Monthly Archives: November 2008

| Montreal, Opinion, Radio, TV

Canadian Association of Broadcasters ignores Quebec

This week, the Canadian Association of Broadcasters, which represents non-CBC radio and television broadcasters across Canada, awarded its annual Gold Ribbon Awards for “excellence” in broadcasting.

Looking at the list of finalists and especially the winners, it’s clear that Quebec is vastly under-represented here, both on the anglophone and francophone sides. In fact, only one Quebec-based broadcaster won an award, and that was the one specifically for French-language broadcasting. CKMF won the “Humour – French” category for its insanely hilarious Les 2 minutes du peuple.

Looking at the list of finalists, here’s how it stacks up for Montreal and Quebec:

Number of nominations for anglophone Quebec broadcasters: 2

  • CJAD 800 (Breaking news for Dawson Virginia Tech shooting)
  • CFCF (Diversity in news and information programming for My Montreal)

Number of nominations for francophone broadcasters outside of French-only categories: 5

  • Info 690 Montreal (Diversity in news and information programming for Philippe Bonville en Afghanistan)
  • CJDM 92.1FM Drummondville (Promotion: Audience building for Drummond Matin)
  • CKMF Énergie 94.3 Montreal (Promotion: Station image for Le week-end des hits perdus)
  • CFGS Gatineau (Television documentaries for De Gatineau au Kilimandjaro)
  • CJNT Montreal (Television magazine programming for Le Pont)

Number of categories with no nominations for Quebec-based or francophone broadcasters: 16

  • Radio community service (large market)
  • Radio community service (medium market)
  • Radio community service (small market)
  • Radio humour (English)
  • Radio information program
  • Promotion of Canadian musical talent
  • What radio does best
  • Television community service (large market)
  • Television community service (medium market)
  • Television community service (small market)
  • Television entertainment programming
  • Television fictional programming
  • Television breaking news
  • Television special/series and public affairs
  • Television promotion (station image)
  • Television promotion (Canadian program/series)

Nominees in the humour (French) category: 5

  • CFTX-FM, Tag Radio 96,5, RNC MEDIA INC., Gatineau (Katastrophe)
  • CIGB-FM, Énergie 102,3, Astral Media Inc., Trois-Rivières (C’est l’fun de bonne heure)
  • CKMF-FM, Énergie 94,3, Astral Media Inc., Montréal (Les 2 minutes du peuple)
  • CKMF-FM, Énergie 94,3, Astral Media Inc., Montréal (Le Retour de Dominic et Martin)
  • CKMF-FM, Énergie 94,3, Astral Media Inc., Montréal (Salvail Racicot pour Emporter)

Now, let’s compare these numbers to other ones I’ve compiled:

  • Nominations for broadcasters in Vanvouver: 17
  • Nominations for broadcasters in B.C. outside of Vancouver: 11
  • Nominations for broadcasters in Alberta: 12.5*
  • Nominations for broadcasters in Saskatchewan: 7.5*
  • Nominations for broadcasters in Toronto: 16
  • Nominations for broadcasters in Ottawa: 6

* Stupid Lloydminster. Pick a province, we’re at war.

So Quebec’s seven non-token nominations rank Canada’s second-largest province about on par with Saskatchewan, a province with 1/7th our population. Does that sound right?

I’m not including pay and specialty channels here, because Montreal is fairly well represented here through MétéoMédia and Astral Media’s Canal D, Canal Vie, and Ztélé, all based out of Montreal. Astral media ended up winning awards here (two for Canal Vie and one for Ztélé), which I think shows how little original programming Canadian specialty TV contributes.

| Media, Opinion, Technology

Newspaper letter credibility scores one at the Star

Last month, the Toronto Star made an interesting decision concerning so-called “user-generated content”: It decided it would no longer be publishing anonymous or pseudonymous web comments on its letters-to-the-editor page. Such “reverse publishing” is being used by a lot of newspapers who want to appear all hip and cool and stuff, and are desperate to increase traffic to their horrible websites.

The main argument, which was also expressed by many people inside the Star’s newsroom (they even circulated a petition about it), is that printing these comments alongside letters to the editor essentially creates a double standard: Letters to the editor must be signed and verified if submitted by email or mail, but don’t have to be if they’re posted in an online forum.

It’s a valid argument, but it ignores the big secret about letters to the editor: The verification process for “real” letters isn’t much of a verification process at all.

Many newspapers, especially smaller ones, don’t even check that the person whose name appears at the bottom of the letter is in fact the person who wrote it. They just copy and paste from their email inbox and assume that if there’s a full name that doesn’t read “Anita Bath”, it’s probably legitimate.

Larger newspapers, like the Star, require readers to send their phone number, and an editor or secretary calls them up and verifies their name and whether they wrote the letter. There’s no exchange of ID, no looking names up in a database, just a phone call. It works mainly because very few people are going to go through that kind of trouble just to get a fake letter into the newspaper.

Still, I think the change is a good one, if only because seeing online handles like “geeko79”, “No McCain fries for John McCain” and “Fagstein” attached to grammatically-incorrect texts in a supposedly respectable newspaper looks ridiculous.

The policy change doesn’t affect the website; people will still be able to post with silly pseudonyms there, though that’s not what public editor Kathy English would have decided:

I would prefer the Star demand real names of those who comment online. I’ve been told that’s a near-impossible expectation in the online environment. I don’t buy that.

Of course, online faces the same problem. Restrict it to verified names, and you cut off most discussion and spent lots of time verifying IDs. The more moderation controls you have, the less commentary you have and the less active the forum becomes.

(via J-Source)

| Opinion, Radio

And how will this crisis affect Maxime Bernier’s penis?

For those of you wondering “who do I have to sleep with to get a job as a political commentator in this town?”, apparently it’s the foreign affairs minister.

(I sympathize with Julie Couillard, and she made a good point on Tout le monde en parle that she’s done nothing wrong and she didn’t deserve all this attention. But she’s the one choosing to make a career off of this, and I’ve yet to see any indication that she has political experience that would make her a good commentator. Just what will CJAD have her comment on?)

| TV

West Wing is back on CLT, only it’s not CLT anymore

Before I could get a chance to delete CLT from my cable subscription list since it was no longer running The West Wing and there wasn’t anything else worthy of my attention on it, the newly Corus-owned network has rebranded itself “Viva” and has gone from “Canadian Learning Television” to “television for boomer women”.

Apparently boomer women are all about political/legal dramas, which also include Judging Amy and Commander in Chief.

But since I am neither boomer, nor a woman, should I not be allowed to subscribe to this channel?

The West Wing has come back, Mondays to Thursdays at 9pm and 2am. They’re starting it at the beginning of Season 6, which means you’ll be able to see as it re-enacts Barack Obama’s Matthew Santos’s campaign through the Democratic primaries and his narrow victory (sorry if I spoiled it for you) over an old fiscal conservative Republican senator with a wacko Christian running-mate to become the first coloured president of the United States.

(Of course, Santos is latino, not black; he was running to replace a very popular Democratic president; and he beat two opponents through multiple ballots at the convention who were men who had served as vice-president; not to mention the fact that Santos won Texas and his opponent won California)

| Uncategorized

Broadcasting regulation nerdgasm

The CRTC got real busy last week making some big announcements/decisions/suggestions about television broadcasting regulations. Many of them are boring, minor or technical, but here are a few that aren’t:

Over-the-air carriage fees

The big one for broadcasting companies like Canwest/Global, CTV, TQS and Quebecor is the decision to reject the suggestion that “broadcast distribution units” (i.e. cable and satellite companies) should be required to pay fees to TV broadcasters who broadcast over the air freely.

This idea came out of the whole TQS saga, when the network’s owners decided that it needed the ability to somehow blackmail cable companies into giving them money. Since cable specialty channels get per-subscriber fees in exchange for their content, shouldn’t broadcast networks – whose budgets are supposedly higher because they need to produce local news – get money too?

The flip side of the coin is that these network broadcasters are broadcasting freely, using public airwaves. Cable and satellite companies are required by law to carry local broadcast channels on their basic packages. Subscribers don’t get any added value from getting over-the-air stations on cable (except, perhaps, not having to deal with rabbit ears), so why should they have to pay for them?

The CRTC’s decision was tough (emphasis mine):

CTVgm and Canwest proposed that any FFC only be made available if broadcasters meet monthly local programming requirements. However, they did not commit that the FFC, or any portion of it, would result in incremental spending on Canadian programming.

While OTA broadcasters have shown a recent decline in profitability, they, as other enterprises, might first look to their own business plans before making a request for increased revenue from the Commission. In the Proceeding, no business plans suggesting new sources of revenue were provided to the Commission. Neither the rationale for strategic initiatives by OTA broadcasters, such as recent major acquisitions, nor the basis for financing those initiatives or the impact of those initiatives on profitability were explained to the Commission at the public hearing.

The CRTC did cave on one point though: It said that so-called “distant signals” (e.g. CTV Vancouver for us Montrealers) should be able to “negotiate” carriage, in order to offset the trouble that this time-shifting business has caused. What that effectively means is that broadcasters can set rates for out-of-market broadcast stations and simply not allow their channels to be carried on other regions’ cable networks unless they pay their fees.

Broadcasters are happy with the parts of the decision that give them money, and unhappy with the ones that don’t. They’re for less regulation in the broadcasting industry, but they want corporate socialism for the “ailing” over-the-air broadcasting sector.

Continue reading →

| Fun, Montreal

Underground City Scavenger Hunt 2

Alex and Kristin check their lists during February's scavenger hunt

Alex and Kristin check their lists during February's scavenger hunt

After a successful event in February with about 40 in attendance, a second underground city scavenger hunt is being organized next weekend on Facebook and through other channels.

Here’s the details:

Saturday, Nov. 8, 12:30pm at the Central Station food court (which is near the gates for the Deux Montagnes commuter train line). The game starts at 1pm and ends at 3pm at the same place.

No entrance fee, age limitations or secret code words.

What you need to bring:

  • A team of between one and four people
  • A bag (you know, to put all your stuff in)
  • Some money (at most $5), though if you think you can get everything for free go nuts
  • A camera (anything, even a cellphone camera, will suffice)
  • A watch or other time-telling device
  • Comfortable shoes

For those of you who weren’t aware of the previous hunt, you can read my post about it, which includes a full list of the items people were searching for. It’s almost all stuff that’s worthless and can be picked up for free in the underground city. You can also read the piece I did for The Gazette about it.

Robin inspects the goodies

Robin inspects the goodies

For those who were there in February, organizer Robin (that’s her above) has made some tweaks to the rules for this time around, mostly concerning what happens when a team arrives late (which happened a lot last time, causing many items to be disqualified). Also note that the meeting point is different.

There’s no RSVP required, but doing so on Facebook would help with estimating how many people will show up.