OTTAWA – The Canadian Broadcasting Corp. as a public broadcaster should foster democracy, and needs stable long-term funding to operate effectively, says new CBC board chairman Timothy Casgrain.
Appearing Tuesday before the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage, Casgrain told the committee though that CBC Television, unlike public radio, shouldn’t be totally free of advertising.
“CBC Radio doesn’t compete with Hollywood and CSI and Lost, and you the viewers make that choice,” he said. “CTV and Global are a rebroadcast of U.S. shows with different commercials – that’s what the CBC is up against. Should we come to the House…
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TORONTO – CanWest Media Works trumpeted the fact it had more shows in the top 10 than it did a year ago in a media release Wednesday. But according to Global’s figures, rival private broadcaster CTV still leads in the three key markets of Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary. And it was the CBC – not Global – that showed the most improvement in Vancouver and Calgary.
In spring 2006 in the Toronto market, CTV had eight of the top-10 shows, Global two and the CBC none. This spring, Global gained one top 10 show for a total of three,…
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TORONTO – Tom Hastings has been hired as executive in charge of production for TV Drama, Arts & Entertainment at the CBC. He started last week.
He comes to the CBC from Alliance Atlantis and has over 11 years of television and documentary production behind him. At AA, Hastings was responsible for a number of programs on both HGTV and the Food Network. In addition to managing over 15 series, he "played a major role in shifting both networks toward more documentary-based formats," says the CBC release.
Previous to his time at these channels, Hastings worked at National Geographic…
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ST. JOHN’s – The CBC plan to expand its supper hour news programs from 30 to 60 minutes without increasing local news budgets is a bad idea, says TV watchdog group Friends of Canadian Broadcasting.
"We know from the St. John’s experience that you can’t produce a 60 minute news program that people will want to watch on a 30 minute budget. CBC management in Toronto should know this well," said Noreen Golfman, chair of Friends’ Steering Committee, in a press release today.
The CBC regional TV news show in St. John’s was expanded from 30 to 60 minutes in…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – The folks at MaxTrax and Galaxie may be wondering about their futures on Rogers Cable today.
The CRTC granted a pay audio license to Rogers Communications this morning. The company plans to launch a 30-channel service of music and spoken word programming. Currently, CBC-owned Galaxie and Corus Entertainment-owned MaxTrax are both carried by Rogers, which hasn’t said when or how it will launch its own service.
The regs require that any carrier which owns a pay audio license must also carry a non-affiliated service meaning that when Rogers launches, it only has to carry one of Galaxie…
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OTTAWA – "It’s a missed opportunity," says Guy Mayson, summing up the Canadian Film and Television Production Association’s overall reaction to the CRTC’s new over-the-air TV policy.
Speaking to Cartt.ca from the streets of Cannes, France, where he’s attending the film festival, the CFTPA president explained that while the policy shows the CRTC has noted producer concerns about the need to increase broadcaster investment in original, Canadian, priority programming, it delayed taking action.
“We’re a little disappointed that the Commission didn’t act” to require conventional TV broadcasters to meet minimum program expenditures and to schedule more of this programming…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – As we told you on Monday, the CRTC will release its new policy on conventional, over-the-air television. In fact, it will be released today.
The primary issue is whether or not Canadians will soon have to pay an additional fee for conventional broadcast signals from CTV, Global and the CBC, as we noted on Monday.
Watch Cartt.ca today and tomorrow for more on this story.
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – Saying the need for new subscriber fees wasn’t demonstrated by conventional broadcasters, the CRTC’s new convention television policy does not include a boost in Canadians’ cable or satellite bills.
The new policy will, however, "ensure Canadians have access to digital and high-definition television programming, and that broadcasters continue to contribute to the production, acquisition and broadcast of high-quality Canadian programming.
The Commission has decided to:
* Remove restrictions on advertising time limits after gradually increasing the amount of advertising allowed;
*Establish August 31, 2011, as the date by which television licensees will only broadcast digital signals (about…
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VANCOUVER – The CBC reached into the private broadcast pool of talent for a new leader in British Columbia.
M Channel’s vice-president of programming, Johnny Michel, has been hired by the CBC to the newly created position of regional director for the British Columbia region. He will be responsible for an integrated approach to all of CBC’s media platforms and starts on July 3, 2007.
“We have great talent and wonderful shows in British Columbia," said Jane Chalmers, vice-president for English Radio, in the press release. "The challenge is to build on our strengths, whether radio, television or digitally…
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OTTAWA – We’ll find out sometime in the next few days whether or not Canadians will be paying more for their television (among many other things). The CRTC’s new policy for conventional television will be released this week, likely tomorrow, said the Commission’s chairman last week.
In a speech to the British Columbia Association of Broadcasters, which Cartt.ca reported on here, chairman Konrad von Finckenstein told delegates: "Around May 15, we will issue our determinations arising out of our review of over-the-air television."
The primary issue is sure to be whether or not Canadians will soon have to pay…
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