OTTAWA – According to Telus, wireless newcomer Globalive should be declared ineligible to operate as a telecommunications common carrier in Canada, as it is controlled by persons who are not Canadians.
The BC-based telecom giant made that assertion again this week as it filed comments for the CRTC’s upcoming review into Globalive’s ownership structure.
Globalive is co-owned by Orascom, a global wireless player based in Egypt with over 79 million wireless subscribers. Orascom holds a 65% indirect equity ownership, but less than 50% of voting control in Globealive Holdings, the parent company of Globalive Wireless.
But Telus alleges that Orascom’s ownership…
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WHILE WE WAIT for the CRTC to decide whether or not Al Jazeera English can be distributed in Canada by cable, satellite and telco TV companies, I already have it in my office.
Actually, I have both the English and Arabic versions, right now, on my television. (No Canadian BDU offers the Arabic version because even though it’s on the eligible satellite list, the regs around it say that BDUs must employ Arabic language censors to monitor it 24/7, if they want to launch.)
And yet, here they both are, in standard definition, full-screen quality, on my 30-inch LCD television thanks…
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OTTAWA – After renewing the broadcasting licences of Rogers’ OMNI television stations for another six years, the CRTC has denied its request to broadcast ethnic programming during "peak" time, and to remove the conditions of licence relating to the overlap of programming between OMNI and Rogers’ Citytv stations.
The Commission did approve Rogers’ request to “harmonize” its requirement for Canadian programming across all of its multiethnic OMNI stations. It further agreed to amend the requirement of CJMT-TV Toronto (OMNI.2) for the provision of ethnic programming in order to harmonize it with the conditions of licence of the other OMNI stations, and will…
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DAVE LEWIS HAS BEEN at this satellite thing for a long time. Thirty-one years, to be exact.
He’s worked for Telesat, Alphastar, Cancom/Star Choice, Lincsat and Ciel – just about every satellite company in the country. And he says there’s no way existing Canadian BDUs can offer up all channels in high definition without multi-billion-dollar upgrades which would include a massive consumer set top box swap-out program.
He believes the best way to deliver local-into-local TV signals – and his new company would deliver every OTA broadcaster in Canada – in high definition (including 1080p), is to start over with a…
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VICTORIA – The employees of CHEK TV have come up with a plan to save their station from closing at the end of the month – they’re going to buy it themselves.
Approximately 40 current employees have raised more than $500,000 in a bid to own a 25% share in a company that will try to buy the Victoria-based station from current owner Canwest Global. If successful, the employees will sit on the board of directors at the new company, which will operate the station. The balance will be held by three local investors.
“And we foresee ourselves making a profit…
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THANK YOU FOR DOING what no mainstream reporters did and provide some analysis on the OECD numbers on wireless rates. Your story got it right. You can’t compare the EU and North America.
But why did mainstream media fail so badly in objectively reporting this? There were obvious signals. The first is that the U.S. is rated most expensive, but we all know it’s been accepted as fact that the U.S. has the lowest per minute costs in the world. (See Merrill Lynch Quarterly)
Number two is the minutes of use of the average European in the report: 780…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC has granted interim approval to BCE Inc. to revise the way it charges small Internet service providers (ISPs) who rent parts of its network.
Bell Canada and Bell Aliant can now introduce two new speed options, usage-based billing rates (instead of the flat rate billing they use now), and levy an “excessive usage” charge for its gateway access services (GAS).
GAS is a mandated Bell Canada wholesale service that ISPs use to provide retail Internet services. It carries an ISP’s customer’s Internet traffic from the customer’s location to a point in the Bell Canada network where the aggregated…
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CABLE AND SATELLITE COMPANIES say Ottawa has forced them to stick customers with a fee increase – a “tax”, as they like to call it – to help subsidize local programming. Their spokespeople say viewers should be “vigilant about how much governments are imposing on you.”
Canadians have good reason to be skeptical.
Canada’s cable and satellite industry is in robust good health. Its profits exceeded $2 billion last year (on revenues of more than $10 billion). Not coincidentally, the average customer’s monthly bill has gone up more than 20% since 2002.
It’s hardly onerous to propose that the cable and satellite…
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TORONTO – In a new message on its “save local” web site, CTVglobemedia says it wants cable and satellite bills to be regulated.
As most Canadian BDU customers are becoming aware, their monthly bills are about to rise due to the launch of the new local programming improvement fund (LPIF) September 1st.
That fund, a levy of 1.5% on revenues (or about $102 million a year) will go directly to small market broadcasters to help them weather the economic storm, changing media markets and buy time until a new ownership group based licensing regime is decided – a process which has…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU and MONTREAL – The CRTC has given the go ahead for two new English language FM stations and a French language community FM radio station to serve the areas of Ottawa and Gatineau.
The Commission also approved, with some changes, applications by Astral Media Radio and Torres Media Ottawa for the allocation of the 99.7 MHz and 101.9 MHz frequencies, respectively, and the application by Radio de la communauté francophone d’Ottawa (RCFO) for the French community station. Corus Radio’s application for a local news and information station was denied.
Astral and Torres originally received approval for the two English stations back in…
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