By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC on Friday adopted a proposal from the government’s Communications Research Centre (CRC) and will standardize the information carriers will be required to report to improve mobile wireless coverage mapping.
The regulator will require, at a resolution of 50 metres, annual reporting of three levels of terrestrial service: Level 1, a wireless signal strong enough to support emergency services, namely 911 calls and public alerts; Level 2, a signal strong enough to support the first level plus voice and video calls of at least 3 Mbps download and 1 Mbps upload; and Level 3, a signal strong…
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By Howard Law, author of MediaPolicy.ca, and Canada vs. California: How Ottawa took on Netflix and the streaming giants (Lorimer, 2024)
Prime Minister Mark Carney recently granted the New York Times an hour-long interview about where he is taking Canada.
Canadian journalists, who would have loved that kind of access to the prime minister, were irked. What ever happened to Canadians telling Canadian stories?
But to heck with cultural irony. There’s an American audience to be educated about Canada.
An interesting item that emerged from the Times coverage was Carney’s candour about Canada’s warming relationship with the European Union. According…
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Comes after TVA Sports secured NHL rights deal from Rogers
By Ahmad Hathout
Quebecor’s Groupe TVA is stonewalling hotel television service provider Coopérative de câblodistribution Hill Valley over access to TVA Sports, a Part 1 application claims.
Hill Valley claims in the application, made public Friday, that Groupe TVA is still refusing to negotiate for the sports signal, four years after the Federal Court found Hill Valley had, for a time, violated copyright law by projecting a single signal to multiple hotel rooms without authorization.
Still, Groupe TVA allegedly wants nothing to do with Hill Valley, which…
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The CRTC on Monday announced its intention to establish a joint working group (JWG) to support and guide the co-development of an Indigenous Broadcasting Policy and issued a call for members.
The JWG’s mandate will be to support a collaborative co-development approach with First Nations, Inuit and Métis, including broadcasters, content creators and audiences from those groups, the CRTC said.
“In the Commission’s view, this JWG is essential to the co-development of a new policy, affirming its commitment to co-development made in Broadcasting Notice of Proceeding 2019-217 and in the Notice…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC ruled Monday that Videotron will not be compensated for having to relocate its equipment due to work done by the city of Ottawa.
The regulator said a 2008 municipal access agreement (MAA), which provided no compensation provision for such work, applied to the equipment in question. That MAA was signed by the original lines owner, SRDP Telecommunication Inc., which was subsequently absorbed by Videotron through the acquisition of subsidiary Fibrenoire.
Despite a newer MAA that allows for compensation whenever municipal projects force relocation, the CRTC said the equipment in question – at Montreal Road and Woodroffe Avenue…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Corus is suing Telus for $32.5 million after allegedly discovering that the broadcaster had been improperly collecting a wholesale rate discount on the distribution of its channels.
Corus and Telus are currently negotiating the terms on which the latter will continue to distribute the former’s services. The last distribution agreement, which currently governs their relationship, has not yet been renewed past its expiry on December 31, 2023.
Under the current distribution agreement, Telus pays a lower wholesale rate if it rolls Corus’s services in a package with at least five services – “theme packs” and “pick packs” – which…
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Videotron claims it is also owed $2.8M in BAI deal; Rogers claims Videotron owes it $4M
By Ahmad Hathout
Quebecor’s Videotron is suing Rogers for $151 million over aspects of its acquisition of Freedom Mobile.
Videotron filed a detail-less six-page notice of action in Ontario Superior Court last year that alleged Rogers owed it $91 million in breaches of the Freedom sale agreement, which required Rogers and Shaw to offload the mobile wireless subsidiary to merge. The transactions – Rogers buying Shaw and Quebecor buying Freedom (formerly Wind Mobile) – closed in April 2023.
Since then, Rogers and Quebecor have…
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Regulator pointed to importance of news
By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC approved Thursday the transfer of Corus’s broadcasting licences to a new parent company, NewCo, that will be held by its debtholders, who will forgive $500 million in debt hanging over the media company.
Quebecor, which wanted to buy Corus and did not respond to a request for comment, was the big opposition to the transfer, alleging the media company did not follow-up on its offer to buy and NewCo shareholders will not have the expertise to operate such a business. Corus, which pushed back against…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Canada’s largest telecoms are welcoming news that the federal government will invest in a national internet backbone.
Prime Minister Mark Carney announced at the Canada Investment Summit in Toronto on Tuesday that the government will spend money from private investment, including in the country’s four largest airports, on “new nation-building infrastructure, including a sovereign broadband backbone” that connects Canadians across the country “with more direct and secure links to Europe and Asia.”
When reached for comment, Innovation, Science and Economic Development (ISED) only added Wednesday: “Further details regarding the initiative will be provided in due course.”
One…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC on Wednesday made projects focused on redundant networks eligible for Broadband Fund money.
The regulator confirmed a preliminary review that such projects, which ensure networks are backed up in cases of outages, should be subsidized. A resiliency project is defined by the commission as a second transport route “that provides a similar or greater level of capacity as the existing route but that is geographically or technologically diverse.” This can also apply to satellite projects.
“The benefits of high-speed Internet and cellphone services can only be fully delivered with reliable access,” the CRTC said in its decision….
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