GATINEAU — The CRTC now says it will expedite an application made by Rogers to review and vary the Commission’s decision in April which gave Bell more time to deploy one-way toll-free (TF) trunks between the two companies’ networks, as part of an ongoing dispute over toll-free call routing.
When the Commission posted the R&V application filed by Rogers to its website on May 27, it set June 26, 2020 as the deadline for interventions. The following day on May 28 in a procedural letter, the Commission revised the deadline to June 8 for interested parties to respond…
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OTTAWA – In August of 2019, the CRTC designated a new English-language closed captioning mandatory quality standard relating to the accuracy rate for live television programming and put the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council in charge of what’s known as the Canadian NER Evaluation Guidelines.
(The NER model is based on (1) the Number of words, (2) ‘Edition’ errors, where a difference arises from a choice made by the captioner to paraphrase the verbatim speech, and (3) ‘Recognition’ errors, where the captioner, or the software used by the captioner, delivers a caption word that is wrong, misspelled, or garbled, according…
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Regional carriers acknowledge opportunity exists, though
By Greg O’Brien
TORONTO – It was heartening to hear from a handful of the top Canadian telecom executives on Wednesday when they detailed how their companies have, admirably, responded to the Covid-19 crisis.
Suspensions of overage fees, no disconnects, working with businesses and consumers to defer payments or re-do packages to help as they struggle financially, serious progress on remote health (especially by Telus), self-installs, employees working from home, networks which have remained robust and resilient, and charitable contributions too numerous to count, it has been an 11-week stretch like none of us have ever…
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By Brad Danks
IN A SERIES OF RECENT ARTICLES, former CRTC commissioners, Konrad von Finckenstein, Peter Menzies and Timothy Denton have all criticized the Broadcasting and Telecommunications Legislative Review Panel Report (also called the “Yale Report”) for one of its key recommendations – bringing all media communications entities under the jurisdiction of the Broadcasting Act.
This is the recommendation intended to include all online services, such as Netflix and similar foreign online streamers, within the Canadian broadcasting regulatory system.
Each of the former commissioners’ objections is slightly different, but all follow two similar themes. The first is the Internet is “free” and…
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By Ken Kelley
TORONTO – Cogeco president and CEO Philippe Jetté said Wednesday he believes the company’s own network advancements are the key to helping fend off Bell’s fibre expansion throughout southern Ontario.
Jetté (above) told the TD Securities Telecom and Media Conference (held online), the company isn’t yet seeing any material impact stemming from Bell’s Fibe rollout in cities like Hamilton, where the two are in direct competition with one another.
“In terms of overlap, Bell isn’t moving fast,” Jetté said. “We’ve seen them take 1% of the fiber-based network. We aren’t too concerned about their progress in these areas, as…
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GATINEAU — Rogers has asked the CRTC to reverse its decision made in an April procedural letter that allowed Bell to delay deployment of one-way toll-free (TF) trunks between Bell’s network and Rogers’ network to carry TF traffic destined for Bell TF numbers until August 17, 2020.
In a review and vary application filed May 20, Rogers says it was given no notice the Commission intended to give Bell a deadline extension for deploying the TF trunks, which originally were to be installed by April 30, 2020. In an abridged copy of the application, Rogers says it will now…
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GATINEAU — Dartmouth, N.S.-based independent telecom provider City Wide Communications has asked the CRTC to order Eastlink to relocate a third-party Internet access (TPIA) point of interconnection to a more central Halifax site, claiming the current location outside of the city gives Eastlink an undue preference.
Currently, Eastlink’s TPIA service point of interconnection (POI) for Nova Scotia is located at its data centre in Pennant Point, which is a rural community approximately 30 kilometres away from downtown Halifax, says the City Wide application
The independent claims in its Part 1 application, filed on May 22 and posted on the CRTC’s…
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LONDON, U.K. — Rural mobile subscribers in Canada enjoy some of the fastest download speeds in the world, says the latest report from mobile analytics company Opensignal.
Released today, The state of rural Canada’s Mobile Network Experience – May 2020 report also found rural mobile subscribers have access to 4G networks close to 90% of the time — a percentage more commonly seen by mobile users in more populated areas, Opensignal says.
For this report, Opensignal analyzed the data of users on Canada’s three largest mobile operators — Telus, Bell Mobility and Rogers. According to its analysis, rural users on the…
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GATINEAU — The CRTC has accepted Cogeco Connexion’s request for final offer arbitration with Bell Media regarding a dispute between the companies over wholesale rates for distribution of Bell’s French language youth channel VRAK.
In a letter dated May 21, the Commission asks Cogeco and Bell to file their final offers for the linear and multiplatform wholesale rates for distribution of VRAK by Cogeco. The final offers are due by June 5, 2020. After examination, the Commission will select one in its entirety and the decision will be binding on the two companies (unless of course they come to…
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GATINEAU — Vista Radio’s application for a broadcasting licence to operate an oldies music FM radio station in North Bay, Ont., was approved Monday by the CRTC.
The English-language commercial FM station will operate on the 90.5 MHz frequency and will broadcast 126 hours of local programming each broadcast week, of which 10 hours and 28.5 minutes will be devoted to spoken-word programming, according to the applicant information included in the Commission’s decision approving the radio station’s licence.
In each broadcast week, seven hours and 46 minutes of spoken-word programming will be devoted to local news and information, with two…
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