GATINEAU – Do customers want more choice or more channels? Are the two questions mutually exclusive?
If that sounds like an odd pair of questions because choice and channels can’t be unlinked like that, hear us out, because those two queries are what repeatedly sprung to mind reading the progress reports submitted to the CRTC by Bell Canada, Shaw Communications, Rogers Communications and Vidéotron on the vertically integrated companies’ moves to allow more programming choice and flexibility for their customers.
When it released its new policy on vertically integrated media and distribution companies last fall, the CRTC gave the big four…
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TORONTO – The CBC’s plan to generate revenue by adding advertising to its national radio networks CBC Radio 2 and Espace musique received a warm response by the Association of Canadian Advertisers (ACA). (The proposal has yet to receive CRTC approval.)
The industry organization, which has long advocated for advertising access to CBC/Radio-Canada, said Thursday that the move “allows government to be fiscally prudent while still advancing public policy goals”.
“Advertisers are seeking evermore narrowly-defined target audiences to promote their products and services”, said Bob Reaume, VP of policy and research, in a statement. “They require a depth and breadth of…
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GATINEAU – Revenues for cable and satellite companies increased by more than $1 billion last year but profit margins continue to decline according to financial information released on Wednesday by the CRTC for the broadcast year ending August 31, 2011.
Cable companies reported revenues of $11 billion in 2011 (an 8.2% increase from the previous year’s total of $10.1 billion), for their basic/non-basic television services as well as Internet and telephone services. They however also reported higher operating expenses of 10.7% during the same period which hit $6.1 billion compared to $5.5 billion in 2010.
The CRTC says…
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GATINEAU – Profits of private conventional broadcasters have risen to pre-recession levels mainly due to cuts in overall program expenses says the CRTC in financial information it released Wednesday for the broadcast year ending August 31, 2011.
While revenues for private conventional television stations remained nearly frozen from 2010 to 2011 ($2.147 billion to $2.153 billion), broadcasters managed to cut 7.2% from their operating expenses, reducing them to $1.9 billion from $2.05 billion. The result is that operating profits rose from $11.5 million in 2010 to $160.6 million last year. Including contributions from the Local Programming…
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OTTAWA – The Toronto radio market is gaining a new station after the CRTC approved an application for an English-language commercial FM radio station in Uxbridge, ON.
Controlled by Frank Torres, on behalf of a corporation to be incorporated, the new station has proposed a classic hits format targeting adults aged of 25 and 54 with a heavy dose of local programming including sports, weather forecasts, traffic reports, an events calendar, business reports and special features.
The new station will be a first radio service for the community of Uxbridge. Its licence will expire August 31, 2018.
www.crtc.gc.ca
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OTTAWA – The CBC will eliminate 650 jobs, including 475 this fiscal year, as it struggles to swallow the $115 million in budget cuts announced as part of last week’s federal budget.
President and CEO Hubert Lacroix told staff Wednesday afternoon that it will seek to increase self-generated revenues by adding advertising and sponsorship to its national radio networks CBC Radio 2 and Espace musique (assuming it can get CRTC approval on that), while CBC Radio One and Premiere Chaine will stay ad-free for now, leasing existing real estate, and by divesting of non-core assets, including digital specialty…
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IT’S PRETTY UNUSUAL for dropped cellular phone calls to be mentioned in a Speech from the Throne.
But, that’s exactly what happened last fall when Saskatchewan Lieutenant-Governor Gordon Barnhart said in that speech that “improving digital and electronic infrastructure is essential to the new economy,” and that “(d)ropped cell phone calls are still a problem, despite an increased investment in SaskTel’s 4G network of $170 million in my government’s first term.”
SaskTel’s ownership – the taxpayers of Saskatchewan – is a holdover of the past, when many telcos were government-owned. While its competitors feel competing against the government is unfair, the…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC has put out a call for comments as it prepares to tweak its definitions of “commercial messages” and “demarcation point”.
The Commission said Thursday that it is proposing amendments to the definition of commercial messages, as set out in the Specialty Services Regulations, in order to clarify that non-traditional advertising does not fall within the maximum number of advertising minutes that may be broadcast on specialty services.
The CRTC is also seeking feedback on a request by Bell TV to amend the BDU Regulations so that a licensee that owns inside wire in commercial or institutional properties…
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I READ WITH INTEREST your commentary concerning the dispute between the independent BDUs (CIDG) and Bell Media.
Like Kevin Crull, the CEO of Bell Media, I too have “walked on both sides of the fence” (as noted in his letter of March 28). I was the president of the Canadian Cable Television Association and the CEO of Star Choice, Bell ExpressVu’s principal competitor, now known as Shaw Direct. More recently, I was the head of English services at the CBC, which, like Bell Media, includes a big conventional network and a number…
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LAST FALL, AROUND THE TIME of the CBC’s 75th anniversary, Edmonton MP Brent Rathgeber suggested the broadcaster become more commercially self-reliant. It couldn’t fulfill its mandate if “few people are watching and listening,” in his estimation.
In January, OpenMedia.ca and Leadnow.ca, two citizen engagement groups, launched a campaign to re-imagine the CBC by crowd-sourcing ideas using an online discussion forum. Then, recently, The Toronto Star launched The Network, a site devoted to what’s wrong with the CBC and how to fix it.
The CBC, however, is already “fixing” what it believes needs to…
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