Mediaucracy looks at Cancon policy for TV in the global online era
By Len St-Aubin
IN HER FORTHCOMING BOOK, Mediaucracy: Why Canada hasn’t made global hits and how it can, Irene Berkowitz shows how policies intended to support premium Canadian content are colliding with the global online era and that collision is preventing Canada from generating Cancon hits for the global market at a level this country’s world-class production industry is capable of as, ironically, this country turns out global hits for foreign broadcasters and streamers.
The book makes a strong case that this outcome is largely due to a missing link…
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VANCOUVER and OTTAWA — In response to Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry François-Philippe Champagne’s announcement last week the 3500 MHz spectrum auction scheduled for June 15 will not be delayed, independent telecom services provider Novus Entertainment has instead asked for the application process to be reopened.
“Novus would like to propose that the Department of Industry, Science and Economic Development (ISED) simply extend the time allowed for providing an application,” writes Donna Robertson, co-president and chief legal officer of Novus, in a letter sent to Minister Champagne on April 30.
“We would not expect a delay to the auction,”…
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OTTAWA — The department of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) released today its latest quarterly report on wireless plans, which shows prices for the majority of mid-range data plans across Canada have decreased since tracking began a year ago.
As Cartt.ca readers know, the federal government wants service providers to reduce the cost of wireless plans by 25% over two years (from the beginning of 2020 to early 2022), and has been tracking prices since January 2020.
For plans with 2 GB to 6 GB of data, the latest tracking data shows most of these plans have seen price…
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GATINEAU — Bell Canada must make interexchange private line (IXPL) facilities available for lease to competitive local exchange carrier Fibernetics to be used in new local network interconnection (LNI) agreements between the two companies, the CRTC announced in a decision issued today.
In July 2020, Fibernetics sought relief from the Commission, saying it had attempted to negotiate a new LNI agreement with Bell for eight local interconnection regions (LIRs) where Fibernetics wanted to enter as a Type 1 CLEC. According to Fibernetics’ application, it approached Bell about leasing IXPL facilities for LNI in the eight LIRs (located in Ontario…
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TORONTO – Wireless upstart Data On Tap (dotmobile), filed a petition to federal cabinet Tuesday asking the federal government to overturn the portion of the CRTC’s recent wireless policy decision which excluded a mandate for full mobile virtual network operators to participate in the wireless market in Canada.
Dotmobile is Canada’s first full MVNO but has yet been unable to come to a wholesale agreement with any Canadian wireless network operator (company owners say none of the carriers even return their calls seeking a meeting). The CRTC’s much-ballyhooed wireless decision, however, didn’t mandate access for full MVNOs like…
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By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – After a week of complaints that Bill C-10, the bill to update the Broadcasting Act, would instead cause all Canadians’ YouTube videos and Instagram posts and so on to fall under CRTC jurisdiction, Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault said late Monday a new amendment is coming to try and fix the fuss.
On April 23, when Julie Dabrusin, Parliamentary secretary to the Minister of Canadian Heritage, proposed to the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage that Section 4.1 of Bill C-10 should be removed because it “has created some confusion for people on whether or not social media…
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GATINEAU — The CRTC announced today in an information bulletin it is adopting a new standardized approach to monitoring linear community channels and on-demand community programming services, which will serve as general guidance going forward and will come into effect on September 1, 2021.
In July 2020, the Commission launched a proceeding to gather input on its proposed standardized approaches to monitoring community programming. The Commission received 10 interventions from Bell, Rogers, Cogeco, SaskTel, Telus, Csur la tele, the Community Media Advocacy Centre (CMAC), the Canadian Association of Community Television Users and Stations (CACTUS), the Conseil provincial du secteur…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU — The next test of Canada’s national public alerting system, Alert Ready, will be conducted on May 5, the CRTC announced today.
With the exceptions of Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and Nunavut, provincial and territorial emergency management organizations in other parts of the country will issue test alerts to be distributed on TV, radio and compatible mobile devices.
For a wireless device to receive a test alert, it must be connected to an LTE or 5G wireless network at the time the test alert is issued; capable of receiving wireless public alerts; and equipped with a recent Canadian version of…
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OTTAWA – Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, François-Philippe Champagne, said today in a letter the 3500 MHz spectrum auction scheduled for June 15th will not be delayed.
Several companies and organizations had asked for a delay in the auction so that they could reconsider applying, since the CRTC changed its wireless policies just days after the auction application deadline and if they knew then what they know now, they might have applied.
The mid-band spectrum is considered crucial to the roll out of next generation 5G networks.
The minister’s short letter addressed to Distributel CEO Matt Stein, reads as follows:
“Thank…
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Wireless, broadband grow, Covid curtails media, overage revenue continues to shrink
By Greg O’Brien
MONTREAL – Bell Canada reported today it has added 108,468 net new mobile, retail Internet and IPTV customers in the first quarter of 2021, ended March 31st, a 51% increase over Q1 last year.
Company revenue in the quarter grew 1.2% to $5.7 billion, and adjusted EBITDA 0.5% to $2.43 billion, “representing the first quarter of growth since the beginning of the Covid-19 crisis,” reads its press release. Net earnings, however, were down 6.3% compared to Q1 2020 to $687 million.
Cash flows from operating activities jumped 37.3% to…
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