LAST WEEK’S ANNOUNCEMENT of BCE’s divestiture of all but 20% of its ownership holding in Bell Globemedia left one enormous burning question.
What is the company going to do with the $1.3 billion in proceeds from its sale of control of one of Canada’s largest media companies? BCE CEO Michael Sabia told an analyst conference call last week that the company won’t be announcing what it plans to do with the money until February.
Here, in no particular order, is the www.cartt.ca Top 10 List of things BCE could do with its new pile of money, when it…
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TORONTO – CHUM Limited and the Waters family today announced the death of company founder and Canadian broadcasting pioneer Allan Waters. He was 84.
As chairman and president until 2002, Waters (right) laid the foundation for CHUM Limited’s growth to its current place as one of Canada’s premier media companies, with radio and television stations across the country. “His vision for CHUM was rooted in fostering strong connections with the communities it serves, while staying true to his own guiding principles of respect, honesty and fair dealing,” said the company’s press release.
“Allan Waters’ contribution to…
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IF YOU WANT AN EARLY look at what the communications infrastructure in Canada is going to look like, it might be worth studying Saskatchewan.
The incumbent telco, SaskTel, has embarked upon an ambitious, aggressive, costly push to modernize its network, driving fibre deep into its communities, taking dead aim at the two large cable companies in the province with its MAX high speed Internet and digital television service.
The reason why this might offer a glimpse into the future is that this is a province where the “normal” economic guidelines the rest of the communications companies in Canada are…
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YEARS BACK, IT WAS EASY to pick on VisionTV. Its programs were old, appearing only on the specialty channel in their second or third (or fourth!) window.
Much of its original “Mosaic” programming looked and sounded terrible – and violated the channel’s Canadian content requirements, it turns out, causing CRTC sanctions. Preachers and traditional religion dominated the channel. However, when current president and CEO Bill Roberts (left) came on board in 2000, he set out to drastically alter VisionTV. More original, interesting, programming – about faith and spirituality and not necessarily organized…
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CAMPBELL RIVER, B.C. – This morning, Shaw Communications restored the TV signals to Campbell River TV.
Due to a battle over digital cable set top boxes, outlined in several stories on www.cartt.ca throughout this week, Shaw (which owns both the microwave system feeding CRTV its distant U.S. broadcast signals and Cancom, which feeds the cable co-op its U.S. and Canadian specialty services) turned off most of the TV channels of CRTV customers on Wednesday.
The Supreme Court of British Columbia yesterday ordered Shaw Communications to restore the TV signals to Campbell River TV.
For a recap of our coverage,…
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TORONTO – Digital TV customers will be able to call on four different seasonal music channels from Max Trax and Galaxie while they roast chestnuts and stuff stockings.
Beginning December 1, four of the combined 40 audio digital music services from Max Trax and Galaxie will offer listeners uninterrupted, commercial-free music across a range of formats.
Max Trax’s Holiday Hits channel features timeless and contemporary songs ranging from Sting’s I Saw Three Ships and Madonna’s Santa Baby to Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas and The Barenaked Ladies’ Green Christmas.
Max Trax’s Instrumental Holiday channel features seasonal standards…
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DARTMOUTH – Charlie Keating, a giant in the Canadian cable television industry – in all senses of the word – died of cancer Tuesday morning. He was 72.
Now, the term “larger than life” may seem a cliché to some, but there wasn’t one person contacted by www.cartt.ca on the passing of the founder of Dartmouth Cable TV (which later became Nova Scotia’s Access Communications) who didn’t use the term.
“He was a great industry individual and a great man in his own right,” said John Thomas, president of Delta Cable. “He was a remarkable man and a wonderful…
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DID YOU HEAR THE ONE about the telephone company delivering TV over its wireline system that’s now one of the top 10 BDUs in Canada?
No? Well, in less than three years, Manitoba Telecom Services’ MTS TV has become a very meaningful presence in the city of Winnipeg. With 260,000 total households, MTS TV has captured nearly a quarter of the market.
While many on the cable side of the equation often dismiss the telcos’ ability to provide TV over their “limited” or “skinny” pipe, citing bandwidth constraints in comparison to the “fat cable pipe”, it seems consumers like…
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WINNIPEG – On Friday, MTS introduced a new long distance plan that offers long distance calling anywhere in Canada and the U.S., any time of day or night, for a flat rate of $15 a month.
The new plan, a swing back at Shaw Cable’s recent voice over Internet protocol service launch in the Manitoba captial, is available to anyone on an MTS Bundle. With MTS Bundles, MTS customers can create their own bundle of savings — $10 a month if they have any two, or $15 a month if they have all three of the following services: MTS TV,…
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WINNIPEG – The rapid growth of the digital television business at Manitoba Telecom Services is continuing.
Less than two years after launch, DSL-delivered MTS TV has really taken it to incumbent cable operator Shaw Cable and has surpassed the 50,000-customer mark and is now approaching 25% penetration in Winnipeg.
"This week we signed on our 50,000th TV customer, and MTS TV continues to grow by leaps and bounds, with over 87% of Winnipeg homes now eligible for the service," said MTS president Cheryl Barker. "The demand has been outstanding, and we hear from our customers all the time how…
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