So basically Global has out-hijacked CTV thus far. This calls for a celebration at Global headquarters, complete with Uncle Sam top hats, a singing of the Star Spangled Banner, all while watching a New York Yankees game and eating corn-dogs. Keep up the great original work!

"The Canadian networks are hardly pretending to save local TV as some kind of patriotic issue. If FOX ever announced that they'd run "House" at 6 o'clock, Canwest wouldn't give a rats patootie how much carriage fees they'd be getting to save the local news all over the place - it would be goodbye 6 pm local newscasts because the CRTC application that would be filed within 9 seconds begging for content rule changes would state just that with the threat of bankruptcy if the regulator doesn't play along." - Fassero

My argument doesn't distinguish between whether the CRTC enforces the exclusivity of the contract, or whether a judge in a black robe does it.

But CTV et al want the CRTC to enforce this, which is the entire point of my original argument.

I established, via an earlier post, that the CRTC recognizes (per their own Web page) that there exists a right to purchase the exclusive right to distribute content. Your argument, as best I can tell, is that, sure, such a thing exists, but wink-wink, nudge-nudge, it really doesn't (or shouldn't, if I correctly comprehend your argument) count for squat.

Just because the CRTC acknowledges the reality of the industry doesn't mean it affords special legal rights on a simple contract and guarantees it will then enforce that contract outside of its mandate. It does "count", but it doesn't bind the CRTC because the CRTC is not a party to the contract.

Judges love to be told that they don't have the legal capacity to do something. That argument, generally, causes their antennae twitch and make them sit up and take notice. Challenging the authority of the court to, for example, enforce a legal contract, is generally not a solid foundation on which to base one's legal argument.

Perhaps you're still not getting my point. Civil courts can enforce legal contracts between parties to that contract. It cannot tell a third party that two other people signed a contract and now it can't act in a certain way. That's not how contracts work.

No. WFFF in Burlington has every right to broadcast an episode of House in its geographic territory.

Is that what the contract says? Considering WFFF's signal reaches Montreal, I find it unlikely that this would violate a contract.

A cable company in Outer Nowhere does not have the right to grab that WFFF signal and redistribute it to its customers if the local Outer Nowhere network has purchased the exclusive distribution rights to House.

Cable companies are regulated by the CRTC, which has rules for U.S. television signals as well as distant signals. If the company has a deal with WFFF to distribute its signal, then it has a deal to distribute its signal.

Because it's not the same. The CRTC is the national regulator for media, which INCLUDES cable companies.

Yes, the CRTC regulates cable companies. It does not enforce tort law.

By your argument, you couldn't bitch about your employer hiring a scab if your union goes on strike, because your employer has made a second agreement that doesn't involve you to perfom the same task.

Labour law is an entirely different can of beans. In Quebec, scabs are banned by government law, not because of a contract. And labour contracts are between the employer and the employees, and so have every right to restrict the employer from violating it by hiring non-union labour.

My argument doesn't distinguish between whether the CRTC enforces the exclusivity of the contract, or whether a judge in a black robe does it. The CRTC may conclude that they are not the proper forum to adjudicate this kind of dispute. Happens all the time; a governmental quasi-judicial tribunal decides a particular dispute is beyond their purview. Point conceded. That's why you have a judiciary, over and above the quasi-judiciary.

I established, via an earlier post, that the CRTC recognizes (per their own Web page) that there exists a right to purchase the exclusive right to distribute content. Your argument, as best I can tell, is that, sure, such a thing exists, but wink-wink, nudge-nudge, it really doesn't (or shouldn't, if I correctly comprehend your argument) count for squat.

I'd almost pay money to see a lawyer trot into a court - a real court, one with judges and lots of wood paneling and whatnot - and argue, in effect, "Yes, your honor, even the governmental entity in charge of regulating the broadcasting and cable industries fully acknowledges that exclusive broadcast rights can be purchased, but I respectfully submit that this court doesn't have any legal capacity to enforce that contract on behalf of either the seller or purchaser of those exclusive broadcast rights, in relation to third parties."

Judges love to be told that they don't have the legal capacity to do something. That argument, generally, causes their antennae twitch and make them sit up and take notice. Challenging the authority of the court to, for example, enforce a legal contract, is generally not a solid foundation on which to base one's legal argument.

No. WFFF in Burlington has every right to broadcast an episode of House [i]in its geographic territory[/i].
A cable company in Outer Nowhere does not have the right to grab that WFFF signal and redistribute it to its customers if the local Outer Nowhere network has purchased the exclusive distribution rights to House.

By your argument, you couldn't bitch about your employer hiring a scab if your union goes on strike, because your employer has made a second agreement that doesn't involve you to perfom the same task.

The scab didn't sign the deal, so why should he be punished?

In my mind, your entire argument turns on a definition of "exclusive" that is so entirely contrary to the plain meaning of that word, and any reasonable interpretation of a contract that sells "exclusive rights" to disseminate content.

And your argument turns on the suggestion that it's the CRTC's job to enforce a contract between two private enterprises. I'm not saying "exclusive" doesn't mean "exclusive", I'm saying a contract between two companies can't bind a third party (or the government), and that I don't think the wording of these contracts is as absolute as that.

And it's not like we are even at risk of losing American programming, there is no way the cable companies will ever pull CTV, ect.. and black out American programming, Having the right to demand programming blackouts is just another reason for cable to not pull Canadian channels. It wont hurt the viewer in any way.

You're assuming the broadcasters are reasonable in their demands. What if they demand $5 a month per station per subscriber? Would there still be "no way" the cable companies would balk at that? Or, for that matter, consumers?

Under the affiliate rules in the U.S., stations are not even obligated to broadcast their own network's programming. When they do not want to carry the network's schedule (or parts thereof), they can go out and buy alternative programming (typically syndicate although, in some cases, non-major network programming i.e. CW, My Network, etc.) There is no purchase price for what they carry from their own network. The network simply agrees that, in exchange for the programs, the affiliate will be given a certain amount of time which they can use for themselves or make available to sell local advertising (the networks, to finance their output, sell ad space of their own to advertisers.)

U.S. networks are also increasingly producing their shows "in house". In fact, I believe ABC doesn't have a single prime time property any longer which is not produced by ABC studios or Disney (it's parent).

Yes, U.S. stations have carriage arrangements but keep in mind that many of them invest in far more powerful transmitters than their Canadian counterparts and they also know that a significant percentage of TV viewers in the US still do not subcribe to cable or satellite and have the ability to pick up a number of signals, including out of market, through conventional antennas. However, because of the signal consistency that cable and satellite provide, plus demand for specialty and pay services, affiliates very rarely yank their arrangement with the distributor. And certainly no border stations even consider it because they know viewers could simply pick up Canadian signals which, even if they carry U.S. programming, there's no way to block it. Last I checked, in the U.S. the only stations involved in carriage disputes are with satellite services and are comprised of a couple of rural stations in Louisiana and, if I'm not mistaken, Oregon.

If you want to emulate the U.S. model, then you have to do it all, not bits and pieces, which is what the "localTV matters" crowd really wants to do. Since U.S. affiliates carry about 95% (or more) domestic programming in the prime time hours, then if Canadian networks think they need carriage fees, let them do the same with Canadian content during the same period. If the CRTC told them this is the way it will happen, let's sing along to the response of the Canadian network heads: "n-e-e-EH-ver m--i-i-i-i-i-i-i-i-ind!"

And if you think "exclusivity" has such great merit, try explaining it to the Canadian arts community, and the media and production guilds, most of whom will argue that the exclusivity protections granted to Canadian networks for these U.S. rights have been almost entirely at their expense (in terms of lost jobs and opportunities.) Canadians aren't buying this nonsense anyway. When the networks go out and do their non-sensical polls, they should just ask the real question: "do you support saving the dopey morning show that goes on while you're stuck in traffic, the local news shows which are not even a third local news, and the one hospital telethon per year because the over-leveraged networks need bailout money so Ivan Fecan can still run up fancy dining bills?"

Why shouldn't it? If the Canadian broadcasters buy the exclusive broadcast rights to those programs, and the cable company refuses to pay and pulls the channel, why should they be allowed to distribute channels that air that same programming who don't own the broadcast rights for that market?
What the broadcasters want is a U.S. model for negotiated value for signal. They want what happens in the U.S., it works great there, why don't we try it in Canada?

To avoid cable bills increasing by 300-400%, perhaps?

and I don't think that everybody will want to see only TV from the rest of the Commonwealth.

What is wrong with Top Gear, Dr Who, Coronation Street and Monty Python’s Flying Circus???

The networks are not trying to save local TV. They are looking for more handout sources to bail out terrible managerial decisions in the acquisitions department and the soft advertising market that even simsubbing is not saving.

Nothing new there. This has been the story of colonial Canada for centuries, starting with Molson whining to the governor to outlaw cider-making because the frogs would not buy his piss-poor beer. If you cannot succeed in business (i.e. you’re too stupid to learn to make cider to cater to people’s needs), pull your political muscle to force people to buy your crap (in Molson’s case, piss, since confirmed by their merger with Coor’s).

It presented itself as a canadian cable operator to avoid copyright retribution.

It was ultimately nailed when it was discovered that it was a canadian front for a US-based company, and therefore the owner was sued out of oblivion in the US.

It also got flak for adding it’s own advertising to it’s “repiping” [as, I guess, rebroadcasting US signals on it’s “cable network” ought to be called, especially that the Internet — happy 40th anniversary Internet, by the way — is a “series of tubes” :) ]…