MONTREAL – Viewers Choice, the 23-year-old pay-per-view service owned by Bell and Rogers and carried on cable providers in eastern Canada, is winding up operations and will shut down on September 30, Cartt.ca has learned.
Sources at two distributors said that Bell Media, which holds a majority stake in Viewers Choice, recently sent out notifications of the closure to those offering the service. Those companies include Rogers, Videotron, Cogeco, Eastlink, Bell Aliant, Source Cable and select other smaller providers.
Viewers Choice was set up in 1991 as a partnership between Astral Bellevue Communications Inc. (50.1 per cent), Rogers Pay Per…
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GATINEAU – The press release headlines sound pretty good, but it’s in the conditions, the details, where all this talk of consumer choice and flexibility gets bogged down.
The three largest Canadian vertically integrated media and carriage companies (Bell, Shaw and Rogers) each issued press releases Friday – the day their submissions to the CRTC on its TV Policy Review were due – saying, and we’re paraphrasing here: “boy oh boy, are we consumer friendly and choice leaders!” The big three each said they support more pick and pay, or a-la-carte channel selection, so that Canadians…
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HALIFAX – To celebrate its first anniversary with Air Miles Reward Program, Eastlink is popping up across Atlantic Canada this month to randomly deliver Air Miles reward miles to customers.
In addition, the company is gifting three Air Miles bonus cards each worth 10,000 Air Miles reward miles to customers who register to win by June 30, 2014. As part of the festivities, Eastlink also asked some Atlantic Canadians how they would pay forward their Air Miles. Click here to see what they had to say.
"As the first full-service telecommunications company in Canada to offer Atlantic Canadians Air Miles reward…
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DENVER and TORONTO – World Fishing Network posted the highest single-month viewership in the history of the network during the month of April as part of its North American free preview.
Overall, WFN said that it experienced a 265% increase in average audience viewership in the U.S. during the preview period. Participating providers included Antietam Cable, Bright House Networks, Cablevision (Optimum), CenturyLink, Cox Communications, DISH, MetroNet and Verizon FiOS.
In Canada, Access, Bell, Cablevision du Nord du Quebec, Cogeco, Eastlink, MTS, Rogers, SaskTel, Shaw Cable, Shaw Direct, Source Cable, TBayTel, Telus, Videotron and Westman participated in the preview. While Canadian television…
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EMERALD PARK, Sask. – It may have taken a little longer than expected for Ag-Com Productions to bring The Rural Channel (TRC) to life, but it recently celebrated its one year anniversary. On May 29, 2013 the rural lifestyle and agri-food business channel hit Canadian airwaves through an exclusive distribution arrangement with Shaw Direct.
Originally licensed in August 2008, TRC took five years to come to fruition. It had planned to go to air in 2011, but it had to wait on the launch of Shaw Direct’s new satellite. Even so, Bill Wilson (pictured), founder, president…
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GATINEAU – New entrants and would-be wireless providers find themselves trying to again convince the federal telecom regulator that it needs to intervene in the wireless market. At the same time however, the incumbent operators tell the CRTC everything is working just fine as it is.
The comments come as the CRTC is studying the wholesale wireless services market with the goal of determining if the market is competitive enough or whether it needs to impose more regulations on roaming, tower and site sharing and others. All interventions can be found here. The public hearing is scheduled for September…
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HALIFAX – Eastlink said Friday that it will begin a roll out of its home and business security and automation systems in Ontario and Alberta, a year after launching the service in Nova Scotia.
Now available to residential and business customers in Prince Edward Island, Northern and Southern Ontario, and northern Alberta, Eastlink’s Home and Business Security and Automation allows customers to remotely arm and disarm security, control lights, appliances, thermostat and locks; receive text and email notifications of household events; view live video and pictures on their mobile device and computer; and receive discounts when bundled with other Eastlink…
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TORONTO – beIN SPORTS Canada has added the East Coast and Quebec market to its roster via agreements with Eastlink and Videotron, respectively.
Videotron and Eastlink customers may receive the international sports network as an add-on paid service with their subscriptions. Videotron viewers can find beIN SPORTS Canada on channel 680, while Eastlink customers can access it on channel 425.
“Canadians are great sports fans and have so far welcomed beIN SPORTS CANADA with open arms,” said deputy managing director Antonio Briceño, in Tuesday’s news release. “We're tremendously excited to provide our international sports coverage to eastern Canada and Quebecers.”
beIN SPORTS Play…
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OTTAWA – “Combined, the new entrants spent about $3 billion to acquire spectrum, build networks and go after subscribers,” said John Bitove, the chairman of foundering wireless company Mobilicity – as well as the yet-to-launch Feenix Wireless, which purchased spectrum in this year’s 700 MHz spectrum auction.
He was speaking to delegates at the Law Society of Upper Canada’s Biennial National Conference on New Developments in Communications Law and Policy held in Ottawa last week in a session on the success, or failure, of Canadian wireless policy. Panellists, which also included economist Steven Globerman, Rogers’ Ken Engelhart, and lawyer George…
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OTTAWA – Sun News has cracked the programming lineup at Bell.
The network said Wednesday that it has secured “a long-term spot” on Bell TV's basic satellite television and in Bell Fibe packages, and will also soon be available for the first time ever to Bell Aliant customers. Viewers can find Sun News Network on Bell Satellite TV on channel 506, on Bell Fibe channel 531 (or 1531 for HD) and on Bell Aliant channel 232.
The network said that the agreements follow a CRTC ruling in December “that told cable and satellite TV providers to treat all Canadian news channels…
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