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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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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CALGARY – A group of Calgary-based businesses calling themselves the Calgary Local Ethnic Petitioners is challenging last month’s CRTC decision that awarded two radio licences to serve that city.
South Asian SCMO operators Unison Media and Punjabi – World Network Ltd., along with the not-for-profit organization Diversified Society of Alberta, have submitted a joint petition requesting that the Governor in Council make an order to either set aside or refer the decision back for reconsideration and hearing.
Citing CRTC Commissioner Peter Menzies’ dissenting opinion, (which Cartt.ca detailed here), the group took issue with a CRTC requirement that applicants would only be…
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TORONTO – CTAM Canada has declared its first CTAM Canada U course “a huge success”, and promises to return with another session next year.
More than 40 Canadian CTAM members packed the inaugural class last month at Corus’ Toronto headquarters to hear Harvard Business School Professors Bharat Anand and Rajiv Lal present five cases, including an analysis of the strategies used by Apple and Netflix, as a starting point to explore key issues in today’s highly competitive environment.
The students, who hailed from Astral, CCSA, Corus, Stingray Digital, WFN, the CRTC, Rogers, AOV, A&E, Hollywood Suite, Super Channel, Teletoon, TV5 Quebec, Ogilvey…
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BANFF – The questions have been delivered in almost every conference room, certainly every hallway of the Banff World Media Festival this year. It has also been postured in many forms: How will Google, Apple and Netflix influence the Canadian broadcast industry? Is the CRTC’s present policies helping or hindering the equation? What about vertical integration?
Times, They Are A-Changin’, so what should we do?
At the Canadian Media Leader session late Sunday afternoon, there was some consensus on the state of affairs in the industry and the direction of video production and development in the country.
For starters, Bell Media president…
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TORONTO – Freshly minted Canadian citizen Kevin Crull said Wednesday that without some regulatory change, he fears for the future of the Canadian television system.
Perhaps newly emboldened after becoming a Canadian citizen just last week, the Bell Media president used his luncheon keynote at the Canadian Telecom Summit on Wednesday to heap criticism on the way the regulations governing the Canadian TV industry have mutated over the past couple of years, and to wonder why our knee-jerk reaction as Canadians always seems to fear the big company and how badly it could act, even in the face of the…
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TORONTO – It might be a sign of the ingrained competitive spirit of the telecom industry in Canada that even when wireless carriers manage to agree on a vital issue – the need for a national code to protect wireless consumers’ interests – they still manage to bicker with one another.
During the Canadian Telecom Summit’s “regulatory blockbuster” panel discussion on Tuesday morning, moderated by Cartt.ca editor and publisher Greg O’Brien, regulatory experts from the big three incumbents – Rogers, Bell and Telus – along with MTS Allstream, Wind Mobile Canada and the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC), appeared to…
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OTTAWA – The cost of telecom regulation in Canada is estimated at just over $26 million this year, a slight drop from $27.26 million last year.
The CRTC said Wednesday that it expects that its total telecommunications regulatory costs for the 2012-2013 fiscal year to total $26.421 million. After taking in to account a $0.078 million credit from last year, the amount will equal $26.343 million.
www.crtc.gc.ca
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