BANFF – The head of Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) will open this year’s Banff World Television Festival.
Paula Kerger will deliver the opening keynote address on June 14, and will be interviewed by Richard Strusberg, CBC’s EVP of English services.
Since Kerger became president and CEO in 2006, PBS has moved aggressively to transform itself from a solely broadcast organization to a multi-platform leader that serves Americans through television, mobile TV, the Web, interactive whiteboards in the classroom and more.
“We are thrilled to have Paula presenting the CBC Opening Keynote session,” said Peter Vamos, executive director of the Banff World Television…
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OTTAWA – Two Canadian economists told a Parliamentary committee studying foreign investment restrictions in telecommunications that relaxing the rules would have a beneficial impact across the entire Canadian economy.
Randall Morck, a professor in the department of finance and management science at the University of Alberta’s School of Business, told the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology last week that foreign investment restrictions have a negative impact on the entire Canadian economy.
“I still think and in fact I’d be willing to be bet several cases of Molson’s Canadian beer that if you wanted to retard the…
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ONE OF THE MOST WIDELY quoted reports on the world wide media outlook for the next four years was Pricewaterhousecoopers’ Global Entertainment and Media Outlook: No hiding from the digital transition.
Depending on your point of view, the report presented an exhilarating, scary, or some combination of both, future for those of us working in media.
Jerry Brown, associate partner, advisory services, for the company’s Canada entertainment and media practice, is a 23-year veteran of the industry and notes that the 2009 study placed its emphasis on advertiser and consumer spending to determine where the revenue is coming from.
“Through a combination…
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WHY DO THE OLD TV sets in the living rooms, garages, kitchens or at the cottages of millions of Canadians deserve to go digital?
As the transition to digital over-the-air TV deadline grows closer and the industry is awakening to the need to act, the question has been asked in some quarters: Why bother?
We can keep fibbing if we want but as an industry we already know it’s now impossible to update our over-the-air television broadcasting system to digital by the August 31, 2011 deadline set years ago by the CRTC. Not “virtually impossible.” Not “challenging.” It is not…
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OTTAWA – The CBC received CRTC approval Wednesday to operate a new French-language regional television station in Toronto.
The Commission also approved CBC’s requests to amend the broadcasting licences for CBOFT-TV Ottawa and CBOFT-DT Ottawa in order to transfer certain analog transmitters to the new station. The original CBLFT-TV station was closed in 1991 and converted to a rebroadcasting transmitter for CBOFT-TV Ottawa.
CBLFT-TV Toronto must broadcast a minimum of five hours per week, on average on an annual basis, of local programming intended for television viewers in Toronto and a large part of Ontario.
At the CBC’s request, the Commission…
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TORONTO – The CRTC is incorrectly interpreting the BBM statistics on television viewership numbers during its examination of community television policy, says Rogers.
As part of this proceeding, the Commission issued a report on April 8 which Rogers says has been used by some critics of cable-provided community television to "prove" that Rogers TV is not often watched. The report states that in the 2008-09 broadcast year, Rogers’ community television stations generated a 0.2% share of the Canadian English-language television market.
But according to a Canadian Media Research Inc. (CMRI) study commissioned by Rogers TV, that figure is deceptive because BBM share…
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THE TRANSITION TO DIGITAL television in Canada is officially Heritage Minister James Moore’s to deal with, but Industry Minister Tony Clement doesn’t want to see the August 31, 2011 deadline moved.
That was the word we received directly from Industry Minister Tony Clement on Friday during an interview (which you’ll read below) in his Parliament Hill office.
Cartt.ca readers will know we’ve been prodding the industry and the federal government about their inaction on the transition to digital broadcast television. Using our bully pulpit here and directly with the ministers on Twitter (they are @TonyClement_MP and @mpjamesmoore).
In a…
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OTTAWA – Edward W. Boyd is the newest member of the board of directors of CBC/Radio-Canada, Heritage Minister James Moore announced Monday.
Boyd has been CEO of 58ninety Inc., a Toronto-based agency that provides digital marketing solutions to clients such as Unilever, Molson Canada, and Expedia, since 2006.
Prior to that, Boyd worked as principal at Counterpart dsr, an agency specialized in maximizing the use of Internet and direct marketing, and also served as president and GM of Iceberg Media.com, a pioneering Canadian Internet broadcaster and provider of custom streamed music solutions.
www.cbc.radio-canada.cawww.canadianheritage.gc.ca
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ON A SUNDAY MORNING three weeks after the earthquake which levelled so much of Haiti, cameraman John Tuk and I found ourselves at the Village of Hope, standing in front of a group of approximately 40 Haitian children (pictured below), ready for their morning church service.
They were preparing to thank God for sparing them from the massive death toll. But before the service began they broke into a beautiful welcome song. As the pastor played the notes on his accordion, the kids stared and sang. John and I were speechless. When the song ended we thanked the curious kids,…
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TORONTO – The Canadian on-line advertising market will top $1.74 billion this year, according to new research from Convergence Consulting Group.
The report ‘The Battle for the North American (Canada & U.S.) Couch Potato: New Challenges and Opportunities in the Content Market’ estimates that on-line TV advertising revenues represented 2.3% ($1.52 billion) of 2009 Canadian broadcast and specialty network TV advertising revenue. That figure is forecasted to grow to 3.1% in 2010.
As in the U.S., Canadian broadcast and specialty networks aim to grow on-line advertising revenue without negatively impacting their traditional TV advertising revenue and programming fees from cable, satellite,…
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