TORONTO – Bell Media and CBC/Radio Canada have ended their Olympic bid partnership after two failed bids for the exclusive Canadian media rights for the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games and the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.
During their partnership, the organizations submitted two bids for the Canadian broadcast rights that were turned down flat by the IOC. The duo said in a joint statement on Monday afternoon that they will formally dissolve their bid partnership as a result.
"We presented not one, but two fiscally responsible bids that are reflective of the Canadian marketplace," said Phil King, president of CTV programming and…
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LAS VEGAS – The National Hockey League has given its blessing to Rogers Communications' and Bell Canada’s acquisition of the Toronto Maple Leafs, as part of the companies' majority ownership purchase of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment (MLSE).
The League issued a brief statement from its annual Board of Governors meeting saying that its approval of the sale of the Leafs, the anchor of the $1.32 billion deal, was unanimous. It also approved a subsequent restructuring of the ownership of MLSE.
However, a report in the Globe and Mail says the league also told the team's about-to-be-owners…
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MONTREAL – More than a hundred people demonstrated in front of the Radio-Canada/CBC building in Montreal Wednesday in solidarity with the RCI Action Committee, a union-supported lobby of Radio Canada International employees.
At the rally, the Committee called on the federal government to stop the budget cuts at the international radio service, and to give RCI financial autonomy from Radio-Canada-CBC. As Cartt.ca reported, CBC/Radio-Canada plans to shut down RCI’s newsroom on June 24 after 67 years on the international airwaves, in favour of a web-only presence, as part of its massive budget cuts.
But supporters maintain that limiting RCI’s presence to the Internet…
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HALIFAX – Veteran broadcast executive Jim Haskins has been named station manager/news director for Global Maritimes.
Haskins, who began his career as a reporter and anchor for CJIC TV and CKCY radio in Sault Ste. Marie, ON, was most recently at CBC Television and CBC.ca where he was responsible for media sales and marketing across Alberta. He was also VP and GM with Craig Media (later CHUM Ltd.) and served as president and GM of the Grand Prix of Edmonton.
In his new role, Haskins will oversee all editorial and station operations for Global Maritimes, and will help the station transition…
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BANFF – The questions have been delivered in almost every conference room, certainly every hallway of the Banff World Media Festival this year. It has also been postured in many forms: How will Google, Apple and Netflix influence the Canadian broadcast industry? Is the CRTC’s present policies helping or hindering the equation? What about vertical integration?
Times, They Are A-Changin’, so what should we do?
At the Canadian Media Leader session late Sunday afternoon, there was some consensus on the state of affairs in the industry and the direction of video production and development in the country.
For starters, Bell Media president…
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TORONTO – The Canadian Journalism Foundation (CJF) has awarded CBC Radio One's The Current with the Excellence in Journalism Award in the large media category, while the Vancouver Observer won in the small/local media category at the organization's annual awards gala.
Additional Excellence in Journalism Award finalists included The Canadian Press-Ottawa Bureau, The Huffington Post Canada and past recipients Toronto Star and Winnipeg Free Press.
Other award winners include:
– The Atkinson Fellowship in Public Policy, worth up to $100,000, was given to Michael Valpy, former Globe and Mail writer and columnist and now a senior fellow at Massey College at the…
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TORONTO – Rogers-owned easy-listening pop music station CHFI-FM held on to top spot in the Toronto radio market with a 13.1% share, down slightly from the winter period’s first place 15.8% share, according to the Spring 2012 portable people meter (PPM) report released by BBM Canada.
For the 13 week period from February 27 through May 27, 2012, Toronto’s second spot went to CBC Radio One (CBLA-FM) with a 10.1% share, while Bell Media’s CHUM-FM rounded out the market’s top three stations with a 9.7% share.
CBC Radio One (CBU) moved into first place in Vancouver with a 10.9% share, followed…
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OTTAWA – Commissioner of Official Languages Graham Fraser said Monday he is “extremely satisfied” with a recent Federal Court decision asking the CRTC to investigate CBC Windsor radio station CBEF.
The decision handed down on Tuesday, May 29 “puts an end to a dispute between my office and CBC/Radio-Canada that has gone on for far too long,” said Fraser in a press release issued Monday. “The Federal Court has acknowledged my authority to investigate complaints about CBC/Radio-Canada, including those regarding its national and regional programming. I expect that CBC/Radio-Canada will co-operate fully in investigations from this point forward.”
The Commissioner is…
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TORONTO – Canada’s public broadcaster has a key role to play, perhaps even more vital in this era of vertical integration, but it needs the Local Program Improvement Fund and “a flexible regulatory framework" to continue to do so.
That was the gist of an address given Thursday afternoon by CBC/Radio-Canada president and CEO Hubert Lacroix at the Economic Club of Canada in Toronto.
In his first public address since the federal government handed the Corp. $115 million in budget cuts this spring, Lacroix wasted no time in taking issue with the popular refrain that CBC, which receives about $1 billion from…
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TORONTO – Freshly minted Canadian citizen Kevin Crull said Wednesday that without some regulatory change, he fears for the future of the Canadian television system.
Perhaps newly emboldened after becoming a Canadian citizen just last week, the Bell Media president used his luncheon keynote at the Canadian Telecom Summit on Wednesday to heap criticism on the way the regulations governing the Canadian TV industry have mutated over the past couple of years, and to wonder why our knee-jerk reaction as Canadians always seems to fear the big company and how badly it could act, even in the face of the…
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