TORONTO, FREDERICTON and ST. JOHN’S — Rogers Communications announced Wednesday morning it is expanding eligibility for its Connected for Success low-cost Internet program to help bridge the digital divide for many more people residing within its service areas in Ontario, New Brunswick and Newfoundland.
The company is also introducing new Internet packages with more speed options to support the evolving connectivity needs of low-income Canadians across these three provinces.
In Ontario, the Connected for Success program is expanding to new qualifying customers receiving income support through Ontario Works and the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP). In New Brunswick, new eligible customers…
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Lobbying, new energy board, sees province take action
By Ahmad Hathout
TORONTO – The Ontario government has made good on a pledge to tackle broadband roadblocks in the province by proposing in new legislation to reduce hydro pole attachment costs, a move that is receiving praise across the board and that has been many months in the making.
The legislation, called Building Broadband Faster Act, proposes timely access by telecommunications companies to infrastructure owned by utilities and municipalities, including underground facilities, and requires utilities to better prepare their poles for new wire attachments, which require weighting assessments – the cost of which…
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TORONTO — The federal government “must dramatically reduce the regulatory burden on the telecommunications industry to accelerate 5G deployment,” says the newest report from the C.D. Howe Institute’s telecommunications policy working group – which includes top regulatory experts and executives from Canada’s biggest telecom companies, including Bell, Rogers, Telus, Shaw, Cogeco and Eastlink.
“Telecommunications providers face obstacles in gaining access rights to infrastructure for installing telecommunications facilities. These barriers, alongside difficulty navigating government incentive programs for expanded connectivity, could stall the federal government’s aim of extending high-speed internet coverage to 98 percent of households by 2026,” reads a press…
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OTTAWA — The Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association (CWTA) announced today it is kicking off a new monthly virtual event series, “5G Canada: What’s Next?”, later this month.
Presented by CWTA and its 5G Canada Council, the virtual series will host leading experts to discuss digital innovations in key areas of Canadian society, including the connected home, education, healthcare, automotive, industry 4.0 and public safety, and how 5G will serve as a key enabler for Canada’s innovators.
The first event in the series is scheduled for Tuesday, March 30 from 12 p.m. to 1 p.m. ET.
The featured speakers include:
Luciano Ramos,…
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By Steve Faguy
“THE SYNDICATION OF LOCALIZED programming is nothing new,” says Troy Reeb, executive vice president broadcast networks at Corus Entertainment. “My career began at 17 years old at CFOK in Westlock, Alta., which was a hub station for a network of rural stations across Alberta and northern B.C., where we had this primitive robot — it was huge, it took an entire room and it looked like something out of Space Odyssey. It had reel-to-reel tapes that turned off and on automatically, and clackity cart machines, and it would deliver differentiated programming and weather forecasts and everything else…
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GATINEAU – With the latest and greatest smartphones now costing more than $2,000, Rogers Communications launched new device financing plans in July 2019, which would let customers spread the cost of a new handset over 36 months, paying $0 up front, if they wanted.
Rogers (and Telus and Ice Wireless, which followed their competitor’s lead) was convinced the device financing plans were on side with the CRTC’s Wireless Code of Conduct because the no-interest financed phones were not tied to a wireless service plan. If customers wanted to leave for another provider, all they had to do was…
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By Len St-Aubin
IN THE GUISE OF “broadcasting policy”, Bill C-10, An Act to Amend the Broadcasting Act, is really about promoting Canadian content in online media. To do that, it would expand the Broadcasting Act to capture virtually all online (internet) audio and video.
My previous articles discussed how Bill C-10 and Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault’s forecast Cancon contributions risk highly problematic outcomes for Canadian broadcasting, for the internet in Canada and for Canadians. A third proposed an alternative approach.
This article returns to the impact on private sector television and revisits potential outcomes in light of market…
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By Ahmad Hathout
MONTREAL – Quebecor’s telecom arm Vidéotron is suing a trio of companies for allegedly conspiring to redistribute, without authorization, its TVA television signals in Quebec hotels, new court documents claim.
Videotron has filed new court documents in federal court in Montreal last week alleging the three companies have concocted a scheme whereby one company would purchase television service from Videotron with the intention of routing it to hotel customers of another company to maximize revenue from the single subscription, infringing on its copyright and bypassing its protections.
The regional telecom claims that Libeo Inc. develops and distributes Konek Technologies…
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TORONTO — Rogers Communications flanker brand chatr today launched an exclusive new contest, Win Biggr, which is offering more than 1,000 prizes to chatr customers through a contest microsite they can visit daily to play a virtual scratch-and-win game as well as enter into the monthly grand prize draws.
Instant prizes available include LG K32 phones (approximate retail value of $130 each) and chatr top-up cards ranging between $15 and $50. Three grand prizes of a 2021 Nissan Rogue are available to be won.
Throughout the Win Biggr contest, chatr customers who use self-serve options to change their price plan, top…
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Real battles will come in front of the CRTC
By Denis Carmel
OTTAWA – It was likely not done by design, but the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage could not have lined a more diverse set of individuals and groups as it did on its Friday, February 26 meeting to talk about Bill C-10, the bill to amend the Broadcasting Act.
Author and former CBC English services chief Richard Stursberg, Corus Entertainment, SOCAN, Rogers Communications, Netflix and two community television association groups.
Most, even including Netflix, support Bill C-10 and wish for speedy adoption (the real battles will come in front of the…
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