TORONTO – TVO will soon premiere a new children's series, Hi Opie!, about a 5-year-old who navigates his way through the struggles and successes of kindergarten for the first time.
Hi Opie! is a TVO developed (marblemedia-produced) live-action series, teaching preschoolers kindergarten readiness skills, helping to ease their transition from home to school, says the public broadcaster’s release. The show features Opie, a custom-built puppet created by Jim Henson's Creature Shop, as he interacts with new real kid friends, gets to know his teachers and discovers a whole new world, all while learning important life lessons.
Targeted to ages 3-5, preschoolers…
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TORONTO – “Contemporary lifestyle network” FYI will take the place of Twist TV as of September 1st, Shaw Media confirmed today.
As we reported in June, the new channel is geared towards “reflecting how people actually live their lives today,” says the company’s press release this morning. “Adding FYI to our portfolio cements Shaw Media’s stronghold on female viewers, especially those captivated by contemporary lifestyle programming,” said Barbara Williams, senior vice president of content, Shaw Media. “With its non-prescriptive and social format, FYI brings viewers big personalities and buzzed about series, a perfect blend for exciting on-air entertainment and engaging…
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GATINEAU – Rogers has been left quite a regulatory pile of laundry to sort through with its license renewals announced Thursday. And, the company was told "no" a lot.
The CRTC has renewed the licences of most Rogers-owned television services until 2016, but though it’s a short-term renewal (at Rogers’ request, so it lines up with the licence terms of the other major English-language broadcasters), the decision makes a lot of changes to how Rogers will operate, particularly in light of its $5.2-billion deal for rights to National Hockey League games.
The biggest change in the decision is that Rogers’s services…
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CALGARY and DENVER – Shaw Communications announced today it will acquire a 100% interest in call centre company ViaWest from Oak Hill Capital Partners and other shareholders for an enterprise value of US$1.2 billion.
Based in Denver, ViaWest is one of the largest privately providers of data centre infrastructure, cloud technology and managed IT solutions in North America. It employs over 350 people and services more than 1,300 customers across Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, Minnesota, Oregon Texas and Utah.
The Company has a strong record of financial growth and over the last decade, ViaWest has grown from five data centres in two…
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TORONTO – CBC announced Monday the appointment of Munro Cullen as the new senior creative director of CBC’s communications, marketing and brand department.
Cullen joins CBC with more than ten years’ experience building brands and prominent marketing campaigns. In his most recent position as senior copywriter at Shaw Media, he was integral to the creative direction of off-air print, radio and online advertising for more than 18 brands.
He was also the head writer for the Shaw Media upfronts, with the scope of his work including corporate brand-building. Prior to Shaw, Cullen worked at Alliance Atlantis, first as a promo producer;…
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GATINEAU – Local TV is struggling mightily. Ad revenue is down and showing no signs of growth, while the ever growing lineup of new specialty channels and the rapid rise of Internet-based alternatives are blasting away at what has always been the bedrock of the television system in Canada.
Some are telling the CRTC that it’s time to adopt a radically different approach for local TV, one that would bolster the revenue side of the ledger while also helping to encourage the development of compelling Canadian content.
For example, Bell Canada and CBC/Radio-Canada suggest shutting down over the air infrastructure completely…
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GATINEAU – It will surprise no one that the cost of sports television are front and centre for so many of the submissions to the CRTC’s TV Policy Review
Telus, for example, called the amount of cash being sent to various leagues and teams for the rights to live games “irrational” and has requested the CRTC address the soaring price of sports services and eliminate penetration-based rate cards in sports packaging.
Lined up on the side of Telus, are Shaw Communications, Cogeco and Canadian Cable Systems Alliance members, distributors who own no sports channels. While vertically integrated companies like Rogers and…
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CALGARY – Shaw Communications is throwing its support behind emerging Canadian professional golfers Michael Gligic and Beon Yeong Lee as they compete at this year’s RBC Canadian Open.
Sporting the Shaw logo, Gligic and Lee (pictured) represent some of the up and coming Canadian golfers at this year’s national championship taking place July 21 – 27 at The Royal Montreal Golf Club in Île-Bizard, Quebec. The two golfers are the latest additions to Shaw’s roster of professional golf partnerships that include PGA Tour star Graham DeLaet and rising Web.com Tour pro Adam Hadwin.
“Supporting Michael and Beon represents Shaw’s desire…
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GATINEAU – The quest of both the CRTC and the federal government to ensure consumers have more choice in their TV packages is running into some difficult headwinds. Vertically integrated broadcast distributors as well as content developers acknowledge that Canadians do say they want more channel flexibility, but they don’t want a so-called “skinny basic” tier of TV channels.
In the official TV Policy Review Notice of Consultation (2014-190), the Commission has proposed a basic cable package that only includes local Canadian TV stations, the 9(1)(h) must-carry channels, provincial educational services if they exist, and in some cases, the community…
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GATINEAU – Canadian prices for wireline, wireless and Internet services are generally competitive when compared to other G7 countries and Australia, with the exception of entry level mobile wireless service and high-speed Internet, according to an annual report commissioned by Industry Canada and the CRTC.
Prepared by Ottawa’s Wall Communications, the 2014 update Price Comparisons of Wireline, Wireless and Internet Services in Canada and with Foreign Jurisdictions is an annual telecom services price comparison study that combines and averages wireline, mobile wireless, broadband Internet, and mobile Internet service rates, as well as bundles of these services along with basic digital TV…
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