BANFF – The federal government is promising better governance and more stable funding for the Canadian Television Fund and has begun addressing those needs with an announcement of $100 million worth of support to the CTF for 2006-07.
Heritage Minister Liza Frulla announced the news as part of a speedy visit to the Banff World Television Festival today.
In a speech moved back one day to Sunday, to allow the politician to be in parliament for Monday morning (never know when those pesky votes might happen…), Frulla hit four main points. First, an oft-heard pledge to secure stable funding…
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WASHINGTON – While denying a request from electronics makers and sellers to put the brakes on digital television conversion, the Federal Communications Commission went a step farther by actually speeding up the process.
On Thursday, the FCC denied an application by the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) and the Consumer Electronics Retailers Association (CERC) to delay the date by which 50% of mid-size TV receivers manufactured and imported must include built-in digital television (DTV) tuners, announced a press release.
Then, “to further its efforts to ensure that consumers are able to receive off-the-air digital broadcast television services, the FCC also…
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MONTREAL – At a special founding assembly last week, Quebec’s movie and TV industry formally created the Quebec Film and Television Council (QFTC).
Some 120 members of the industry were in attendance to adopt the office’s statutes and regulations and elect its first 11-member board. The QFTC’s mission is to attract foreign shootings to Quebec and to ‘carry out high-value projects for the optimal development and competitiveness of the film and television industry” in the province, says the release.
The new association grew out of the Forum métropolitain de l’industrie cinématographique, which was held on November 29, 2004, presided…
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THE 2005 SOCIETY OF CABLE Telecommunications Engineers’ main trade show, the 2005 Cable-Tec Expo, begins next week in San Antonio, Texas.
As a service to our cable technical readers, here is a smattering of what you can expect to see there. Print and save this as your own shopping list, if you wish, for when you’re roaming those exhibit halls from June 14th to 17th.
******************** TVC Canada, the country’s leading broadband solutions provider, is pleased to announce that it will be exhibiting products from both White Sands Engineering and BGI Technology in booth number 1263 at this year’s…
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VANCOUVER – Telus and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) have launched a new annual contest which features $20,000 in cash prizes and an opportunity to present their projects to a panel of industrial, academic, and media experts.
The IEEE Telus Innovation Award invites IEEE Canada student members in their final year of an engineering or technology program at a Canadian undergraduate institution to submit a significant Information Computing and Telecommunication (ICT) Technologies project for which they are receiving education credit.
"We are very pleased that Telus is sponsoring this award," says Bill Kennedy, president of IEEE…
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SO THE CBC IS GOING to pursue ratings after all.
After years of downplaying its ratings (and sometimes lack thereof) in favor of talking about an overall strategy as a public broadcaster that offers programming of value to the Canadian public – and not necessarily ratings blockbusters – the CBC has decided to change course.
With executive vice-president of CBC television Richard Stursberg firmly at the helm now (he had barely begun his tenure during the run-up to the fall 2004 season), the shift at the CBC has begun, where ratings mean far more than they had.
Shows on…
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OTTAWA – The Telecommunications Policy Review Panel today launched its formal stakeholder consultation process by releasing a consultation document inviting input from interested stakeholders.
The Industry Canada-appointed panel hopes to obtain a wide range of submissions to gain a better understanding of the pressing issues concerning telecommunications policy, such as telecommunications regulation, and the access and adoption of advanced information and communications technologies. The goal is to develop recommendations that will provide for the best long-term telecommunications policy and regulatory framework for the benefit of all Canadians, says the press release.
The panel has been asked to deliver its…
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TORONTO – Last week’s Canadian Telecom Summit saw the leaders of Canada’s largest ILECs stay relentlessly on the attack, hitting at the CRTC as well as Canadian cable companies.
While Bell Canada Enterprises CEO Michael Sabia’s keynote on Tuesday said the telecom regs were just plain wrong, Telus Communications CEO Darren Entwistle backed him up the next day.
Both executives are peeved at the May 12th voice over Internet protocol regulatory decision which said, mainly, that for the incumbent local exchange carriers VOIP will be regulated as their traditional circuit-switched systems in that they must file tariffs each…
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TORONTO – With the telecom industry taking swing after swing at the Commission he runs for three straight days, CRTC chairman Charles Dalfen jabbed back on Wednesday.
He was given the last word by Canadian Telecom Summit organizers and spent much of his speech at the conference defending the CRTC’s VOIP decision. The May 12th voice over Internet protocol regulatory decision said, mainly, that for the incumbent local exchange carriers VOIP will be regulated the same as their traditional circuit-switched systems in that they must file tariffs each time they want to alter their pricing.
Telephony newcomers like cable…
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NIAGARA FALLS – APTN has asked the CRTC for a 10-cent increase in its monthly wholesale rate.
The request is part of its broadcasting license renewal application which the CRTC will hear today in Niagara Falls.
As a CRTC-mandated must-carry, the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network already gets 15 cents per TV subscriber per month from all cable and satellite TV customers and wants the Commission to increase it to $0.25.
It would mean an increase in annual baseline subscription revenue from about $18 million to approximately $30 million, given that there are a little over 10 million TV subscribers…
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