OTTAWA-GATINEAU – The CRTC has shuttered its investigation into Rogers’ Internet traffic management practices, noting that its concerns over the company’s practice of slowing down certain types of Internet traffic have been satisfied.
The Commission launched an enforcement action late last year after receiving a complaint from the Canadian Gamers Organization alleging that Rogers’ throttling of peer-to-peer traffic created a major impediment to online game playing. After the CRTC found its practices in breach of the net neutrality rules within the Telecommunications Act, Rogers announced that it would phase out its traffic shaping policy for all customers by December…
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NEW YORK and VANCOUVER – One of Telus’ biggest shareholders is demanding that the telco disclose its current foreign ownership levels to verify that it is in compliance with the Canadian ownership requirements.
U.S. hedge fund Mason Capital Management LLC made public a letter that it sent Telus on Thursday citing information from the proxies submitted for Telus’ recent annual shareholders meeting which it claims shows that approximately 42% of voting shares voted at the meeting were held by shareholders who declared themselves non-Canadian or refused to answer the required declaration as to their residency. Under the Telecommunications Act and other related statutes,…
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GATINEAU – Unless there is a last minute change of heart from one side or the other, a panel of three CRTC commissioners will soon decide the terms of the next carriage agreements for 29 Bell Media specialty channels on a number of independent BDUs.
The Commission panel will choose one offer over the other in the final stage – known as Final Offer Arbitration (FOA), sometimes referred to as “baseball arbitration” – of this carriage battle. It’s high-risk business brinksmanship. In Major League Baseball, if a player and his team can’t come to a negotiated salary agreement, an arbitrator…
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OTTAWA – Telus, Cogeco, Eastlink and MTS Allstream have all told the CRTC that they are opposed to BCE and Rogers’ proposal to take control of sports channels Leafs TV, NBA TV Canada and Gol TV Canada from parent Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment (MLSE).
The interventions filed by the independent distributors claim that the move, which comes as part of the BCE/Rogers $1.32 billion bid for a majority stake in MLSE, “are bad for the Canadian broadcasting industry, further extending the control exerted by these large vertically integrated conglomerates”.
“Increasing the already extensive market power enjoyed by vertically integrated programming…
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OTTAWA – Bell Aliant has received CRTC approval to compete with regional rival Eastlink in Sudbury, ON.
After receiving an application by Bell Aliant last December and a public hearing in March, the Commission said Friday that it has approved the company’s application for a regional broadcasting licence to operate a terrestrial broadcasting distribution undertaking to serve Greater Sudbury.
The BDU's licence will expire August 31, 2018.
www.crtc.gc.ca
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GATINEAU – In what could be described as a case of “turnabout is fair play”, Globalive has formally questioned the Canadian bona fides of Telus and has asked the CRTC to hold a public hearing on the matter.
Globalive (which, of course, does business under the Wind brand) says that Telus’s recent aborted attempt to convert to a single share structure blew the lid off of the Vancouver-based telco’s non-compliance with the country’s telecom ownership rules and that it may well be in breach of the Telecom Act. So, a full public hearing must be held…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – The CRTC has given Rogers the green light to move ahead with its acquisition of Saskatchewan Communications Network (SCN), however, the deal may be a little more expensive than Rogers had anticipated.
The Commission said Thursday that Rogers may continue to broadcast commercial programming and advertising on the educational service, as its previous owner Bluepoint Investments was allowed to do. But it also directed Rogers to invest an additional $1 million on independent production in Saskatchewan over the course of the six year licence term in order to “maintain the integrity of its licensing process and properly reflect SCN’s…
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GATINEAU – It took some time, but the CRTC got into the meat of Sirius XM Canada’s licence renewal application on Thursday afternoon, quizzing the company about its proposal for a decreased Canadian talent contribution (CTD) charge and insistence that its licence be renewed for seven years.
While the company wants a 90% reduction in its CTD charge, a renewed licence with a shorter term could have potentially damaging impacts on satellite radio in Canada, Sirius XM insisted during its appearance.
“Why would choose to support the satellite radio dashboard proposition when the proponent is regulated and subject…
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TORONTO – Toronto Blue Jays owner Rogers Communications is sponsoring an application by the MLB Network that could make the baseball network available for distribution in Canada.
The U.S. cable channel has officially applied to be added to the list of list of non-Canadian programming services authorized for distribution in Canada on a digital basis. Dedicated solely to coverage of major league baseball, MLB Network says that it covers all 30 MLB clubs through its original sports news, talk and analysis programming, and the live broadcast of up to 150 regular season and spring training games.
In its application, the channel maintains that it…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC will stage a public hearing starting Tuesday morning to consider 18 renewal applications from radio stations that are in apparent non-compliance with the Commission’s radio regulations and/or certain conditions of licence.
One of the applicants, Aboriginal Voices Radio (AVR), issued a statement Monday accusing the Commission of censorship after being directed to restrict its presentation to matters pertaining to its licences for CKAV-FM Toronto, CKAV-FM-2 Vancouver, CKAV-FM-3 Calgary, CKAV-FM-4 Edmonton and CKAV-FM-9 Ottawa. AVR, in association with the National Indigenous Media Association of Canada, had proposed that the CRTC also review its native broadcasting policy at that…
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