IN THE FIRST PART OF Cartt.ca’s exclusive, wide-ranging interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation CEO, Robert Rabinovitch talked about stable funding, the TV Policy Review, The One, CBC radio and SRC, among other topics.
Click here to read Part I of the story from last week.
In the second part of our chat, Rabinovitch goes over on demand strategies, HD, CBC Sports (the interview was prior to Nancy Lee’s departure), local news and the residual effects of the 2005 lockout. What follows is an edited transcript.
Greg O’Brien: Let’s switch back to English TV – but actually this question…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – G4techTV Canada announced Monday that digital cable and satellite subscribers will get to see its high-tech and gaming programming through the month of November at no charge.
As well, the Rogers-controlled digital specialty service is offering viewers a chance to win a five day trip for four to Honolulu, Hawaii and tickets to the NFL Pro Bowl football game in February 2007.
The winner will also receive four passes to the Madden Championship online football gaming tournament being held in Hawaii.
Participating BDUs include: Bell ExpressVu, Rogers, Cogeco, Videotron, Persona, Access, Telus, MTS, Mountain Cable, Source, and…
Continue Reading
VANCOUVER – Last week Telus turned on the first five of seven new cellular sites which are providing voice and data service to a 25 kilometre stretch of Highway 1 between Revelstoke and Golden, B.C. known as Rogers Pass. The remaining two sites are planned for later in the year.
The $7 million project is part of the company’s ongoing investment to improve existing cell service along the highway and throughout British Columbia’s interior.
“We recognize cellular service along this corridor is particularly important for people living in the area and travellers, and are doing what we can to…
Continue Reading
VANCOUVER – Telus announced this week it will invest $800,000 to launch mobile phone service to four small coastal B.C. communities in the coming months.
The company is upgrading existing central switching offices with state-of-the-art cellular network and transmission equipment in Port Edward, Hartley Bay, Klemtu, and Oona River. The sites will provide PCS cellular and wireless data services such as text messaging and Internet access to each community. Similar upgrades were just completed to bring mobile phone service to the Queen Charlotte Islands, Bella Bella, and Bella Coola.
“By adding cellular network equipment to existing Telus landline sites…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – The spiffy new Treo 700wx from Palm was launched in Canada with Bell Mobility today.
It has a big (for a handheld), bright touch-screen. It’s a smart phone with numerous bells and whistles with push e-mail and a camera, 64MB of RAM and integrated Bluetooth. It runs Microsoft Windows Mobile 5.0, meaning web access is simple, quick and easy (when on the right network).
So, with the explosion of video (of the free variety) available on the web that is easily viewable on such a device, who needs DVB-H, the nascent standard which stands for digital video broadcast…
Continue Reading
WHEN NBTEL FIRST CAME to market in 1998 with a digital TV product serving customers in Moncton and Saint John, N.B., the cable industry laughed.
Sure, it was all-digital television, but each TV needed its own set top box, channel-changing latency was a problem and due to the limitations of the early ADSL technology it used, all the TVs in the house had to be tuned to the same channel. Fine for homes without a second TV, but not so much for most folks.
At the time, NBTel (which is now Aliant) was the North American leader on the…
Continue Reading
SAN FRANCISCO – Just four percent of Canadian mobile phone subscribers and three percent of American cell customers use their handsets to shoot video, says research firm Telephia.
To some, that might say folks aren’t really all that keen on using their mobile phones to record video, since camera phones have been around for some time now. However, says Telephia, it just means we’re only at the beginning of an emerging market.
The mobile industry is buzzing these days about services that share user content, like YouTube, MySpace and Facebook because mobile phones are the camera of choice for…
Continue Reading
VANCOUVER – Telus launched a pair of products today that will help lost customers find where they’re going and let parents electronically track their kids.
Navigator and Kid Find are the two new GPS services that will help "consumers get increased peace of mind whether on the road, at the park or going trick or treating," said Robert Blumenthal, Telus senior vice-president of products and services, in a press release.
Navigator and Kid Find now operate throughout Telus’ 1X Digital PCS coverage area in British Columbia, Alberta and Ontario’s Golden Horseshoe region, which stretches from Oshawa to Kitchener, and…
Continue Reading
TORONTO – By the end of this year, cablecos are expected to have 12% of residential telephone subscribers in Canada, while telcos will have 2% of TV subs, a report by The Convergence Consulting Group predicts.
Showing how the competitors are going after their untraditional business, the report forecasts that cablecos will have 1.56 million phone subscribers at year end 2006, up from 835,000 subs at the end of 2005. By 2009, they’ll have a healthy 27% of the residential market, or 3.3 million subscribers, the consultants predict.
The telephone companies will make inroads in television distribution, ending with…
Continue Reading
VANCOUVER – Members of the British Columbia Government and Service Employees’ Union working at a subsidiary of Telus have reached a tentative agreement.
The BCGEU members work at Telus Sourcing Solutions, which provides payroll services to the B.C. government.
The agreement provides what the union calls “significant pay increases” of an average of 6% retroactive to Apr. 1 this year, followed by additional hikes in December this year and December next year.
The BCGEU bargaining committee is recommending its member accept the deal when a ratification vote is held during the week of Oct. 2.
The B.C. government privatized…
Continue Reading
