OTTAWA – The CRTC has extended its deadline for comments on draft electronic commerce protection regulations.
The Commission said Monday that comments are now due by September 7th, more than a week later than its initial deadline of August 29.
The move comes in response to a request from the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association (CWTA) made late last month. The CWTA said in a letter to the CRTC that "there would be merit" in extending the deadline to coincide with the end of the comment period applicable to the related draft regulations proposed by Industry Canada.
www.crtc.gc.ca
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OTTAWA – The CRTC is seeking input on proposed new French and English-language closed captioning quality standards for television broadcasters.
The closed captioning quality standards are sets of standards, one for each official language market, that address the quality of closed captioning provided by Canadian television broadcasters. Once approved by the Commission, all TV licensees will be required to adhere to the closed captioning standards through conditions of licence that will be applied at the time of licence renewal or approval of a new licence.
The deadline for comments on the French-language closed captioning quality standards is September 14 and the…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC is set to release its revised policy on campus and community radio this week, Cartt.ca has learned.
The new amendments, which will come into effect on September 1st, will reflect determinations made in the Commission’s regulatory framework for campus and community radio released in July 2010, plus feedback from the industry.
The matters addressed by the policy include:
– the role, definition and mandate of campus and community radio stations; – a simplified approach to licensing campus and community stations, including elimination of the campus instructional category, elimination of the distinction between Type A and Type…
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OTTAWA – Following a CRTC hearing that could determine the internet prices and options available to Canadians, the Canadian Network Operators Consortium (CNOC) had applied to the CRTC for “clarification and expedited relief concerning the manner in which cable companies intend to implement directives in Telecom Order 2011-377.”
The Commission had directed cable companies to issue, by June 23, 2011, tariff pages with interim rates for wholesale high-speed access services. Final rates for these services will be set at the conclusion of the proceeding.
CNOC, which represents a number if independent ISPs, has expressed concerns “about how the major cable…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC will cease issuing multipoint distribution system (MDS) licenses as of September 1, 2011 and will now require companies to apply for standard broadcast distribution licenses. The Commission ruled that existing licenses for those undertakings will simply lapse on that date.
The Department of Industry had converted various broadcasting certificates issued to MDS undertakings to Broadband Radio Service (BRS) licenses. Any BRS licensee that requires a CRTC license because it chooses to offer broadcasting services, but does not meet all criteria set out in the Commission’s exemption order for broadcasting distribution undertakings (BDUs), will be need to…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC has approved a trio of new specialty channels, including a five-year license for Shaw Television to operate Shaw Media Sports, a national, English-language service that has been licensed as a Category C service.
Shaw is the latest media company to apply and receive permission to operate a sports channel, since the CRTC opened up competition in the mainstream sports segment. Rogers, CBC and MLSE have previously applied to the regulator and been approved to launch their respective sports channels, but one wonders what big name sports rights are left for another new sports channel to acquire.
Category…
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LOS ANGELES and TORONTO – A company that produces the ad-supported application textPlus – which provides free text messaging – has announced users in Canada can now obtain their own free phone number to support free and unlimited texting with anyone, whether they are using textPlus or not.
The mobile social messaging app is available from GOGII and is for Android and iOS devices. It reaches over 50 million users in 193 countries/territories, says the company. To date, GOGII claims there have been 60 million messages sent per day and over 14 billion overall messages sent in the textPlus…
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GATINEAU – Back in June of 2007 when CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein was just about five months on the job, the Commission denied CTVglobemedia’s request to keep the Citytv stations as part of the company’s purchase of CHUM Limited.
Since CTVgm (now Bell Media) already owned CFTO-TV in Toronto along with existing stations competing in Citytv’s other markets, the Regulator held firm to its one broadcast station per market policy of the same language, disallowing that portion of the sale. Weeks later, Rogers Communications stepped forward to buy the Citytv stations.
When it issued its decision then, the…
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DARTMOUTH, N.S. – Radio broadcaster Newfoundland Capital Corp. has reported profits of $5.9 million in the second quarter, up from $2.5 million in the same quarter last year. Revenues increased to $33 million from $30 million.
Newcap also announced agreements to acquire the independently owned radio stations CKKO FM of Kelowna and CIGV FM (along with its two repeater licenses) of Penticton, British Columbia, subject to approval from the CRTC.
"These licenses are a great fit for our company. It is in a growing area of the country and gives us a presence in British Columbia’s Okanagan Valley. There is potential for…
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THE QUEBEC MARKET is the country’s Bizarro World for Canadian content. Frame its borders with mirrors and the reflected image offers the opposite of everything we know, and believe, in the rest of Canada when it comes to culture.
Francophone broadcasters don’t have to air Cancon; they like and want to air it. They don’t air the minimum CRTC-required hours in prime time. They go over and above them. They invest in their own Cancon and promote it. That’s crazy talk for English language broadcasters.
But, it doesn’t take voodoo to ensure success. There’s no magic elixir or Harry Potter-style wand…
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