OTTAWA – Knowing CBC-TV chief Richard Stursberg will meet some of the national media (including cartt.ca) in Ottawa today at the CFTPA’s Prime Time gathering to talk about the Ceeb’s future plans, Friends of Canadian Broadcasting and ACTRA released an hour-count it says shows CBC has "dropped the ball" on Canadian drama.
FOCB, a lobbying group, and ACTRA, the Canadian actors union, are still stinging from the announcement this week that the CBC has cancelled the critically praised, but low-rated This is Wonderland, The Tournament, and DaVinci City Hall. Both groups are still angry about the CBC lockout of…
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MONTREAL – The local digital transmission of the broadcast feed from Radio-Canada and CBC is being delivered by Videotron.
Throughout the duration of the 2006 Winter Olympics in Torino, Videotron Business Solutions and T-Systems, a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom, are co-operating to transmit the feed. Under an agreement between Videotron and T-Systems, T-Systems is responsible for carrying the feed from Italy to its own network end points (points of presence) in Montreal and Toronto, while Videotron is responsible for local transmission of the fibre-optic signals to CBC headquarters in Toronto and Radio-Canada headquarters in Montréal.
Videotron Business Solutions routes…
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TORONTO – Karen Gelbart has been promoted to senior vice-president content, lifestyle channels at Alliance Atlantis.
It was the position vacated recently by Kirstine Layfield who, as previously reported, is joining CBC as executive director of network programming. "I think it is terrific that we have such a strong and proven leader and manager as Karen to fill this important position," said Norm Bolen, AA’s executive vice-president, content, in a memo to staff.
Gelbart (right) joined Alliance Atlantis in 1997, initially in charge of the company’s Cinevillage studio facilities. She was then vice-president of programming for the Food Network, then…
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MONTREAL – Subscribers to Videotron’s illico digital cable are able to access Olympic coverage from Radio-Canada, the French-language network of the CBC, via video on demand.
Under an agreement announced Friday, over 160 hours of programming will be available free of charge and without commercial interruption on VOD throughout the 2006 Winter Games in Torino.
Illico customers will be able to go to channel 900 to watch the competitions and the opening and closing ceremonies 24 hours after they are broadcast on Radio-Canada, which is the same as what Rogers is getting from CBC in its territories.
“We are…
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TORONTO – The Canadian Media Directors’ council has lined up a large, interesting, diverse slate of senior executives to speak at its upcoming conference.
The CMDC’s March 28 conference is called "Mining Growth – Discovering Potential in Media Mayhem" and will likely attract more than 800. The annual get-together is the Canadian marketing industry’s largest single-day event.
The keynote speakers include: Michael Grimaldi, president, General Motors Canada; Maurice Lévy, Paris-based CEO of Publicis Groupe SA; and Pierre Karl Péladeau, president and CEO, Quebecor Inc.
The outlook for growth from media outlets will be presented by five Canadian media leaders:…
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WHY IS GLOBAL NATIONAL the only Canadian content I can get from iTunes for my Video iPod?
Why is the sports content on the Samsung a920 from Bell Mobility I’ve just started testing (downloads are surprisingly speedy, by the way) from ESPN? Where’s Sportsnet or TSN?
Why is its business news a bland CP report and not from ROBTv or Newsnet, for example? Why isn’t FashionTelevision the feed for the "fashion" channel on this nifty multimedia wireless phone?
Where’s Treehouse On Demand for these devices – my kids would flip for it (actually, there’s no kids content offered at…
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TORONTO – Are there enough viewers looking for national and international news at 5:30 in the afternoon?
Anchor Kevin Newman (below) and the crew at Global National and Global Television think so. But, when conventional wisdom says that news consumers aren’t home yet at 5:30, Global’s relocation of Global National to a consistent (almost) national time slot which is basically before dinner for working families, the risk isn’t a small one.
Parallels are being drawn to CBC’s attempted re-making of The National into Prime Time News, moving their flagship news show from 10 p.m. to 9 p.m. in November…
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TORONTO – After months of looking, CBC Television today announced that Kirstine Layfield, a senior executive at Alliance Atlantis, will become executive director, network programming.
She replaces Slawko Klymkiw, who joined the Canadian Film Centre in the fall of 2005. Her official start date in what is considered the plum job in Canadian TV has not yet been announced. It was a much-sought-after post. Layfield (left) will be responsible for the overall programming strategy for CBC Television and brings almost 20 years of combined experience in the broadcasting and television industries, most recently as senior vice-president, lifestyle…
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SINCE WWW.CARTT.CA WAS IN Vancouver a couple of weeks back, we decided to drop in on Paul Fisher, the executive vice-president and cluster market manager for Rogers Radio in the city.
Having moved west two years ago after a very successful stint as general manager of then-Toronto market leader CHFI, we wanted to ask Fisher about the differences in the two big-city markets (why does Jack FM work so well in Vancouver and not Toronto?), the similarities (News 1130 in Vancouver is built off the successful 680 News template from Toronto) and how Rogers’ newest brand, Clear FM is…
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Dear Greg,
Saw your article this morning.
I do differ with Mr. Asper on one very key point. I believe that there may be both business and policy reasons for a DTT network in Canada to deliver HD over the air to Canadians – I just don’t believe that it is economical to do so while we have no idea how long the requirement to maintain an analog network will persist, and I’m not sure in what timeframe it would make sense to extend that network much past the 80% point.
Fred Mattocks, CBC
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