And is about to make the biggest financial mistake in its history
By Barry Kiefl
THE CRTC, APPOINTED BY THE government to safeguard our broadcasting system, in January completed a three-week long public hearing into how the CBC should be spending its $1.7 billion annual budget over the next decade, where CBC executives told the Commission they want to spend close to $400 million annually on internet services by 2022-23 and effectively reduce budgets of traditional radio/TV to accomplish this.
CBC radio already has a smaller budget than CBC digital.
The Commission’s decision on CBC’s licence renewals will be based mostly on unsourced…
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QUISPAMSIS, N.B. – The Canadian Communication Systems Alliance has announced the shortlisted nominees for three of its five contest categories for Tuned-In Canada 2021, the organization’s long-standing annual initiative which celebrates the contributions CCSA-Member independent communications companies make to their communities and for their customers.
Judges Matt Polka (president and CEO of ACA Connects – America’s Communications Association), Suzanne Lamarre (lawyer at Therrien Couture and former CRTC commissioner), Greg O’Brien (editor and publisher of Cartt.ca), and newcomer judge Greg Hemmings (founder and CEO of New Brunswick-based Hemmings House Pictures) have completed the scoring process for the three “Public Voting” contest…
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Real battles will come in front of the CRTC
By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – It was likely not done by design, but the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage could not have lined a more diverse set of individuals and groups as it did on its Friday, February 26 meeting to talk about Bill C-10, the bill to amend the Broadcasting Act.
Author and former CBC English services chief Richard Stursberg, Corus Entertainment, SOCAN, Rogers Communications, Netflix and two community television association groups.
Most, even including Netflix, support Bill C-10 and wish for speedy adoption (the real battles will come in front of the…
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By Ahmad Hathout
OTTAWA – The Supreme Court of Canada will not hear a big telecom appeal about the alleged incorrectness of the CRTC’s decision to reduce the cost for internet capacity purchased by smaller service providers.
The decision, announced Thursday, exhausts the legal routes for a challenge of the August 2019 rates that dramatically reduced the amount that smaller providers would need to spend to purchase network capacity from the larger players. The rates were never implemented because it was almost instantly appealed to the federal government, the courts, and the CRTC, which granted a pause on its own decision…
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By Ahmad Hathout
OTTAWA – The Supreme Court of Canada will not hear a big telecom appeal about the alleged incorrectness of the CRTC’s decision to reduce the rate for internet capacity purchased by smaller service providers.
The decision, announced Thursday morning, exhausts the legal route for a challenge of the August 2019 rates that dramatically reduced the amount that smaller providers would need to spend to purchase network capacity from the larger players. The rates were never implemented because it almost instantly was appealed to the CRTC, the federal government, and the courts.
The SCC does not give reasons for why…
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SWIFT outlines its top five lessons
By Greg O’Brien
OTTAWA – The Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology, which continues its study on the accessibility and affordability of telecom services, must now be inured to overheated rhetoric, but Quebecor Inc. CEO Pierre Karl Péladeau took it a bit further on Tuesday.
After, rightly, singing his own company’s praises when it comes to connecting Quebecers, spending billions on home internet and delivering serious wireless competition in the province and then taking his usual swings at Bell Canada’s “obstruction”, he took aim at third party internet service providers, saying they deliver “zero” in…
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Whatever the SCC decides, all still await the CRTC’s Review & Vary call
By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – The Supreme Court of Canada will, on Thursday morning at 9:45, release a decision on whether it will hear an appeal of the August 2019 decision which the CRTC set new wholesale internet fees for incumbents, a decision which also forced the likes of Bell, Rogers and others to pay retroactive fees to independent resellers.
Both Bell as well as the large traditional cable carriers sought leave to appeal the Federal Court of Appeal decision which upheld CRTC decision 2019-288—Final rates for aggregated wholesale…
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LEOs and wireless and fibre fans and how the government’s spectrum policy lacks vision
By Bill Roberts
ONE OF THE FEW POSITIVE side effects of the Covid-19 pandemic is that it has forced everyone to recognize the importance of access to broadband.
It has also underscored the serious problem of the digital divides, be it an affordability divide or the lack of reliable, robust, fast broadband in rural and remote areas. According to CRTC data, 87% of Canadians have access to excellent broadband speeds with unlimited data, but only 45% of rural Canada and 35% of Indigenous communities have that same access,…
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OTTAWA — Seven in 10 Canadians listen to commercial radio on at least a weekly basis, with 39% saying they listen daily, according to a new report prepared by Ipsos Public Affairs on behalf of the CRTC.
In comparison, 39% of Canadians surveyed for the report said they listen to streaming music services on a weekly basis, while 32% said they listen weekly to CBC/Radio-Canada. The next two most-popular audio formats were podcasts (22% said they listened on a weekly basis) and satellite radio (17%).
According to the report, a car radio is by far the most commonly used device to…
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CCO Tony Geheran on growth opportunities and funding broadband better
By Greg O’Brien
IN THE CANADIAN TELECOM world, the two big eastern Canada-based companies get a lot of the attention from those of us in the press.
And they should. They’re dominant in wireless and broadband and pay-TV in the most populous two provinces in Canada. They also own sports teams and television and radio stations and digital outlets. Their names are on the arenas in which some of our most beloved pro teams play. They’re in the media and they are the media. We can’t help ourselves.
Which means Telus, big as…
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