Investigates

GATINEAU – Despite the fact cable and other TV carriers in many countries are compiling and using data gleaned from customer set top boxes to modify their programming and advertising, Canadian companies seem loathe to do the same or are apathetic about moving quickly to gather that real-time information, according

GATINEAU – There is broad consensus among parties to the CRTC’s TV policy review that a mandated small basic package is not likely to come with a lower price tag. A skinny basic to go along with a pure pick-and-pay channel regime could also cause some sticker shock, not only

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

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

GATINEAU – Broadcast distributors and programmers are divided over rules governing television service provision in Quebec and official minority language communities across the country. Some say current rules are doing a fine job, while others argue changes are needed to ensure a diversity of programming for these two markets in

GATINEAU – Independent broadcasters are telling the CRTC that they will lose their spots on the broadcast dial if the Commission decides to eliminate genre protection rules and access rights for certain types of programming because the big Vertically Integrated (VI) media and carriage companies have the incentive to muscle

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

TORONTO – Some of the big American media companies that participated in the Let’s Talk TV initiative pulled no punches when evaluating the perils of a possible mandated pick and pay subscriber model in Canada. Representatives at Walt Disney, Turner Broadcasting, Viacom and A&E Television Networks (AETN) declined to appear

TORONTO – Peter Finch, in the 1976 movie Network, may have summed it up best for the U.S. Television Coalition, when his character, Howard Beale screamed, “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore.” Those sentiments seem to sum up the U.S. Television Coalition’s 17-page submission to

GATINEAU – The place, and prominence, of American specialty networks in Canadian television programming packages may soon be changing as the CRTC grapples with the part that U.S. discretionary services play in our rapidly changing broadcast environment. When the Commission launched the third phase of Let’s Talk TV: A Conversation