OTTAWA – It took three years to produce and then five months to decide that the Senate Committee’s Final Report on Canadian News Media will, in essence, be shelved.
As reported in June by Cartt.ca, Senators made a number of recommendations to government on how to improve news and information getting to Canadians – not to mention the CRTC and CBC (come to think of it, some of those topics have been front-and-centre at the TV Policy Review hearings that began November 27th, but we digress…).
For example, to stem the effects of mega-mergers, the Competition Bureau should…
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TORONTO – The fall 2006 BBM ratings book (officially called S4 2006) came out Monday and one of the more notable stories in Canada’s largest market is the boost in ratings at CHFI to a 9.1 share this fall, compared to an 8.6 in the S3 book and a 9.0 in S4 2005. All numbers are A12+.
The difference between the top line shares between periods isn’t all that large, but the talking point is that the Rogers-owned station is now at the top of the Toronto heap. It jumped over CHUM FM in Toronto, which recorded an S4…
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TORONTO – Saying it wants to try different things, CBC is canceling its early evening national newscast, Canada Now.
Canada Now is anchored out of Vancouver by Ian Hanomansing but will be replaced in early February by a new show in that city. Other markets will see an expansion of local news shows from 30 minutes to a full hour. Until now, the CBC’s suppertime news hour consisted of a 30-minute Canada Now and the local newscast. Ratings are poor.
Staff were informed by CBC executives Thursday afternoon in a conference call.
No jobs will be lost due to the…
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GATINEAU – If the CCTA was still around, it wouldn’t have been able to find consensus among its members for the CRTC’s TV Policy Review either.
While the schisms among the Canadian Association of Broadcasters members meant that association was unable to come up with a submission containing any consensus among its members, some of whom want large carriage fees for broadcasters, some who want small ones and some who oppose them altogether, fractures of opinion exist in the distributor world, too.
Two of the former Canadian Cable Television Association‘s largest members faced the Commission yesterday with diametrically…
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GATINEAU – As the so-called softer side of the industry comes to the fore over the next few, final days of the CRTC TV Policy Review hearing, groups like producers, actors, documentary makers and unions are just hoping the Commission pays more attention to them than the consumer media.
Reporters had elbows up in a crowd most of the week as the likes of CTV, Rogers, Shaw, Bell and Global Television faced the Commission – and then the microphones and notebooks right after.
No such problem Thursday afternoon and Friday.
At one point Friday morning we counted 13 people…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – The idea that Canada’s signal distributors should pay conventional broadcasters fees to carry their signals is “trash” according to Rogers Communications CEO Ted Rogers.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday following his company’s appearance before the CRTC on day three of its over-the-air TV review hearings, Rogers countered the many broadcaster arguments in favour of such charges, known as fee-for-carriage (FFC), made over the hearing’s first two days. He said broadcasters should look to new technologies – not new regulations – for new revenues. “These guys should get back to high def and keep up with the new stuff.”…
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GATINEAU – After a two-day ad campaign by Shaw Communications that ran in numerous newspapers across the country prior to the company’s appearance at the CRTC’s TV Policy Review hearing Thursday morning, Commission vice-chair broadcasting, Michel Arpin, opened proceedings this morning by letting Shaw executives know he was not pleased.
The ads (which appeared in the Vancouver Sun, Edmonton Journal, Calgary Herald, Winnipeg Free Press, Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, Victoria Times Colonist – which are all in Shaw Cable territories – as well as the Globe and Mail and National Post) asked Canadians to let the CRTC know whether or not…
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OTTAWA – Satellite radio has another distribution platform, if they want it.
A Commission decision today that will surely be copied by other broadcast distribution undertakings said that Rogers Cable can add satellite radio stations to their cable channel lineups.
Bell ExpressVu recently asked the Commission for permission to add the satellite radio signals to its service offering but were refused, as the CRTC told the DTH company it needed a license amendment, which is what was granted to Rogers today. Cogeco Cable has also submitted a similar request for a license amendment.
There are conditions to the rule,…
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FEE-FOR-CARRIAGE will happen.
There. I said it. I don’t like it and sure don’t want to pay it, but I’ve come to believe – thanks to my talks and travels this year with folks from all sides of the issue – that in some form, the CRTC is going to grant the conventional broadcasters’ demand for more money from Canadians as additional compensation for the content they deliver.
"On the face of it, it’s a bizarre idea," Rogers vice-chairman Phil Lind told me recently. "(Consumers) get nothing extra, they just have to pay five dollars more."
True enough, but…
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THE CRTC’s TELEVISION POLICY Review hearing, which gets under way this morning with the CBC facing the commissioners, will have everyone involved in the Canadian TV industry on tenterhooks for months (like it hasn’t already!).
The Ceeb will be followed today by TQS, then CanWest Global and CTV.
While fee-for-carriage will overshadow much of the discussion over the next week-and-a-half or so, of course we at Cartt.ca know there’s far more to this hearing than that. The overall effects of new media will be a dominant topic, as will important issues like advertising flexibility, high definition transition solutions, what…
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