TORONTO — Organizers of the Banff World Media Festival today announced CRTC chair and CEO Ian Scott will speak on the opening day of the virtual Banff 2021 festival, which starts Monday, June 14.
Scott’s virtual keynote session will kick off the festival’s Marketplace Week (June 14 to 18) and a month of curated online programming (running until July 16).
With delegates from more than 50 countries, the Banff Festival attracts some of the world’s top creators, producers, showrunners, talent, networks, studios, streamers, press and media companies. The 2021 edition of the Festival will build on the success of last year’s…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC today approved an application made by WOW! Unlimited Networks to revoke the broadcasting licence for the former specialty channel known as Comedy Gold.
Back in 2017, when WOW agreed to purchase the channel from Bell Media for $6.86 million, the kids content production company (in which Bell took an ownership stake in as part of the deal for Comedy Gold), said it was going to turn the channel which aired old sitcoms into a kids channel. That, of course, never happened and Comedy Gold went dead at midnight, August 31, 2019, still being run by…
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By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – When Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault tabled Bill C-10 in November 2020, his department issued a Q&A which stated: “As the independent regulator, the CRTC will determine whether and how broadcasting services with differing characteristics are required to contribute, and the form of these contributions.
“If the CRTC requires online broadcasters to contribute to Canadian content at a similar rate to traditional broadcasters, online broadcasters’ contributions to Canadian music and stories could amount to as much as $830 million per year by 2023.”
Members of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage (CHPC), during a meeting held on…
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By Etan Vlessing
OTTAWA – Neil McEneaney, president and CEO of media measurement firm Numeris, was on the hot seat Thursday as he told the virtual CMPA Prime Time conference how the Canadian TV ratings firm collects and measures race-based audience data amid an industry reckoning.
McEneaney told an online panel that while Black Canadians and others from diverse communities were included in Numeris panels for a representative sample of domestic TV viewership, Numeris isn’t “segmenting one race or another” as it focuses on broad Canadian French and English language TV audiences.
He explained Numeris’ “measurement design” for data points is to…
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By Ahmad Hathout
GATINEAU – The CRTC has announced a second round of funding commitment from its $750-million Broadband Fund and it’s going to what the industry has often identified as a serious cost barrier to rural broadband: transport facilities.
On Thursday, the regulator announced five recipients for funds worth a total of $26.7 million, focusing on British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Ontario. Those companies are Rogers, Shaw, BH Telecom Corp., Columbia Basin Broadband Corporation, and Tough Country Communications Ltd., which are expected to connect 41 communities with 550 km of fibre transport.
The first announcement pledged $72 million for satellite and fibre…
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Assuming stability in regs, company to accelerate over $1 billion in capex in 2021 to expand networks
By Greg O’Brien
MONTREAL – While the Covid-19 pandemic shaped Mirko Bibic’s first year as president and CEO of Bell Canada (and the company’s 140th year) in ways no one could have predicted when he took the top job last January, the company’s first 12 months of fiscal results under his leadership look sound, all things considered.
Many other sectors did not weather the pandemic the way telecom companies have (as evidenced by the hit taken by Bell Media).
Fourth quarter operating revenue for the period…
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TORONTO — In a press release issued Tuesday afternoon, Unifor is condemning a round of cuts being made to Bell Media newsrooms this week, saying so far 100 Unifor members in Toronto have been let go, plus more to come outside Toronto, affecting all station operations including news gathering.
As we reported earlier, Cartt.ca has learned 210 positions at Bell Media will be cut in Toronto alone, and the company has laid off all staff in the newsroom of Montreal radio station CJAD.
“Since the beginning of the pandemic, Canadians have seen how important a strong media sector is to…
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By Etan Vlessing
OTTAWA – Janet Yale, chair of the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Review (BTLR), on Monday argued the federal government’s proposed Bill C-10 is “future forward” legislation for the digital age as it seeks to embed increasingly dominant foreign online players in Canada’s TV regulatory system as content curators.
“It’s a simple, effective way to bring online undertakings into the legislative framework and support cultural policy on a like-for-like basis,” said Yale (right) on Monday during a virtual debate with University of Ottawa professor and Bill C-10 critic Michael Geist (left) during the Canadian Media Producers Association annual Prime…
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By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – The 2021 Parliamentary season is back in full swing and the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage began to dig into a pair of important topics over the past few days
This session’s first two meetings, on Friday and Monday January 29 and February 1, dealt with “Relations Between Facebook and the Federal Government,” said the meeting notice – and Bill C-10, the amendments to the Broadcasting Act.
That first meeting was spurred by an email from Kevin Chan, global director and head of public policy, Facebook Canada, sent to the director general of broadcasting, copyright and creative…
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Local stations hit Monday as radio reporter jobs slashed. CFRB newsroom decimated. Cuts at 9 Channel Nine to be announced Wednesday
By Steve Faguy
MONTREAL — After recent cuts at the senior executive and senior manager levels, Bell Media began making major changes at the local level this week, with a so far unspecified number of job cuts happening at local stations and in Toronto.
UPDATE: Since publication of this story, Cartt.ca has learned 210 positions will be cut in Toronto alone. Notices of the mass layoffs have been posted at the Bell Media buildings in Toronto on Queen St. W., 9…
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