OAKVILLE – The Weather Network/MétéoMédia said today it will make available to broadcasting and telecom companies a data feed of emergency and public safety messages received from Environment Canada and provincial authorities.
The service is free of charge and available immediately, said Pelmorex, TWN/MM’s parent company, in a press release.
With the launch of Pelmorex’s data feed, radio and TV broadcasters, cable and satellite companies will be able to begin developing systems that will allow them to automatically access emergency and public safety messages for broadcast over their networks.
This expanded service gives Environment Canada and provincial authorities the…
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OTTAWA – The CRTC has ordered Bell Canada to publicly disclose information about the level of congestion on its network in conjunction with a dispute with ISPs over the company’s traffic throttling practices.
The commission is giving Bell until June 23 to release the data, which it provided to the regulator in a May 29 filing but wanted to keep confidential for competitive reasons.
“…Commission staff has determined, based on all the material before it, that no specific direct harm would likely result from disclosure, or that the public interest in disclosure outweighs any specific direct harm that might…
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OTTAWA – The federal government asked the CRTC on Friday to report on the accessibility and quality of broadcasting services offered to minority French- and English-language communities.
The request is part of a government-wide initiative, called the Roadmap for Canada’s Linguistic Duality 2008-2013, that is aimed at strengthening the vitality of minority official language communities.
The government said in a statement that it was time to re-look at the issue given the proliferation of new technologies that has transformed the broadcast industry in recent years.
“As the Roadmap for Canada’s Linguistic Duality attests, our government takes very seriously the…
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TORONTO – Will we have smart Internet networks, or big fat dumb pipes? If net neutrality proponents win the debate, we’ll wind up with big fat dumb pipes that’ll be far more congested than they are now. That’s the message three of the four panelists drove home at Wednesday’s net neutrality panel at the 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit.
Net neutrality, although it has different meanings, is essentially about equal access to the Internet. Proponents fear that broadband carriers will use their market power to control activity online and determine what content gets to the consumer first and fastest.
The…
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OTTAWA-GATINEAU – Canada’s TV distributors generated $8.95 billion in revenues in 2007, according to the CRTC’s statistical and financial summaries for Canadian broadcasting distribution companies released Wednesday.
The cable companies accounted for $7.1 billion of the total, while direct-to-home satellite and wireless cablecos brought in $1.85 billion.
Cable revenues were up 16.1% to $7.1 billion in 2007 from $6.1 billion a year earlier, according to the data. The number of basic cable subscribers increased 2.3% to 7.65 million from 7.48 million during that period.
This sector’s profits before interest and taxes (PBIT) rose 10% to $1.5 billion in 2007…
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OTTAWA – The Supreme Court of Canada on Tuesday reserved judgement on an appeal of the $53-million takeover of BCE Inc. by a consortium, including the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan.
BCE took the case to the Supreme Court after some investors in Bell Canada successfully convinced a Quebec Court of Appeal that the acquisition did not adequately consider the impact on Bell bondholders. The Quebec Court of Appeal rendered its decision in favour of the bondholders on May 21.
BCE subsidiary Bell Canada is guaranteeing the $34 billion needed to finance the deal, but the bondholders contend that Bell…
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TORONTO – Industries have converged. Companies have converged. It’s about time the laws and regulations covering the telecom and broadcast worlds converged, too.
That’s the message CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein brought to delegates today at the 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit. (Ed note: This story is a compendium of von Finckenstein’s written text and his verbal comments during the speech.)
After outlining a number of changes implemented and challenges overcome in the past 12 months on the telecom file, the chairman noted that with all that is changing in the industries the CRTC oversees, the Commission is bound by two…
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WINNIPEG – Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN) CEO Jean LaRose praises the CRTC for seeking to “strike a fair middle ground” in its recommendations on how to fix the Canadian Television Fund (CTF).
He added that he’s pleased that the regulator recognized the “special place” that APTN has in meeting the goal of the Broadcasting Act of reflecting the country’s Aboriginal people.
The CRTC recommended that APTN be permitted to tap into both the public sector and private sector streams it is suggesting be created. The CRTC’s suggests APTN get one-third of its funding from the public sector side…
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QUISPAMSIS, NB – The Canadian Cable Systems Alliance (CCSA) conference and annual meeting, including a bulk purchasing trade show, is set for September 21-22 in Mont-Tremblant, Quebec.
The event is an opportunity for CCSA members, programmers, equipment suppliers and other delegates to discuss industry needs and learn about hot topics. The topics of formal presentations on September 22 have not yet been released, but the day also features the trade show, board meeting, CRTC reception for CCSA members only, and a dinner hosted by the board of directors.
The President’s Reception is on September 21, while golf at Le…
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BANFF – Government policy for real new media, including social networks, should not focus on culture, but instead on industrial development, Telus recommends in a white paper on new media released during the Banff World Television Festival.
This approach will provide the flexibility needed to harness the opportunities of new media, suggests the report, entitled “A Friendly Future for New Media.”
“There are huge economic opportunities with new media. We should think about the world as a whole as the market for new media content,” said Telus vice-president of wireless, broadband and content policy Michael Hennessy.
The big western…
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