GATINEAU – Imagine – a video presentation at the CRTC’s hearings on broadcasting! Who would ever think of doing that?
“3-2-1. Blastoff!”
The Shaw Rocket Fund cleverly grabbed the attention of CRTC commissioners yesterday with a short animated video to make their point that children, as the ones who are already immersed in multi-media culture, should have a voice in this three-week gabfest about a future Canadian broadcasting model.
But it also took a former Radio-Canada journalist and now CRTC commissioner, Michel Morin, to ask the most probing question of the day: how come no one else at these…
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GATINEAU – Quebecor Inc. president and CEO Pierre-Karl Péladeau challenged the CRTC today to re-write its “little red book” of more than 400 broadcasting rules and regulations or risk seeing the Canadian broadcast industry bypassed by the global digital environment.
In a presentation before the CRTC’s hearings on broadcast distribution and specialty services, the head of the powerful Quebec media conglomerate which owns, among other assets, #3 cable company Videotron and top Quebec broadcaster TVA, said that it would be a mistake to go through these “crucial” hearings and make only minor adjustments.
“An accumulation of regulations won’t solve…
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LAS VEGAS – Now that we have our digital deadline in Canada, it might behove us to keep an eye on just how the American television industry is handling its transition from analog conventional broadcast TV to digital, since there are a scant 308 days until analog shut off here.
After a session yesterday on the upcoming transition here at NAB – which included American broadcasters and cable companies – there is one inescapable conclusion: With just 10 months left until analog OTA TV is shut off in the States, there is a lot for them left to do…
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LAS VEGAS – The results of an unprecedented partnership (which, ironically, includes a Canadian company) aimed at dramatically boosting the rollout of HD Radio across the U.S. by taking some of the conversion costs out was unveiled at the National Association of Broadcasters convention here Sunday afternoon.
The NAB itself invested US$ million in a partnership with iBiquity Digital Corporation and four broadcast equipment manufacturers to develop products based on next-generation HD Radio "Exporter" technology. The new products, which significantly reduce a radio station’s cost to upgrade to HD Radio, are being introduced and made available for purchase during…
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LAS VEGAS – Of course, next February’s transition to digital over-the-air television is a big deal here on the show floor at the National Association of Broadcasters annual convention. But, another HD transition has also emerged as a top-of-mind-issue among U.S. broadcasters this year.
HD Radio, the standard which American radio broadcasters have chosen to go digital, is continuing to gain traction, with various automakers having made announcements to add the technology to their vehicles. Giant retail chain Target has also said it will stock a range of the devices (now over 60 of them, some as cheap as…
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BELOW ARE SOME QUICK QUIPS, a few lines – and their explanations, that we found interesting over the first four days of the CRTC’s hearing in broadcast distribution undertaking and specialty service policy.
Broadcasters as babies (1) “There is an opportunity for the over the air broadcasters to help themselves. If they were embracing the on demand platform, if they had a CTV on demand or a Global on demand, then we could have a very serious discussion about incremental value for the customer and compensation for that. But we are not having those discussions because we seem to…
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OTTAWA – Canada’s independent producers on Thursday called on a Senate committee to amend Bill C-10 so that the Criminal Code becomes the standard for determining what’s “contrary to public policy.”
Currently, the bill includes provisions that would allow the Canadian Heritage minister to develop guidelines for determining which productions would not be eligible for tax credits because they were "contrary to public policy.”
Representatives of the Canadian Film and Television Production Association (CFTPA) and the Association des producteurs de films et de télévision du Québec (APFTQ) told the senators that employing the Criminal Code will “ensure the continuation…
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GATINEAU – What would have been fun, was a debate.
Day three of the CRTC hearings into BDU and specialty service regulations featured the Canadian Association of Broadcasters and Canadian Cable Systems Alliance, two groups with decidedly different constituents, and points of view, on the future policy direction of the TV industry.
The CAB represents most broadcasters in Canada who together serve basically 100% of the Canadian population. The CCSA, on the other hand, has a far smaller group of members whose companies deliver cable and broadband service to under a million rural Canadians.
While each had their turn…
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GATINEAU – “Overall, television itself as an advertising medium, remains very strong,” the Association of Canadian Advertisers vice-president of policy and research, Bob Reaume, told the CRTC this morning.
The annual Canadian ad spend on television is now at about $3.2 billion, and it’s growing, said Reaume, adding that TV’s share of the ad spend has been, and is remaining, stable, with small levels of revenue growth every year. “Year in and year out, TV has attracted about a quarter of all of the advertising spend in Canada,” he explained.
One of the primary concerns of the ACA and…
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GATINEAU – To many we’ve talked to so far this week, it smacks of re-regulation, not de-regulation, but commissioner Michel Morin wants to know what the industry thinks of a new points system he has devised to help small specialty services gain more notice.
At the BDU and specialty service hearings on Monday and Tuesday, the first-year commissioner has explained and re-explained his proposal to just about each intervener – several of whom seem a little perplexed by the proposal. Count some audience members in that group scratching their heads, too.
After hearing Morin (a former broadcaster explain it…
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