CALGARY – Corus Custom Networks, the division of Corus Entertainment that books and runs ads on Shaw Cable’s TV listings channels, introduced a new format for its TV Listings Channels (pictured) on Tuesday.
The company will roll out the new design (pictured below) in 77 markets across Western Canada throughout the summer. The TV Listings Channels will shift from a vertically-split to a horizontally-split format that displays the TV Listings guide along the bottom half of the screen with the top half split into two advertising blocks.
One block will feature advertising in conventional 4 x 3 broadcast format, enabling…
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CALGARY – Shaw Communications launched its local phone service on B.C.’s Saanich Peninsula (the southern tip of Vancouver Island) this week.
As a primary home line, Shaw Digital Phone offers unlimited local and long distance calling within Canada and the U.S., as well as 1,000 international calling minutes per month to some of the most popular international destinations in Asia Pacific, Europe and the U.K. Also included in the service is a bundle of six popular calling features, such as Voicemail and Call Waiting, plus professional installation, 24/7/365 customer service support, enhanced 911 access, Operator and 411 service
It’s…
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THE TECHNOLOGY IS the easy part. Everything else is maybe just a bit frustrating.
The regulatory landscape for voice over Internet protocol, Vonage Canada’s raison d’etre, may be changing underfoot and the company has had its share of scrapes with incumbent telcos and cable companies. A particularly bitter one with Shaw Communications is still active in the courts and in front of the Commission, as we’ve reported.
Through it all, Vonage’s chief Canadian executive, president Bill Rainey, seems pretty upbeat. The former Group Telecom and Telus executive and manager is convinced he can beat the bundle being…
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TORONTO – Suppliers Telonix and Sunrise Telecom are hitting the road in September and October to update the engineering and technician community on all those flowing 0s and 1s.
A series of four half-day seminars (morning or afternoon, your choice) are scheduled for September 12 in Montreal, September 14 in Halifax, October 3 in Toronto and October 5 in Calgary. They’re $50 each.
Shawn Armstrong on Telonix and John Samoluk of Sunrise will host and cover topics from basic knowledge of digital signals and key terms and acronyms, to downstream and upstream issues and an architectural overview.
For more information…
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BOSTON – The future weighed heavily on the minds of marketers at this week’s Cable Telecommunications Association for Marketing Summit held in Boston Monday to Wednesday. ********** At first glance, having the vice-president of product marketing from Neustar – a third party provider of local telephone number portability for network operators – seemed a bit of a stretch. But, said John Ticer, he’s in a unique position, having to deal with wireless, wired, VOIP and cable telephony providers and make their systems talk to one another.
Each of those networks and their companies were developed "in stovepipes" aimed at…
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TORONTO – Don Iannetta of Toronto will get a $10,000 Sony entertainment system and a free subscription for a year for being Rogers Cable’s one millionth digital cable customer, the company announced today.
The company said its "dramatic growth in digital penetration is evidenced by the 187% increase from December 2003 until the company reached its millionth customer in June 2006.
"Rogers On Demand on channel 100 is fantastic. I’ve been able to watch all kinds of programming and movies whenever I want. My favourite so far was being able to watch all of the FIFA World Cup soccer…
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VANCOUVER – Canadian production company Shavick Entertainment has purchased gay and lesbian digital specialty service OUTtv, but the release touting the sale has a key fact wrong.
The purchase price was not announced and the deal is subject to CRTC approval. This is the second time the category one digi-net launched in 2001 has been sold. The service has had its problems.
It was originally launched and owned by Score Media and named Pridevision. It aired a variety of gay and lesbian programming as well as many hours of adult content late at night. The adult content scared some…
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OTTAWA – After consulting with the space players over the past eight months, Industry Canada today called for applications to fill satellite slots over Canada.
The launch of this licensing initiative to authorize the development of Canadian satellites says that up to 29 satellite licences may be assigned. It will be the largest spectrum licensing initiative ever undertaken in Canada. A comparative competitive licensing process will be used in which applicants will be required to submit proposals to Industry Canada but license winners will be expected to have birds operational in the 2008-10 time frame.
"We need to increase…
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ONE UNINTENDED HAZARD of deregulation is that all other news outlets will be under-reporting the size of the Canadian cable industry this morning.
On Wednesday, the CRTC released the Canadian broadcast distribution industry’s statistical and financial summaries. But the report doesn’t include all distributors.
From 2004 to 2005, revenues, as well as number of subscribers, remained more or less constant for Class 1 cable carriers. However, with growing investments in voice over IP, for example – as evidenced in Shaw Communications’ third quarter report that said capex will rise at a good clip for the next 24 months…
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CALGARY – While the company that bears his name posted another strong quarter and is quickly closing in on 200,000 phone customers, Shaw Communications founder and chairman JR Shaw was again asked about rumors that the company would be sold during Friday afternoon’s conference call with financial analysts.
Pointing out that the family has been very active purchasers of Shaw shares, the chairman added, "The family is very content with the ownership that they have… We have no intention of doing anything with this property, or any other properties that we have, on an exit basis… Someone asked me…
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