MONTREAL – Frosty relations between Quebecor Media and CBC/Radio-Canada may be thawing after the two companies finalized a number of agreements aimed at “re-establishing their commercial relationships over the years to come”.
In a statement on Monday, Quebecor Media said that the agreements include distribution deals with its Videotron subsidiary for “the specialized channels and the other broadcasting vehicles of Société Radio-Canada”, plus ad buys on Quebecor-owned Sun Media’s francophone digital and print platforms.
Quebecor's media outlets have been openly critical of the CBC for an alleged lack of transparency after submitting hundreds of requests under the Access To Information regulations, as Cartt.ca…
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OTTAWA – Establishing a carriage relationship with Netflix, YouTube, Google, Yahoo! and others as well as reworking how money is distributed to fund online entertainment are two ways to ensure Canadian content will secure a space for itself on the Internet, Canadian Media Production Association’s (CMPA) annual Prime Time conference in Ottawa, heard Friday.
Online entertainment is growing leaps and bounds with the help of some major players such as Google and Yahoo, but what can be done to ensure that Canadian productions have a place? Richard Stursberg, senior advisor on media and entertainment with Telus (and former head of…
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OTTAWA – The biggest challenge the Canadian broadcasting industry is facing is a subset of distributors who are seeking lower rates for specialty services, Kevin Crull, president of Bell Media, told the Canadian Media Production Association’s annual Prime Time 2012 conference in Ottawa on Friday morning.
Crull spoke about this issue and other challenges Bell Media is facing in a interview style session with former CTV president, former head of CBC News and current professor, MBA program in arts and media administration, Schulich School of Business, Trina McQueen. Crull said this issue is more important than the group licensing regime…
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OTTAWA – Last year’s transition to digital transmission helped to cut Canada’s over-the-air television penetration to an all-time low of just 5%, says a new report by the Media Technology Monitor (MTM).
The report, entitled ‘Post-DTV Transition: Did Canadians Convert?’, found that there are now more Canadians who have opted out of television than there are those who use antennas. These “tuned-out” Canadians – people who choose to live without TV – increased from 4% to 7% of the population in just one year.
The conversion from analog to digital over-the-air TV broadcasting occurred in most markets in Canada on September…
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MONTREAL – One of the most influential figures in Canadian media history, Pierre Juneau, died yesterday in Montreal. He was 89.
A staunch backer of Canadian content on the airwaves, Juneau held three of the most important cultural positions in the country during his long and distinguished career. First, at the National Film Board, he created the French language arm of the organization and is recognized in Quebec as playing a central role in the development of French filmmaking in Canada. Back when TV didn’t exist much (let alone any other form of transmission) Juneau first toured Europe showcasing Canadian…
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GATINEAU – One thing the aggregate annual financial returns of Canadian broadcast and distribution companies showed is holding the rights to the Olympics, even a home one, isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.
(Last Friday, February 10th, the CRTC released the 2011 broadcast year aggregate annual returns of large distribution undertakings, multi-system operators and conventional television and radio ownership groups, a requirement under Broadcasting Regulatory Policy CRTC 2009-560. The 2011 broadcast year ended on August 31st.)
The figures show that at Bell Media (which during the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics was still CTVglobemedia) 2011 national ad…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC’s Local Programming Improvement Fund (LPIF) is either a necessary source of cash desperately needed to keep some local TV stations on air, or a stimulus program circa 2008 that now should be terminated. However, if the Commission is tabulating submissions for and against (and it isn’t) LPIF the 1300-plus submissions so far on the CRTC web site land squarely on the side of maintaining it.
The fund was created almost three years ago (in the midst of the financial crisis and just prior to the destructive Stop-The-TV-Tax vs. Local-TV-Matters battle), before Shaw and Bell bought into…
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OTTAWA – As the CRTC prepares to review the relative success of the Local Programming Improvement Fund (LPIF), it has released new numbers for the 2010-2011 period, ending August 31st, which indicate Shaw Communications paid the most into the fund, followed by Bell Canada and Rogers Cable.
Shaw (cable and satellite) combined to pay almost $32 million (an earlier version of this story had an erroneous amount for Shaw), followed by Bell at $25.08 million and Rogers at $24.05 million. Quebecor (Videotron) contributed $13.6 million and Cogeco, $6.77 million.
Shaw, the LPIF’s largest contributor, received only $8.06 million in…
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TORONTO – Leveraging a recent music licensing deal with Audio-Video Licensing Agency (AVLA), the CBC has launched a new, free, digital music service.
CBC Music and the CBC Music App will offer subscribers a choice of 40 different web radio stations, 14 genre-based communities, and direct access to the music of nearly 1,000 major and independent music companies. At first glances, it looks pretty slick.
The music services features “original content from the most knowledgeable and experienced music personalities and programmers from across the country, hundreds of concerts, features, blogs, playlists, and more,” says the CBC in…
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TORONTO – Three in four Canadians view domestic media companies as too important for cultural and security reasons to allow them to be controlled by foreign interests, according to a online survey commissioned by Friends of Canadian Broadcasting.
In the survey of 2,022 adult Canadians conducted from November 4 to 10, 2011, 77% respondents said they believed that Canadian media was “too important for culture and national security” to be foreign owned, according to the Friends release. However, 23% said they believed Canadian media owners should be able to sell to foreigners to be competitive. The survey was designed and…
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