By Ken Kelley
OTTAWA – In an already competitive landscape where ad dollars are becoming tougher to secure, the Covid-19 pandemic piled yet a new challenge on top of several long-simmering issues for independent broadcasters in the country.
Appearing virtually before the Standing Committee of Finance, Luc Perreault, an advisor to Stingray (and former Pelmorex executive), outlined the challenges the Independent Broadcast Group (IBG), a consortium of 10 independent Canadian TV broadcasters, have seen over the last three months.
“We estimate the broadcast advertising market has shrunk by 50%, or more since January,” Perreault said. “Before Covid-19, the Canadian ad market was…
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TORONTO – It’s been a while in the works, but Bell Media, Corus Entertainment, Rogers Sports & Media, and Quebecor Media have announced an agreement in principle to adopt a common set of advanced advertising audience segments, thinktv announced today.
Thinktv member companies are joining forces to adopt a shared set of 19 audience segments for advanced advertising on linear television. It’s not the full integration of Corus’ Cynch platform (which Rogers already uses and which Corus has been trying to get Bell on board), but it’s a good start. Please click here for the breakdown and explanation…
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OTTAWA – While the TV industry was hoping to hear about more help from the $500 million Covid crisis aid funding from Canadian Heritage when it announced phase two of the plan, the federal government only announced limited components today.
Phase one funds are already being doled out to CMF, Telefilm and sports organizations.
Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault today announced $25.7 million in new funding for national museums (the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, the Canadian Museum of History, the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21, the Canadian Museum of Nature, the National Gallery of Canada, the Canada…
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Including two that won’t cost a cent
By Greg O’Brien
CAL MILLAR DOESN’T want to kick the federal government while it is scrambling hard to keep Canadians healthy and our economy upright. However, broadcasters need more help and Millar and his fellow broadcasters have some ideas.
The president of Channel Zero (owners of CHCH, Rewind and Silver Screen Classics) is genuinely thankful for what the federal government has already done for broadcasters, and the country, in trying to manage an unprecedented health crisis that has decimated the economy while we all tried, and try, to do the right things to make sure…
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By Doug Barrett
HERITAGE MINISTER STEVEN Guilbeault’s appearance at the virtual Banff World Media Festival Tuesday morning was a bit of a revelation to me, and in a surprisingly good way.
We usually show up to these things expecting the three Ps: politics, platitudes and postponement – and certainly the various industry and media appearances of one of Mr. Guilbeault’s Liberal predecessors met all three of those tests, sometimes in the case of her appearance on Toute le Monde en Parle in 2017, famously so.
However, Guilbeault’s time Tuesday was, I almost hate to say it, refreshingly different.
Why?
First, he was well…
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By Ken Kelley
AS THE WORLD continues to grapple with the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic, the television industry mostly remains in a holding pattern that has executives attempting to plot their next move amongst a backdrop of uncertainty on multiple fronts.
That topic and how broadcasters and producers are dealing with systemic racism were at the centre of Media Leaders 2020: The Path Forward, a discussion held Tuesday at the virtual Banff World Media Festival. Moderated by Variety Magazine’s Manori Ravindran, guests on the panel included Lionsgate Television group chairman Kevin Beggs; Sandra Dewey, president, business operations and productions HBO…
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MARKHAM — Independent telecom services provider Iristel announced today a new service designed to help customers eliminate unwanted telemarketer and spam phone calls.
“We are dedicated to rooting out abuse on our telecom networks and taking corrective action, where possible, and lead the industry with innovative solutions for protecting Canadians,” said Samer Bishay, Iristel president and CEO, in the news release. “We are the first telco in Canada to specifically block an abuser from contacting a user when the abuser is using a service provided by Iristel.”
Iristel says its anti-spam service has been in the planning and testing stages…
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TORONTO — Saloon Media, a Blue Ant Studios company, announced Tuesday it has hired Melissa Williamson (pictured) for the newly created role of senior vice-president of scripted content.
Based in Toronto, Williamson will oversee the development and production of all scripted series across comedy and drama for Saloon Media. She reports to Michael Kot, Saloon Media’s managing director.
Prior to joining the company, Williamson was president of Toronto-based production company Pier 21 Films, most recently serving as executive producer on Pier 21’s news satire The Beaverton for CTV. Williamson began her career working in Los Angeles for independent production company Blueprint…
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By Denis Carmel
GATINEAU – In 2015, the CRTC decided to move from mandatory aggregated services to disaggregated services when it comes to wholesale high speed access services for the Internet, in Québec and Ontario.
That would allow competitors to interconnect closer to the client and lower the cost of service purchased from incumbents. In other words, instead of purchasing the local loop (or last mile) and the backhaul, they could buy just the local loop, including gaining access to fibre-to-the-premises portions of the incumbent networks.
The 2015 decision also determined the rules for the implementation of a transition from one regime…
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OTTAWA and QUEBEC CITY — The government of Canada today announced the opening of an artificial intelligence research centre in Montréal as part of Canada’s participation in the new Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI), also launched officially today.
Canada’s minister of innovation, science and industry, Navdeep Bains, and Quebec’s minister of international relations and la francophonie, Nadine Girault, jointly announced the opening of the International Centre of Expertise in Montréal for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (ICEMAI), as well as the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MOU) under GPAI.
GPAI is designed to facilitate international and multi-stakeholder collaboration by…
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