DELTA, B.C. – Shaw Communications trucks have rolled into Delta, B.C. as Shaw Communications has launched an overbuild program in the region.
Shaw president Peter Bissonnette told Cartt.ca Monday afternoon that it began expanding its network about three weeks ago after receiving approval from the CRTC to grow its cable territory into Delta, Ladner and the surrounding areas southeast of Vancouver.
“We’ve got our cable up one side of the street and theirs on the other,” Bissonnette said when asked about the existing company already there, Bragg Communications-owned Delta Cable.
“We’ve been receiving calls from people there saying they would like to…
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DELTA, B.C. – Shaw Communications trucks have rolled into Delta, B.C. as Shaw Communications has launched an overbuild program in the Delta, B.C. region.
Shaw president Peter Bissonnette told Cartt.ca Monday afternoon that it began expanding its network about three weeks ago after receiving approval from the CRTC to grow its cable territory.
“We’ve got our cable up one side of the street and theirs on the other,” Bissonnette said when asked about the existing company already there, Bragg Communications-owned Delta Cable.
“We’ve been receiving calls from people there saying they would like to get Shaw,” said Bissonnette.
More to come.
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OTTAWA – Astral Media Radio has offered to donate $750,000 to make up for a 2008 Canadian content development (CCD) contribution shortfall impacting 65 of its commercial radio stations.
According to Astral’s application to the CRTC on Monday, the shortfall for the 2008 broadcast year amounted to $659,752, and was due to “a misunderstanding of its transitional CCD conditions of licence”.
Astral has proposed directing $450,000 or 60% to MUSICACTION and $300,000 to the Community Radio Fund of Canada to be paid out over the next seven years.
The deadline for the submission of comments and/or interventions is October 13,…
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GATINEAU – Rogers Cable has been subjecting new pay TV service Super Channel to “an undue disadvantage” in its marketing, the CRTC ruled this morning.
Contrary to section 9 of the Broadcasting Distribution Regulations, which say all channels have to be treated equally, the Commission has directed Rogers to file, by October 19th, written documentation “setting out the steps it will take to ensure that, in future, its marketing of Super Channel does not result in the service being subjected to an undue disadvantage,” reads the decision.
The Regulator, however, said there was insufficient evidence to establish that Rogers has…
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HOLDING A HEARING ON fee-for-carriage one month after a hearing on fee-for-carriage sounds stupid to the extreme, on the face of it, anyway.
However, in a very political move, Heritage Minister James Moore yesterday told the CRTC it must hold a hearing into the issue of fee-for-carriage so that consumers can have a chance to participate in the process and make their voices heard.
Of course, mobs of consumers (more than 12,000 submitted form letters supplied to them by Rogers) are already participating, or have already participated, in BNC 2009-411, and November’s hearing into group licensing and fee-for-carriage is…
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IN A VIRTUALLY unprecedented display of unity, Canada’s biggest broadcasters and BDUs unanimously agreed that the federal government’s decision to step in on the fee-for-carriage issue was a good one.
In a joint statement, CTV, Global and CBC all said that they welcomed the government’s “commitment to consumers” and “new negotiation for value regime”.
"We are in agreement that consumer interests should be front and center when it comes to implementing a new negotiation for value model for local television across the country," said Charlotte Bell, Global’s SVP of regulatory and government affairs, in the statement. "Going forward, we welcome a clear…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – The CRTC was quick to reply to the government’s request to hold consumer hearings into the fee-for-carriage debate.
It will begin public hearings this December, the Commission said in a statement, with a report to the government to follow.
In addition to soliciting feedback on the implications of fee-for-carriage (or a compensation regime for the value of local television signals, as the Commission calls it), Canadians will also be able to respond to the proceedings at the November broadcaster hearings.
Click here to the read the Commission’s formal reply to Heritage Canada.
www.crtc.gc.ca
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OTTAWA – The Supreme Court of Canada has told the CRTC is can do what it pleases with the $650 million in deferral account money.
That means the Commission’s plan of giving some back to urban telecom customers who overpaid – while rural areas with little broadband will be able to draw on a few hundred million for more access, will go ahead.
The Court dismissed appeals from the major telcos and consumer groups that wanted the money to be doled out differently.
“While distinct questions arise in each of the appeals before us, the common problem is whether the CRTC, in…
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TORONTO – Canada’s two largest cable companies have very different opinions of a nine-year old agreement that had its genesis during a March 2000 dinner in Toronto between Ted Rogers and Jim Shaw – and the dispute has led the country’s two largest cable companies to court.
Rogers Communications is asking the Ontario Superior Court of Justice for an injunction blocking the $300-million sale of Hamilton’s Mountain Cablevision because Shaw signed a letter that became effective in March of 2001 which says the Calgary-based MSO wouldn’t mess in Rogers’ territory and the big red machine would stay out of the…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – Despite the fact the CRTC is set to take a new look at fee-for-carriage for local broadcasters in a hearing this November, Minister of Heritage James Moore today announced that the Government of Canada issued an Order-in-Council requesting the Commission “hold hearings and provide the government with a report on the implications of implementing a compensation regime for the value of local television signals, more commonly known as fee-for-carriage.”
The CRTC, says the government’s release “is to consider the views of the general public regarding the impact of such a measure. By making this request of the CRTC,…
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