News about news
C'est un record! 200 journalistes ont soumis 280 œuvres journalistiques pour les prix Judith-Jasmin! Bonne chance à tous! #congrèsFPJQ pic.twitter.com/nkoft2n9Us
— FPJQ (@FPJQ) September 26, 2017
- If you missed the CBC’s Annual Public Meeting, its video archive is here. But the biggest news about the Ceeb is that its Toronto office is losing its mail robots.
- Meanwhile, CBC Montreal is holding an open house on Sunday as part of the Journées de la culture. Among those present are local CBC/Radio-Canada personalities and the cast of Kim’s Convenience, which is on a cross-country tour promoting the new season of the show.
- Susan Delacourt argues that Canadian all-news channels shouldn’t be as distracted by Donald Trump. She has a point — people who want the latest Trump stuff can go to CNN, MSNBC or Fox News, but we only have two English-language Canadian news channels for stuff from our country.
At the CRTC
- The Globe’s Christine Dobby sits down with new CRTC chair Ian Scott.
- Michael Geist points out an order in council issued last week that requires the CRTC produce a report about how programming is distributed and how that will change in the coming years. This sounds a lot like work the commission has already done in its Let’s Talk TV process and discoverability conferences.
- EBOX, an independent Internet provider in Quebec and Ontario, has decided to enter the TV distribution industry in Quebec’s major cities, but has run into a wall negotiating a distribution deal with … oh, go ahead, guess … yup, Bell Media. According to EBOX’s complaint of undue preference at the CRTC, Bell cut off negotiations, citing something about EBOX’s behaviour, and said it was no longer interested in allowing any Bell Media channels (TSN, RDS, Discovery, Space, Bravo, D, Vie, Investigation, CTV News Channel, Comedy, Much, Z, TMN, HBO) to be distributed by EBOX. Bell’s initial response says it has done nothing against the rules and will explain its dealings with EBOX.
- Michael Geist notes (and CBC picks up) that Bell argued at a committee hearing into NAFTA renegotiations that there should be criminal provisions to prevent piracy and a CRTC-managed list of websites that Canadian ISPs should block for piracy violations.
TV
A message from the alley… pic.twitter.com/rMnDIEqjmd
— Rick Mercer (@rickmercer) September 25, 2017
- Rick Mercer is ending the Mercer Report after 15 years, announcing this season will be its last.
- RDS has picked up broadcast rights to the Laval Rocket, the Canadiens’ American Hockey League farm team, and plans at least 16 home matches this season. Stéphane Leroux and Bruno Gervais will be on the broadcast team. This follows a similar announcement from TSN 690 for English radio broadcasts (tentatively 11 games, all on Friday nights). French radio rights are held by 91,9 Sports, which promises to broadcast all regular-season and playoff games.
- Global has ordered a third season of the Jason Priestly series Private Eyes.
- The Canadian government will be unveiling its new cultural policy Thursday, which is rumoured to involve an announcement of new money from Netflix but otherwise hasn’t been revealed yet. But that hasn’t stopped various parties from trying to get ahead of it. Among them, Quebecor CEO Pierre Karl Péladeau, who says the government needs to equal the playing field between Canadian broadcasters and foreign ones like Netflix, at the very least charging the same taxes to the latter. Quebec says it’s willing to start taxing Netflix on its own if the feds don’t step in.
- ARTV is taking the web series C’est juste du web, an online-only spinoff of C’est juste de la TV, and putting it on TV, Thursdays at 11:30am and Sundays at 2:30pm.
- The Canadian Press explores the sale process of Transcontinental’s Quebec community newspapers, Since May, TC has announced eight sales of 20 newspapers, all to local independent owners.
- National Post staff in Ontario have filed for unionization after signing membership cards.
Online
- Twitter is expanding to 280 characters, which you’ve heard about a gajillion jokes about if you’re on Twitter.
- The Globe and Mail goes into detail about Bell’s multi-billion-dollar fibre-optic network rollout and why the company (along with Telus and others) is spending thousands of dollars per home to create it.
- DAZN, the streaming service that has exclusive rights to out-of-market NFL games in Canada, is offering a $20 refund because of its crappy delivery of those games to start the season.
News about people
Welcome to #NHLNetwork @Jackie_Redmond!
Think you can stop these shots, @KevinWeekes? pic.twitter.com/ikHEKYmqT1
— NHL Network (@NHLNetwork) September 21, 2017
- Jackie Redmond is leaving Sportsnet for NHL Network.
- Selena Ross is the new Associate Editor for Maisonneuve Magazine
- Ian Morrison, executive director of the lobby group Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, is stepping down.
- CBC has announced several changes of duties for senior managers in preparation for the new launch of the National.
- Scott Feschuk is ending his column at Maclean’s.
- Vincent Marissal, formerly of La Presse, has turned to the dark side.
- Lisa Christensen is taking leave from hosting the CJAD Car Show so she can run for office as a borough councillor for Projet Montréal.
- Corus has announced new leadership for its French channels Séries+ and Historia: Catherine Vidal and Julie Potterat, both of whom were already working there in acquisitions and original programming, take over the work of Brigitte Vincent, who is stepping down on Oct. 3.
- Patrick Lagacé interviews Paul Arcand.
- The Athletic Winnipeg has added Leah Hextall as a contributor.
- Elena Cherney, whose previous workplaces include the Montreal Gazette, is now Coverage Planning Chief at the Wall Street Journal.
Obituaries
- David Mainse, religious broadcaster and founder of 100 Huntley Street.
- Joe Gelmon, former reporter and editor at the Winnipeg Free Press, Globe and Mail, Toronto Star and Montreal Gazette. He’s remembered at the latter for his style guide, which had a lot of consistency and rigour but infamously tried to convince people to spell the plural of sock as sox.
Jobs
- Newsroom Operations Supervisor, CTV Montreal (deadline: Sept. 28)
- Lead Editor, Halifax Chronicle Herald (deadline: Sept. 28)
- Host, Power and Politics (deadline: Sept. 28)
- Host, CBC’s Power and Politics (deadline: Sept. 28)
- Digital broadcast journalist, Global News Toronto (plus same job but as a 12-month contract) (deadline: Sept. 29)
- The Walrus fellowship (deadline: Oct. 2)
- Editorial assistant, CBC’s The National (deadline: Oct. 4)
- Analyst, Quebec Press Council (deadline: Oct. 5)
- Managing Editor, Nunatsiaq News (deadline: Oct. 13)
- CBC/QWF writer in residence (deadline: Oct. 15)
- Pupitreur surnuméraire, La Presse
- Journaliste-pupitreur, Métro (deadline: Oct. 22)
- Summer intern, Globe and Mail (deadline: Oct. 27)
- Colour commentator for Montreal Canadiennes CWHL home games
The “let’s talk TV” process really didn’t accomplish what it could have, in part because it really spent most of it’s time talking to incumbent players and really didn’t spend enough looking towards the future.
IP TV, streaming, and other forms of digital delivery is already changing things so much, and things are only going to get even more diverse and more complicated. Beyond distribution, creation is also changing. Already, some of the biggest “TV” series aren’t even on TV at all, Netflix, Amazon, and others are producing content. The incumbent players don’t even want to talk about it.
So instead, we have a whole report about skinny basic and re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic that is Canadian broadcasting. Cord cutting is a real issue moving forward, as people become disconnected physically and mentally from the 1000 channel universe.
It’s also that the Let’s Talk TV was sort of the final swan song final gasp from the previous chair, an attempt to create a legacy other than rubber stamping mergers and take overs for the big players. It’s probably a very good thing for the new chair to lead something that looks at the actual future without worrying about offending Bell, Rogers, Corus, and so on.
If Bell Media wants censorship (blocking sites it deems as pirate sites) It should be told to move its assets to North Korea or Russia. That’s not the way we do business around here.