OTTAWA – A coalition of media stakeholders has published a draft report calling for a more coherent approach to community media in the digital environment.
The report, Community Media in the Digital Era: Relic or Renewal, is based on an online survey and focus groups that were conducted in August and September of this year. There were 419 respondents to the survey from 152 communities in all ten provinces, the Yukon and NWT, and over half were from urban centres.
Highlights from the report include:
– Most respondents were aware of a community media organization in their communities. Community newspapers had the…
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OTTAWA–GATINEAU – Some two thirds of Canadians own a smartphone, and nearly half of Canadians use tablets, according to the 2015 edition of the CRTC’s Communications Monitoring Report.
The report, released Tuesday, is an overview of the six sectors of the telecommunications industry including local, long distance, Internet, wireless, data, and private line. It is the second of three parts in the Communications Monitoring Report.
The adoption of smartphones and tablets continues to grow, with 67% of Canadians owning a smartphone in 2014 compared to 62% in 2013. Tablet ownership increased to 49% compared to 39% year-over-year. The percentage of Canadians…
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PEOPLE ARE ALREADY CALLING Justin Trudeau our first “selfie” Prime Minister. Images of him on the campaign trail – and the day after the election – mugging with various Canadians who have one arm outstretched and the other around our PM-to-be number in the hundreds of thousands. He’ll apparently even click it for you, if you like.
Of course, those snapshots are then uploaded to the likes of Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter, LinkedIn or any other sharing platform to display to followers around the country and the world. Just Google “Justin Trudeau selfie”.
Invariably, those images ride…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – Two home-improvement companies have paid a total of $170,000 as part of settlements over violations to Canada's telemarketing rules, the CRTC said Monday.
Acting on complaints, the Commission investigated Canadian Choice Home Improvements Inc. and Le Groupe Hydro Hvac Inc. for presumed violations of the Unsolicited Telecommunications Rules. The investigations established that Canadian Choice Home Improvements Inc. was registered but failed to subscribe to the national do not call list (DNCL), and that Le Groupe Hydro Hvac Inc. had not registered nor subscribed to the list during specific timeframes. Both companies contacted consumers who are registered on the…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC has wrapped up a fact-finding exercise with Canada’s wireless service providers as part of its review of next-generation 9-1-1 services.
In a letter to the country’s WSP’s dated October 23, 2015, the Commission acknowledged that the companies have “proactively deployed hybrid location determination technologies that combine handset capabilities with network capabilities to offer the most accurate caller-location information possible to PSAPs”. This includes assisted-GPS and network-based technologies such as tower location, Round-trip time, and Advanced Forward Link Trilateration.
The CRTC said in the letter that it expects WSPs to continue to invest in the best-available wireless location…
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OTTAWA – All Canadian telecom service providers must continue to be members of the Commissioner for Complaints for Telecommunications Services (CCTS), at least for now, says the CRTC.
The Commission issued the interim decision Friday, as it continues to review the structure and mandate of the CCTS. The CCTS is an independent organization designed to resolve complaints between consumers and their telecommunications service provider.
With the current membership requirement set to expire on December 20, 2015, before the Commission has made its determinations related to the review, the CRTC said that this decision “will provide regulatory certainty”.
www.crtc.gc.cawww.ccts-cprst.ca
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OTTAWA – Late Thursday, Bell Canada applied to the Federal Court of Appeal for leave to appeal the CRTC’s recently announced Wholesale Code of conduct which it established for the TV industry as part of its Let’s Talk TV policy review process.
The Commission released the Code September 24th.
The CRTC has overstepped its jurisdiction with this Code, says the Bell application to the court. “The purpose of the Wholesale Code is to govern the commercial relationships between Programming and Distribution Undertakings. In doing so, the Wholesale Code conflicts with the Copyright Act and exceeds the CRTC’s…
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TORONTO – Ontario CRTC commissioner Raj Shoan says chairman Jean-Pierre Blais has been exceeding his authority by “unilaterally” naming panels of commissioners to hear and decide upon certain applications made to the Regulator and so Shoan has asked the Federal Court of Canada to prohibit the chair from naming such panels on his own.
Shoan’s application to the Court and his affidavit says chairman Blais has convened all commissioner panels for CRTC matters, but also that the chairman is not technically allowed to do that on his own. Instead those decisions are supposed come from a committee, not just the…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – For the first time, more Canadians subscribe exclusively to mobile wireless services than to wired landline telephone services, according to the 2015 edition of the CRTC’s Communications Monitoring Report on the state of Canada’s communications system.
The report, released Thursday, provides an overview of the Canadian communication industry for the year ended August 31, 2014. As it did last year, the Commission will release the report in three parts, with data on the telecommunications sector and broadcasting sector still to come.
According to the report, 20.4% of Canadians opted solely for mobile wireless services than their traditional landline telephone…
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OTTAWA – The radio market of Hamilton and Burlington in Southern Ontario won’t be tuning in to a new station anytime soon after the CRTC determined that the area cannot sustain any additional new commercial radio stations at this time.
The Commission said Wednesday that it will therefore return the application originally filed by Byrnes Communications Inc. for a broadcasting licence to operate a commercial radio station in the area, and will not issue a call for new applications.
In a lengthy dissent, Commissioner Raj Shoan said that the decision “does a disservice to the residents of Burlington”, noting that “Burlington…
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