News about news

• Finalists for the FPJQ’s Judith Jasmin awards have been announced. The awards honour the best in Quebec journalism. Since you’re looking for the penis-measuring stuff, here’s how it breaks down by organization:
  • La Presse: 9 (including a sweep of the opinion category)
  • Radio-Canada: 5
  • Le Devoir: 2
  • Montreal Gazette (Postmedia): 2
  • Journal de Montréal (Quebecor): 2
  • Le Droit (Capitales Médias): 1
  • Le Guide de Montréal-Nord (TC Media): 1
  • Canal D (Bell Media): 1
• Speaking of the FPJQ, the organization also does its elections during its annual conference. The candidate for president is a familiar name to anglo Montrealers: CTV’s Stéphane Giroux, who has been on the board for three years.
• CBC executives appeared before the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage on Tuesday. We didn’t learn much that’s new (mainly politicians questioning their competition for ad dollars and dealing with pet gripes), but I wrote a story about it anyway for Cartt.ca.
• Val d’Or police officers are suing Radio-Canada because of an Enquête program that broadcast allegations of abuse and assault of local aboriginal people.

At the CRTC

• The commission has released its annual Communications Monitoring Report. Look at all the statistics! There’s enough of them to push whatever agenda you want. But generally, traditional broadcasting is in slow decline, TV subscriptions are flat (as the population grows), and specialty TV channels generally still make a lot of money. One concerning statistic though, young people (ages 12-24) listen to half the traditional radio that other age groups do (partly because of technological changes, but party I’m thinking because that group doesn’t have cars).
• The commission issued a series of mandatory orders against broadcasters who were using licences for tourist information stations in Surrey, B.C., to broadcast general programming.

Went to see the progress of our new CBC station in Iqaluit.The studio is looking amazing! Move in date: Nov. 25th. pic.twitter.com/yc0Wu741aj

— Mad (@Allakariallak) October 19, 2016

TV

• TVA has finally joined the 21st century, launching a new website and a TV anywhere app. You can watch TVA live (most of the time) online, and see episodes of its series for seven days after they air, without having to authenticate with a TV provider.
• Corus is replacing W Movies with Cooking Channel as of Dec. 12. Corus says this channel will be “complementary” to its own Food Network, and both channels are Canadian versions of U.S. channels owned by Scripps Networks. Both will compete with Gusto, the channel recently acquired by Bell.
• Showtime programming is going to be made available on Bell’s Crave TV the same time it airs on regular TV in the U.S.
• For those who wonder why the Maple Leafs always get CBC on Saturday nights, consider this: On opening weekend (albeit a big ceremonial home opener for Toronto), the Leafs-Bruins game had an audience of 1.5 million, while the Canadiens-Senators had half a million on City.
• Mohawk Girls, the TV comedic drama series set in Kahnawake, debuted its fourth season Tuesday night. You can watch the repeat on Sunday night on APTN or watch episodes on its website. La Presse was among the media to write about the series.
• Cord cutting, while definitely a thing, hasn’t done to the TV industry what online advertising has done to the newspaper industry yet. A U.S. consulting firm says it’s overblown. And the CRTC numbers (see above) show that TV distribution is about flat, though as the population increases, the penetration rate drops. It’s now below 80% of households, but that’s still the vast majority.
• The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council says a Musique Plus program discussing dildos should have had viewer advisories, though it wasn’t so bad as to avoid being broadcast in the afternoon.
• Éric Salvail made a bad joke on his talk show about indigenous reserves, which was posted to Twitter and then deleted.
• Comedian Marc Labrèche was a guest editor of La Presse’s arts section a couple of weeks ago. A lot of silly stuff, but he also brought together the heads of Quebec’s four conventional TV networks, and they discussed some interesting things.
• Historia has begun production on a biographical drama series about the life of Jean Béliveau. The cast includes Pierre-Yves Cardinal as Béliveau, and Stéphane Crête as broadcaster René Lecavalier.

Radio

• Sharon Hyland marked 20 years at CHOM on Oct. 21. In this unforgiving industry, where stations hire and drop talent often, it’s rare to see someone stay at the same station for so long, especially when they’re not the biggest name there.
• Tom Power officially took over the reins of CBC Radio’s Q this week. The Globe and Mail gives the blow-by-blow.
• Corus’s news-talk radio station in Vancouver will save some money by just rebroadcasting the audio of the Global News evening newscast.
• Corus’s Toronto news-talker AM 640 has a new lineup that includes a morning show hosted by Matt Gurney (poached from the National Post) and Supriya Dwivedi (a freelancer who co-hosted the Canadaland Commons podcast), with Global Toronto’s Jeff McArthur as a contributor.

Print

• Gannett, the largest U.S. newspaper company, is cutting hundreds more jobs.
• The Wall Street Journal has a depressing take on the state of the newspaper industry, mentioning that even the mighty WSJ has to make some cuts. The company is offering buyouts.
• The Yorkton News Review, a Glacier Community Media publication, is being shut down.
• On the plus side, Le Droit in Ottawa/Gatineau has launched a new monthly print business magazine.
• Parents went ballistic after the editorial board at a student newspaper in Colorado Springs endorsed Hillary Clinton for president, some even going so far as to insist the school board punish them in some way.

Online

• A new Conservative subscription video network has been launched in the U.S. Its personalities include Canadian Mark Steyn. $99 a year or $12 a month.
• I read (most of) this Lainey Lui gossip blog profile so you don’t have to.

https://twitter.com/caroleaoun/status/788864355441926144

News about people

• Pierre Bruneau’s 40 years at TVA got him a classy shout-out during the competition’s newscast.
• Paul Woods is retiring as executive editor at the Toronto Star.
• Canadian Press national reporter Bruce Cheadle is also retiring.
• It’s paywalled, unfortunately, but the Globe and Mail has a really good take on why Rogers changed its chief executive.

Jobs

• Globe and Mail summer internship (deadline Oct. 28)
• Montreal Gazette reporting and editing summer internships (deadline Nov. 4)

Upcoming events

• Nov. 18-20: FPJQ conference in Mont-Saint-Sauveur
• Dec. 11: CBC Christmas Sing-In