VANCOUVER – Tens of thousands of Telus customers in British Columbia and Alberta lost their voice mail access this week, say reports.
On Tuesday afternoon this week, says cbc.ca, about a quarter of Telus customers were without access to voice mail for six hours. Callers could leave messages, but they couldn’t be retrieved, nor would the recipient know a message is there.
According to the cbc.ca story, the system went down again Wednesday morning, affecting 250,000 customers.
Telus blamed the problem on faulty software and said that no messages were lost.
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TORONTO – For two days next week, dozens of CBC Television and Radio personalities from across the country will lend their voices to VoicePrint, the specialty service that provides full-text audio broadcasts of the most popular newspapers and magazines to millions of vision impaired Canadians.
The two days of reading, which will happen May 31 and June 1, are part of VoicePrint’s Celebrity Reader Days, designed to build awareness for the national service and will be heard on VoicePrint July 4th to 7th.
CBC hosts, including George Stroumboulopoulos, Roger Abbott, Mark Kelley, Jeannie Lee, Terri Campbell and others, will donate…
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OTTAWA – Distributing separate feeds simultaneously is currently a no-no for national sports service The Sports Network, the CRTC said today.
In January, the CBC complained to the Commission that CTV Specialty’s TSN had breached the conditions of its licence by broadcasting NHL hockey games using two simultaneous, national feeds on at least three occasions between October 2005 and December 2005. These games were distributed by cable companies (BDUs) on an analog as well as a digital basis.
The Commission agreed with CBC and found that TSN’s use of two simultaneous national feeds when broadcasting a pair of games…
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TORONTO – The senior executive shuffles continue at the CBC.
Last week, the Corp announced that Sally Catto is returning to CBC Television as Creative Head of Drama, replacing Susan Morgan, who quit last week. Morgan was in the position since 2003.
From 2001 to 2005, Catto served as an executive in charge of production for drama at CBC Television and was responsible for the development, licensing and production of a broad menu of drama for broadcast, acted as story editor on projects in development, selected submissions from writers and producers to become part of our development slate, and supervised…
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SUDBURY – The Radio-Television News Directors Association of Canada presented its Central Canadian awards at the Regional Professional Development Seminar in Sudbury Saturday evening.
The 2005 TELEVISION winners are:
Bert Cannings Award – Best Newscast
* A-Channel London for Lynda Shaw’s Killer – (Medium Market) * CTV Montreal for CTV NEWS AT 6 The December 16 Blizzard – (Large Market)
Charlie Edwards Award – Spot News
* Global News – Ontario for Man on Fire * CTV Toronto for The Boxing Day Shootings – (Honourable Mention)
Dan McArthur Award – In-depth/Investigative
* City TV in Toronto for Fabry’s Drug…
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TORONTO – Corus Entertainment and the CBC announced today that the public broadcaster will purchase Corus’ 53% ownership in The Documentary Channel.
As CBC/Radio-Canada currently owns 29% of The Documentary Channel, this agreement will give it majority interest and control of this digital service, currently available in approximately 950,000 Canadian homes. The National Film Board of Canada (14%) and four Canadian production companies – Omni Film (1%), Cinenova Productions (1%), Barna-Alper Productions (1%) and a numbered company (1%) – also have minority positions in the service.
"This is excellent news for CBC/Radio-Canada. Documentary programming is a core part of…
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TORONTO – Sirius Canada announced today that it has passed the 100,000-subscriber mark.
"In just over five months we have reached 100,000 subscribers exceeding all of our expectations, and our growth continues to climb," said Mark Redmond, president and CEO. "Sirius fans are loving the wide range of commercial-free music, leading news and sports programming, and exclusive content from Howard Stern, Lance Armstrong, Martha Stewart Living Radio, the CFL and the NFL."
Sirius Canada is owned by Standard Broadcasting, the CBC and Sirius (U.S.) in a 40-40-20% partnership. It’s Canadian competitor, XM Canada, announced last month it had reached…
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OTTAWA – Jason MacDonald was named chief of staff for CBC Television this week. He replaces Ian Alexander, who has moved to the learning and development department at the Corp.
MacDonald has worked at CBC since 2002, most recently as director of public relations and operations for corporate communications in Ottawa. Before that, he had a career as a communications officer and journalist with various organizations in Montreal and Toronto, including Rogers Media.
"I’ve been very impressed by Jason’s strong strategic skills and his ability to perform well under pressure," said CBC TV’s executive vice-president Richard Stursberg, in a…
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TORONTO – The innovative, quirky, little-watched, ZeD TV has been cancelled.
The late night show’s current season will be its last, CBC management told staffers late last week. Six jobs will be cut.
"This is another blow to the concept of public television," said Lise Lareau, national president of the CMG, in a release. "In its quest for high ratings and commercial success, CBC management is abandoning the things that make public television special, like its ability to take risks, chart new courses for TV and other media, and reach audiences who are not well served on the rest…
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TORONTO – Canadians can now listen to CBC Radio’s programming on demand as podcasts.
The public broadcaster is making a rather large number of its programs available for complimentary download or subscription, including “best of” editions from The Current, Dispatches, Definitely Not The Opera, Ideas, Outfront, As It Happens plus comprehensive highlight packages of regionally-based radio programs.
According to a recent CBC survey, one-third of podcast users listen to more than three hours of podcasts per week at home, work or in transit. The top reason for listening to podcasts is to hear the program anytime.
“Canadians have the…
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