277 episodes of…
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OTTAWA – Registration is now open for the CMPA’s Prime Time In Ottawa conference scheduled for January 31- February 2, 2018 at the Westin Ottawa.
Prime Time in Ottawa (PTiO) is a national conference for some 600 of Canada’s most prominent business leaders from the feature film, television, interactive media, broadcasting and telecommunications industries.
The best and brightest thought-leaders in the business are teaming up with the CMPA to assemble a slate of keynotes, panels, debates and roundtables that matches the breadth and depth of their combined knowledge and expertise, say organizers.
The Prime Time 2018 Advisory Board includes Vince Commisso (9 Story Media Group),…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC told the CBC on Wednesday that it could not rent a multiplex of its Toronto radio signal to launch a Tamil-language radio station in that city.
In regulatory-speak, the CBC asked for “authority to use the subsidiary communications multiplex operations channel of CBL-FM Toronto” to launch the station, which would have been owned by TIME FM based out of Scarborough, whose plan was to leased the frequency (this is an update of an earlier version of this story which did not include the TIME FM plan). However, such a station would certainly have an impact on small, independent local…
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