By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC is looking for a senior auditor to prepare an annual report detailing the impact of the Online News Act on the Canadian digital news marketplace.
According to a contract published on the federal government’s procurement website Tuesday, the independent auditor or auditors will cover the period between June 2024 to June 2025, with a CRTC option to extend it two additional one-year periods.
Bid closing is October 15.
The CRTC is required to get an independent auditor under the new law, which mandates that foreign tech platforms pay news businesses for linking to their content….
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By Connie Thiessen
Netflix has confirmed it’s pulling back on its film and television training and development programs in Canada, citing mandated CRTC contributions under the Online Streaming Act.
According to the streaming giant, it’s invested more than $25 million in training and development in Canada since 2017, including initiatives ranging from the Pacific Screenwriting Program, to a short documentary effort with Hot Docs, and a five-year partnership with the Canadian Film Centre (CFC) aimed at supporting Canadian talent.
A Netflix spokesperson told Broadcast Dialogue that following the CRTC’s decision to require online streaming services to contribute five per cent of their Canadian revenues to support the…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The province of British Columbia wants the CRTC to stop treating with confidence granular broadband mapping information not designated as such by internet service providers.
The province filed a Part 1 application this month asking the CRTC to stop treating connectivity coverage data down to the 250-meter road segment as confidential if ISPs don’t treat it such. That information includes who services those areas and with what technology and speed.
It is asking that this information cease being deemed confidential and be made public or allowed to be made public in a way that can be searchable by address,…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The Independent Telecommunications Providers Association (ITPA) is urging the CRTC this month to reject a request from Telus to destandardize a form of legacy voice interconnection service in its operating territories because it would allegedly leave new competitors at the mercy of commercial negotiations with the dominant telco with no regulatory backstop.
Telus filed a request in early August asking the CRTC to destandardize and therefore no longer make available to new competitors legacy interconnection technology called time-division multiplexing (TDM) because it claims it hasn’t had a new customer on that technology in over three years and because…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Saskatchewan Telecommunications Holding Corp. has fired Thursday the first challenge to the CRTC’s decision to force it to open its last-mile fibre facilities to its major competitors, alleging the regulator relied in its decision on a cabinet direction that was already beyond the jurisdiction of the Governor in Council.
“The CRTC, by adhering to the cabinet direction, conducted a lengthy consultative exercise, with input from a broad spectrum of industry participants and interested parties, including SaskTel, in service of making a determination that was, in effect, already made,” the Crown corporation says in its memorandum to the Federal…
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By Len St-Aubin, a policy consultant who has worked for clients including Netflix, and was a member of the policy teams that developed the 1991 Broadcasting Act and the 1993 Telecommunications Act
On August 28, Cartt published Howard Law’s commentary rebutting my contention that Bill C-11 and CRTC regulation risk destabilizing market-driven CanCon.
Law took issue with my assertion that foreign streamers have driven the significant increase in foreign investment (FI) in CanCon over the last 10 years:
“…The fact is that foreign television companies around the globe were snapping up CanCon through pre-sales and advances…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Organizations representing news media and their workers are warning the CRTC not to redirect any of the $100 million they were earmarked by Google toward public interest participation in CRTC proceedings related to news linking matters.
The Broadcasting Participation Fund (BPF), which bankrolls public interest participation in CRTC proceedings, filed a Part 1 application this summer requesting that the commission expand its mandate to include matters pertaining to large technology platforms that must pay to link to Canadian news content under the Online News Act. Google has already agreed to put an annual inflation-indexed $100…
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By Connie Thiessen
The CRTC has released its annual snapshot of the broadcast sector for 2022-23, which overall remained profitable, with the exception of conventional television.
For the 2023 broadcast year, ended Aug. 31, 2023, the commission’s report says Radio, Discretionary TV, and Broadcast Distribution Undertakings (BDUs) remained in the black, while Digital Media Broadcasting Undertakings (DMBU), like Spotify and Disney+, experienced ongoing revenue growth. Conventional television continued to operate at a loss. In total, broadcasting revenues decreased by 0.37 per cent from the 2022 to 2023 broadcast year.
Commercial Radio reported a revenue decrease of .55 per cent, Conventional TV (-7.16 per cent), Discretionary TV…
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Peladeau lambasts “contradictory” decision
By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC said Thursday that Quebecor must come to an agreement on separate terms with Bell unrelated to the commission-approved tariff in order to access the telco’s national wireless network.
After the commission picked Bell’s access rate in final offer arbitration with the regional carrier last fall, Quebecor filed a complaint to the CRTC alleging Bell is attempting to delay its access to the large network by making it agree to terms that were outside of those already approved by the commission – and that there was an expected access date of…
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The CRTC is committing more than $17 million through its Broadband Fund to Bell Canada, TBayTel, Telus Communications and Sogetel Mobilité to build new cell towers and improve mobile wireless service along eight major roads, the telecom regulator announced Wednesday.
The four telecommunications service providers submitted their funding applications in response to the CRTC’s third call for applications to the Broadband Fund.
Bell has been approved for up to $1.05 million in funding to build a cell tower to serve approximately 15 kilometres of Route 330 near the community of Gander Bay South in Newfoundland and…
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