News about news

• Former Ontario Progressive Conservative leader Patrick Brown has made good on his threat to sue CTV News for the story that got him kicked out of his job. He’s focusing on something CTV got wrong — that a woman he is alleged to have given alcohol to was underage at the time.
• The Journal de Montréal summarizes the absurdity that is access to information, from both the provincial and federal governments.
• Véronique Lauzon of La Presse studies the gender breakdown of sources cited in the media. You will very much not be surprised by what she found.
• Canada has climbed four spots to 18th on the Reporters Without Borders press freedom ranking.
• RTDNA Canada has announced its annual national and network award finalists. CBC Montreal, CBC Quebec City, CTV Montreal and CJAD are among the nominees in the national awards, having won regional awards in the same categories.
• Plateau Mont-Royal borough mayor Luc Ferrandez said he would no longer speak to TVA’s Yves Poirier after Quebecor media outlets published a story about him apparently falling asleep during a city council meeting. It’s unclear how seriously we should take this apparent boycott.
• Radio-Canada is going to hold its televised Quebec leaders’ debate on Sept. 13, broadcast as well on Télé-Québec, V, and online via La Presse+, Le Devoir, HuffPost, Metro and others. TVA is hosting its own debate a week later.
• Netflix has a new series following BuzzFeed reporters.
• The Peabody Awards for news, radio and public service were announced. This American Life’s S-Town podcast is among the winners.
• Bloomberg News is reportedly putting up a paywall. Vanity Fair has also launched a metered paywall.

At the CRTC

Someone likes @weathernetwork a LOT! So much so the company led their @CRTCeng reply (for their hearing coming April 30th) with this poem penned by a happy viewer! #cdntv #crtc pic.twitter.com/t30oCNJyLh

— Cartt.ca (@CarttCa) April 21, 2018

• Quebecor CEO Pierre Karl Péladeau writes an open letter in Le Devoir saying the commission needs to stop Bell’s proposed purchase of Historia and Séries+ from Corus. He also goes on at length about his company losing an arbitration decision over how much Bell TV has to pay for TVA Sports.
• The CRTC has gotten Ancestry.ca to change the way it emails its users to allow them to unsubscribe from all emails from each email they send out, instead of just the type of email they received.
• Cogeco, which has until June to move the CKOI transmitter from the CIBC building to the Mount Royal tower, has decided to buy a new antenna on the tower and move not only CKOI but its other FM stations — 98.5, Rythme FM and The Beat — to that antenna, which it qualifies as better performing. The stations’ patterns would remain virtually identical. The CRTC is accepting comments until May 28.

At the CBC

• The SCRC, the union representing CBC/Radio-Canada workers in Quebec and Moncton, as well as foreign correspondents, has rejected an offer in principle negotiated between their union executive and employer.

Ethical reviews

• The Canadian Broadcast Standards Council dismissed a complaint against Vrak’s Code F. show, in which female comedians discuss the lifestyles of young women, but blamed it for failing to provide a proper recording of the episode when asked. The Bell Media channel sent a screener instead, which didn’t include the right on-air content advisories.
• The CBSC also blamed TSN after it aired the F-word spoken by a player during a life CFL game.
• CBC ombudsman: A report on the Colten Boushie/Gerald Stanley case was not unduly biased against Stanley.

TV

• Sportsnet released its second-round NHL playoff schedule within minutes of the Toronto Maple Leafs being eliminated Wednesday night. All four second-round series will be produced by Sportsnet with their own play-by-play teams, highlighted by Jim Hughson and Craig Simpson on the Winnipeg Jets series, for which all seven games (if needed) will be on CBC. They’re also airing a couple of Saturday games in Punjabi on OMNI.
• Meanwhile, Wednesday’s Leafs game had an average audience of 4.18 million viewers on CBC and Sportsnet, making it the second-most watched NHL game since Sportsnet got national rights in 2014. Add to that 536,000 who watched in French on TVA Sports. These numbers are despite the fact that there were another 631,000 watching the Raptors on TSN and 347,000 watching the Blue Jays on Sportsnet One at the same time.
• V wants to improve its schedule, particularly in the early evenings when it can offer counter-programming to TVA and Radio-Canada. And no news yet on whether disappointing new shows Le show Rousseau and Danser pour gagner will be renewed.
• CBC’s Dragon’s Den has two new dragons, one of whom is Montreal-based movie cinema entrepreneur Vincenzo Guzzo.
• The Gémeaux, Quebec’s television awards, has changed its nomination rules again after hit drama District 31 was deemed ineligible because it’s the only series of its kind (a drama that airs four days a week). The new rules say that in such situations, a series can be included in a different category. The Gémeaux tried to put TV series on a more even playing field by splitting its drama category into three: “daily” shows, “annual” shows that have both fall and winter seasons, and “seasonal” shows that usually only air 10-12 episodes a year.
• TVA’s Moi & Cie channel is changing its focus a bit, trying to attract more male viewers. It also has a new logo.
• Canal Vie has a new talk show hosted by Mélanie Maynard.
• CBS All Access has launched in Canada. It’s $6 a month and includes access to current and classic CBS series. But its two original series, Star Trek Discovery and The Good Fight, are still owned by Canadian broadcasters, so the service doesn’t have Discovery at all and only the first season of The Good Fight. Similarly, NFL games aren’t available in Canada this way.
• It’s been 10 years since TQS shut down its news division. Its successor V currently runs a cheap daily newscast called NVL.
• The BBC is launching a new channel to better appeal to Scottish viewers.
• BBC has pulled the TV series Human Planet after discovering some scenes filmed in the nature documentary were staged.
• The European Union is trying to impose a 30% content quota on Netflix and other streaming services.
• Comcast has made a $31-billion offer for UK broadcaster Sky, kneecapping a bid by Fox.

Radio

• The Gazette’s Brendan Kelly has a feature on ICI Musique personalities Catherine Pogonat and Philippe Fehmiu.
• Kitchener radio announcer Craig Fee has been ranting against Ontario premier Kathleen Wynne without disclosing that his wife is running as a candidate for the PCs.

Print

• The National Post union drive failed when its membership referendum failed by a single vote.
• Influence Communication lists the most cited newspapers in Quebec, and La Presse (which isn’t a newspaper) came in first. Though if you combine the Journal de Montréal and Journal de Québec scores, they’re not far behind.
• The Journal de Montréal is holding a panel discussion on the legalization of marijuana featuring some of its columnists. Tickets are $15.
• Student newspapers in the United States are engaging in a national campaign to save themselves and ask for alumni donations.

Online

• Blacklock’s Reporter, a subscription news site covering the federal government, has settled a lawsuit against one of its own contributors accusing him of bad faith. Though the matter is settled, there’s clearly bitterness on both sides still as they have differing stories about what happened.
• YouTube says it has removed 8 million videos in three months for violating its policies, of which 6.7 million were flagged by computer algorithm and 76% of those were taken down before a single view. Similarly, Facebook says most of the extremist content it has taken down was found by computers.
• BBC has put its sound effects library online for free non-commercial use. It has 16,000 clips.

News about people

Congrats to @sleeCJAD for 25 years of sweat and good cheer at @CJAD800 pic.twitter.com/t7IaRId2Eb

— Mitch Melnick (@HunterZThompson) April 24, 2018

• Chris Nuttall-Smith, former Globe and Mail restaurant critic, is planning to launch a new Athletic-like subscription service for Toronto restaurant reviews.
• Former Québec solidaire co-spokesperson Françoise David will be contributing columns to La Presse during the election campaign, along with former Tory candidate (and senator) Michael Fortier.
• Wendy Daniels has been dropped by Boom 99.7 in Ottawa.
• MSNBC host Joy Reid is in the middle of a bizarre story about old homophobic blog posts she says were fabricated, but that the Internet Archive says it has no evidence to dispute.
• Bill Cosby is a rapist.

Obituaries

• Stéphanie Bois-Houde, Le Soleil restaurant critic

Jobs

• Desk editor, La Presse (deadline: April 27)
• Diversity bursary, La Presse (deadline: May 3)