OTTAWA-GATINEAU – The CRTC has given Rogers the green light to move ahead with its acquisition of Saskatchewan Communications Network (SCN), however, the deal may be a little more expensive than Rogers had anticipated.
The Commission said Thursday that Rogers may continue to broadcast commercial programming and advertising on the educational service, as its previous owner Bluepoint Investments was allowed to do. But it also directed Rogers to invest an additional $1 million on independent production in Saskatchewan over the course of the six year licence term in order to “maintain the integrity of its licensing process and properly reflect SCN’s…
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LAS VEGAS – The National Hockey League has given its blessing to Rogers Communications' and Bell Canada’s acquisition of the Toronto Maple Leafs, as part of the companies' majority ownership purchase of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment (MLSE).
The League issued a brief statement from its annual Board of Governors meeting saying that its approval of the sale of the Leafs, the anchor of the $1.32 billion deal, was unanimous. It also approved a subsequent restructuring of the ownership of MLSE.
However, a report in the Globe and Mail says the league also told the team's about-to-be-owners…
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TORONTO – Toronto Blue Jays owner Rogers Communications is sponsoring an application by the MLB Network that could make the baseball network available for distribution in Canada.
The U.S. cable channel has officially applied to be added to the list of list of non-Canadian programming services authorized for distribution in Canada on a digital basis. Dedicated solely to coverage of major league baseball, MLB Network says that it covers all 30 MLB clubs through its original sports news, talk and analysis programming, and the live broadcast of up to 150 regular season and spring training games.
In its application, the channel maintains that it…
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GATINEAU – The CRTC will stage a public hearing starting Tuesday morning to consider 18 renewal applications from radio stations that are in apparent non-compliance with the Commission’s radio regulations and/or certain conditions of licence.
One of the applicants, Aboriginal Voices Radio (AVR), issued a statement Monday accusing the Commission of censorship after being directed to restrict its presentation to matters pertaining to its licences for CKAV-FM Toronto, CKAV-FM-2 Vancouver, CKAV-FM-3 Calgary, CKAV-FM-4 Edmonton and CKAV-FM-9 Ottawa. AVR, in association with the National Indigenous Media Association of Canada, had proposed that the CRTC also review its native broadcasting policy at that…
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TORONTO – Rogers technicians will begin walking the picket lines on Friday morning, according to their union.
Members of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada, Local 5011, will walk off the job after failing to reach a new collective agreement with Dependable Home Tech and Intek Communications, who employ 200 technicians in the Simcoe and Greater Toronto Area regions. These techs provide installation and repair services to Rogers customers.
"These employees have the legal right to strike, and no amount of employer intimidation will change what will happen tomorrow," said Kim Ginter, CEP VP for the Ontario Region, in…
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TORONTO – Popular Canadian daytime show Cityline has undergone a makeover, after 28 years of offering them to its viewers.
The show, which airs weekdays at 9:00 am ET/PT on Citytv, unveiled a revamped set, logo and on-air graphics this week. Debuting simultaneously, the show’s refreshed brand is also reflected on every on-air element, including graphics, logo and the new, community-oriented intro, which is shot on-location throughout Toronto.
“It was time for the studio to evolve to accurately reflect Cityline’s status as the leader in the lifestyle genre. It’s the same content viewers have come to know and trust – but now…
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TORONTO – CTAM Canada has declared its first CTAM Canada U course “a huge success”, and promises to return with another session next year.
More than 40 Canadian CTAM members packed the inaugural class last month at Corus’ Toronto headquarters to hear Harvard Business School Professors Bharat Anand and Rajiv Lal present five cases, including an analysis of the strategies used by Apple and Netflix, as a starting point to explore key issues in today’s highly competitive environment.
The students, who hailed from Astral, CCSA, Corus, Stingray Digital, WFN, the CRTC, Rogers, AOV, A&E, Hollywood Suite, Super Channel, Teletoon, TV5 Quebec, Ogilvey…
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BANFF – The questions have been delivered in almost every conference room, certainly every hallway of the Banff World Media Festival this year. It has also been postured in many forms: How will Google, Apple and Netflix influence the Canadian broadcast industry? Is the CRTC’s present policies helping or hindering the equation? What about vertical integration?
Times, They Are A-Changin’, so what should we do?
At the Canadian Media Leader session late Sunday afternoon, there was some consensus on the state of affairs in the industry and the direction of video production and development in the country.
For starters, Bell Media president…
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TORONTO – Rogers-owned easy-listening pop music station CHFI-FM held on to top spot in the Toronto radio market with a 13.1% share, down slightly from the winter period’s first place 15.8% share, according to the Spring 2012 portable people meter (PPM) report released by BBM Canada.
For the 13 week period from February 27 through May 27, 2012, Toronto’s second spot went to CBC Radio One (CBLA-FM) with a 10.1% share, while Bell Media’s CHUM-FM rounded out the market’s top three stations with a 9.7% share.
CBC Radio One (CBU) moved into first place in Vancouver with a 10.9% share, followed…
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DERMOT O’CARROLL WON’T HAVE any issues settling into a retirement rhythm this week from his 17-year engineering run at Rogers Cable, most recently as SVP Access Networks.
He’s already a (very) active kayaker, karate practitioner (fourth degree black belt), bicyclist, and photographer. Three years ago, he began studying Italian, and on vacation last summer, his conversational skills were so strong, a Tuscan bicycle storeowner asked him if his parents were Italian.
O’Carroll, 60, is decidedly Irish, as was his (beekeeper) father and…
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