GATINEAU – As we’ve reported, one of the outcomes of the Let’s Talk TV process was the creation of a national ratings service to include set top box viewership data from all major TV carriers – which was enshrined in the conditions of licence for large BDUs.
However, with Videotron’s status still unclear since it abandoned the process earlier this year despite its condititions of licence requiring it to take part (the Commission has since turned down its request to pull out and the Federal Court has refused to hear its appeal) and causing delay, members of the set-top box (STB) working group (Bell, Rogers and Shaw) wrote on August 9th to request an extension to the September 30th deadline to have the system in place, which is set in their conditions of licence (COL). That date was extended in June 2019 to January 15, 2020.
The three also propose the Commission “approve certain targeted amendments to the terms upon which the licensees would be required provide STB data directly to programming services should the Suspensive COL be triggered. Specifically, the BDUs strongly recommend that the Suspensive COL is amended such that a licensee is only required to provide raw STB data pursuant to a commercial agreement negotiated between the BDU and the programming service making the request.”
That in turn triggered requests for information from the CRTC and was sent on October 4th. The response by the BDUs: “Canada is poised to introduce a system (fusing return path data from multiple BDUs with existing TAM data to create the ETAM system) that is unlike any measurement system in the world. While we appreciate the Commission’s frustration with further delays—caused by Videotron removing itself from this initiative—we are still far ahead of our international peers and the introduction of the Measurement System will represent a significant achievement.” (TAM = TV Audience Measurement; ETAM = Enhanced TAM)
Later in the document: “We reiterate our confusion with the Commission’s apparent focus on the suspensive COL rather than the more important and achievable objective of developing and implementing the Measurement System.”
Videotron decline to comment on this file.
Finally, on November 27th, the Commission sent a procedural letter responding to the BDUs request for an expedited process by asking intervenors to submit their interventions on or before December 12th.
Then the BDUs have until December 17th to respond.
