IF YOU JUDGED BY the various ad campaigns, Facebook pages and Twitter streams, you’d be thinking that the hearing beginning today in Gatineau is only about whether or not conventional broadcasters should get a fee for their signal.
Well, granting the broadcasters the right to negotiate a fee for carriage of their local TV signals is a foregone conclusion. I’m convinced this will happen. The term “negotiation for value” – which has begun to replace “fee-for-carriage” in the industry lexicon – was coined by CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein himself earlier this year and while I’m not necessarily opposed to…
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OTTAWA – We choked a little on our coffee when we read the co-signers, but a letter to Industry Minister Tony Clement – to be printed Monday in an ad in the Hill Times newspaper – urges him to respect the Telecom Act as he reviews the CRTC’s decision on Globalive’s lack of Canadian ownership.
Signed by western competitors Telus and Shaw Communications, along with the Canadian Film and Television Producers Association (which often doesn’t see eye-to-eye with carriers) and wireless newbie Public Mobile, the letter reinforces to the Minister that the CRTC was and is right to tell Globalive…
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TORONTO – While much of the industry’s attention will be focused on a plain, grey building in Gatineau on Monday (btw, anyone else see the irony that the Cable Public Affairs Channel is the only place providing full video coverage of the hearing this week on cpac.ca?), a couple of other interesting items are on the industry docket this week.
Rogers Communications is apparently still set to launch its new broadband video customer portal in a soft launch to certain customers this week.
More irony here… While the closed shop, regulated, OTA, MPEG2 and RF driven system is being debated in…
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TORONTO – As his wireless company nears its launch in the new year, Public Mobile CEO Alek Kristajic was talking tough this week, addressing how the company plans to attack the Canadian marketplace while applauding the CRTC for standing firm on Globalive’s ownership shortcomings.
Speaking at the Scotia Capital 2010 Telecom and Tech Conference on Tuesday, Kristajic (a former Rogers Cable and Bell Canada executive) emphasized how he believes his company is going after a market that no one else has tended to yet: “the low end of the market that doesn’t have a cell phone,” he said.
When western markets…
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GATINEAU – All right, we don’t recall CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein ever brandishing a gavel, the headline is just our way of saying Cartt.ca will provide daily (or even more frequent, as required) coverage of the CRTC hearing into the latest “fee for carriage” or “value for signal” hearing.
Officially, of course, BNC 2009-411 is the “policy proceeding on a group-based approach to the licensing of television services and on certain issues relating to conventional television.”
So while there will actually be some substantial, other, issues debated (like, can priority Cancon obligations be spread across all the channels of an…
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OTTAWA – CPAC will carry live, on-line coverage of next week’s CRTC hearings on group licensing for broadcasters and fee for carriage for local conventional TV stations.
Starting Monday, the parliamentary channel will stream the proceedings on its website www.CPAC.ca. The hearing will be broadcast on the television channel at a later date.
And, of course, Cartt.ca will be there too with daily reports.
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OTTAWA – The Canadian Film and Television Production Association is urging Industry Minister Tony Clement to be “vigilant” and “not submit to the current pressures being exerted” in his review of Globalive Wireless.
In letter dated November 9, the CFTPA said that Minister Clement has its “strong support for holding firm to the current Canadian ownership and control requirements in the telecommunications and broadcasting sectors”.
“We believe that the current ownership and control rules are a positive force in the Canadian economy”, reads the letter, which is signed by president and CEO Norm Bolen. “They are necessary to ensure that Canadians…
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OTTAWA – In a letter to incumbent telcos and others involved in the recent review of Globalive’s ownership by the CRTC, Industry Minister Tony Clement has asked for even more information as he examines the Commission’s call on the prospective new wireless entrant.
On October 29 the CRTC decided that since Egypt-based Orascom Telecom owned 65% of the equity in Globalive and virtually all of the debt, that the company was not Canadian controlled and could not operate as a telecom company in Canada. Our Telecom Act says our telcos, cablecos and broadcasters have to be majority Canadian-owned and…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC has approved the transfer of CHEK TV’s assets from Canwest to a numbered company owned by station employees, a local investment group and the Communications Energy and Paperworkers Union.
In a decision on Monday, the CRTC identified the purchase price for the transaction as $2.00. It also noted that the station “is currently losing approximately $12 million per year and has not shown any marked improvement in profitability over the past three years”.
The Commission also renewed the station’s broadcasting licence through August 31, 2016, though said that given the specific context of the renewal…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC has received over 15,000 submissions – and counting – on the issues of fee for carriage and the digital transition, after encouraging Canadians to take part in the public consultation process that ended Monday.
According to the broadcaster backed coalition ‘Local TV Matters’, support for local TV has been “unprecedented”. And a CRTC source says those cataloguing the submissions are working nearly 24/7.
“We are overwhelmed by the outpouring of clear and unequivocal support for our position," said Paul Sparkes, EVP of corporate affairs for CTVglobemedia, in a statement on Wednesday. "Canadian consumers were not fooled, they understood…
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