By Ahmad Hathout
Google is asking the Federal Court of Appeal to allow it to argue that the CRTC should have included in its new broadcasting fee regulations an explicit exemption for advertisements that are placed on user-generated content.
The CRTC ordered in March a new way it was going to calculate revenues and collect fees for its operations, lowering traditional broadcasting obligations with the transfer of some of that collection to online platforms in line with the new Online Streaming Act that will bring the latter services under its ambit.
During the intervention phase of that 2023 proceeding,…
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Quebecor said it will rethink pricing strategy as a result
By Ahmad Hathout
Quebecor will need to accept Telus’s rate to connect to its wireless network, the CRTC ruled Monday, eliciting a scathing response from the Montreal company that included a promise to reconsider its low-cost pricing and suspend the launch of certain plans in Manitoba.
Telus and Quebecor could not come to an agreement on the price-per-gigabyte component of that access, so they each presented their respective prices and asked the CRTC to make that determination via final offer arbitration.
While it said both offers would allow Quebecor’s mobile virtual network…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Bell will argue before the Federal Court of Appeal that the CRTC was not right to rely on the government’s policy direction to order telcos to provide interim access to their bundled transport and last mile fibre facilities because it is inherently contradicted by the Telecommunications Act.
Section 10 of the 2023 policy direction to the CRTC requires the commission to mandate the provision of an aggregated wholesale high-speed access service. At the same time, section 8 of the Telecommunications Act provides the government with the ability to order the regulator to make decisions of “general application on…
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Access Communications Co-operative announced last week the membership of Regina’s only community radio station, 91.3 FM CJTR, voted overwhelmingly in favour of transferring ownership of the station to Access in a vote held during a special meeting on April 16.
Several months ago, the non-profit organization that runs the station, Radius Communications, presented Access with the opportunity to own the station to preserve community radio, says an Access press release. CJTR was facing financial hardship and was looking for an alternative operating model, the release explains.
“We extend our sincere appreciation to…
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Videotron has filed a Part 1 application asking the CRTC to force the city of Ottawa to reimburse it for being made to reallocate its telecommunication line to make way for city construction projects.
The city had requested that the telecom move its transmission lines and equipment at two locations, one at Montreal Road and another at Woodroffe Avenue, less than five years after it installed the equipment on Hydro Ottawa poles.
When Videotron went to the city in early 2022 to get reimbursed for the $300,000 move, it was denied on the basis that the request to reallocate came from…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Corus is urging the CRTC to hurry up and make a decision on a proposal to grant the media company temporarily relief on its financial obligations to Canadian content and pandemic back pay.
Next Friday will mark exactly six months since the CRTC proposed granting the pure-play media company “exceptional” relief by reducing its spending to programs of national interest from 8.5 to 5 per cent of previous year’s revenues and by extending the time to pay back what it already owes the regulator from the pandemic relief period.
In the days after the decision, Corus…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC is asking for comments by Friday on a request by a consortium of internet service providers urging the regulator to rule on the eligibility of the big three telecoms to lease bundled access to middle and last mile fibre facilities both under the interim, and any future permanent, mandated regime.
The consortium – which is made up of Bell, Cogeco, Eastlink, TekSavvy, and the indie rep the Competitive Network Operators of Canada – filed a request dated March 28 to the CRTC asking for a final ruling before May 7 on whether Bell, Rogers, Telus and…
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By Ahmad Hathout
Rogers wants the CRTC to limit the time telcos reserve space to attach wireless equipment on their own poles, according to a submission to the regulator.
The ask comes in response to a consultation launched by the commission inquiring, among other items, about whether it has jurisdiction over wireless attachments on telco-owned or controlled structures. The CRTC holds the preliminary view that it has concurrent jurisdiction over those structures with the department of Innovation, Science and Economic Development (ISED), which has domain over towers and siting.
Beside recommending that the CRTC confirm that jurisdiction – which…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The CRTC has ordered Cogeco on Monday to ensure TekSavvy can continue to access its facilities at two Ontario locations the cable provider said it would need to migrate to fibre by May 1.
Cogeco’s transition to fibre facilities would lock TekSavvy and its customers out of locations in Burlington and Windsor – where it uses the Montreal company’s older coax facilities – in part because the commission does not allow mandated access to cablecos’ bundled middle and last mile fibre infrastructure, the Chatham-based company argued in an application in January. TekSavvy also alleged Cogeco…
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By Ahmad Hathout
The country’s largest broadcasters are asking the CRTC to wait until it has implemented the rules from the Online Streaming Act before it does anything to the rate that broadcasters must pay to carry certain television programs.
Not-for-profit media company Accessible Media Inc. filed a Part 1 application in February asking the regulator to up the price broadcasters pay it to carry its English-language AMI-tv and French-language AMI-tele programs, citing financial difficulties. It is asking for “modest” 1 cent and 2 cent increases per subscriber per month for the programs, respectively, until the next licence…
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