News about news

• News from the FPJQ’s annual conference: Judith Jasmin journalism award winners (La Presse picked up the most prizes), Antoine Désilets photojournalism award winners (almost swept by La Presse), the Arthur-Prévost grant recipient (Christopher Nardi of the Journal de Montréal), an honourary membership for jailed blogger Raif Badawi, and new members of the association’s board.
• The Globe and Mail is joining something called the Trust Project, which based on its description consists mainly of providing better labelling of news, opinion and advertising. Generally it provides greater transparency, but whether it will increase trust is far from certain.
• The Toronto Star has a section on “trust” issues in which it explains how it works to ensure readers’ trust, which includes things like how front-page stories are chosen, how breaking-news stories come together, how election endorsements don’t tie the newspaper to a political party and how corrections are made (here we learn that the public editor handles corrections, which seems a bit odd to me).
• Journalists covering the Nathalie Normandeau trial will get quicker and easier access to evidence presented at the trial after the judge ordered they be given such access as soon as that evidence is presented in court.
• After justices of the peace were criticized for being too lenient in approving search warrants against journalists, chief judge Lucie Rondeau complained that they were getting a bad rap. Rondeau blamed police, the media and the system for the problems revealed at the Chamberland Commission. (Le Devoir’s Brian Myles was not impressed.)
• LaSalle is going to start allowing cameras back in the room during borough council meetings after previously forbidding them with undemocratic and probably illegal regulations.
• A man in Hamilton was arrested for yelling FHRITP at a reporter who was conducting an interview outside a police station. This just days after the same reporter was harassed at Mohawk College. The story doesn’t make clear what the man would be charged with.
• Quebec’s press council is launching a new mediation service to help resolve disputes between news outlets and their consumers before they go through the 12-to-14-month process of a formal decision. Apparently the fact that it takes more than a year to reach a non-binding press council decision is not the problem here.
• The CEGEP de Jonquière has a new pilot project that will adapt journalism courses specifically for aboriginal students.
• The Ryerson Review of Journalism writes about The Sprawl, a Calgary-based news outlet that started up to cover the Calgary mayor’s race and then stopped its coverage after it was over.

At the CRTC

• The commission begins its hearing Monday into new radio stations in the Grimsby/Beamsville and Georgina markets in Ontario. There are three applicants for each.

TV

• For the benefit of the three people who haven’t seen it yet, a lesson: If you’re looking for the money shot, don’t shoot through traffic on an open road.
• Comcast had a major setback in court that will disrupt delivery of set-top boxes for its new X1 cable system that’s being used by Shaw, Rogers and Videotron in Canada. TiVo (a rival system used by Cogeco up here) had a patent for being able to schedule DVR recordings on a mobile device, and though X1 had its own independently-developed system for doing so, the patent prevents it from being used without a licence. Comcast says it will simply disable that feature.
• SNL Québec’s appearance on Radio-Canada Télé will be a one-night only affair, hosted by Magalie Lépine-Blondeau, on Jan. 6 at 9pm.
• City has released its Christmas movie schedule. Congratulations if you recognize any of the movies.
• Corus’s Nelvana is producing a new original animated children’s comedy series called D.N.Ace for Teletoon. 40 half-hour episodes have been ordered.
• Bell Media has greenlit a new six-episode documentary series about maritime disasters, in co-production with the Smithsonian channel in the U.S. and Seven Network in Australia.
• Bill Brioux points out that CHCH’s decision to dump House of Cards may have as much to do with ratings as it does concerns over actor Kevin Spacey.

Radio

• A column by the very funny Rosalie Bonenfant on Énergie 94.3 in Montreal (on the morning show co-hosted by her mother Mélanie Maynard) last November about femininity and men prompted one listener to write to the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council complaining that her monologue was targeting all men, accusing them all of being sexual aggressors. Yes, folks, someone actually complained that #NotAllMen. The CBSC’s decision (English, French) notes that Bonenfant’s statements in context are pretty clear and don’t accuse “all” men of anything.
• Corus is creating more multi-market content for its talk stations. Alex Pierson has a new show that will air weeknights on stations in Toronto, London and Hamilton. Toronto’s AM640 and Hamilton’s AM 980 will also add Charles Adler’s show, which already airs on other Corus talk stations in Winnipeg, Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver. Both Adler and Pierson were previously hosts on Sun News Network.
• CKRP-FM, a French-language community station in Falher, Alta., has pulled the plug, with a lack of volunteers to keep it running.

Print

Excited to announce I'm moving to Montreal after 28 years away to be a Canada correspondent for The New York Times. pic.twitter.com/qNKcqHQih1

— Dan Bilefsky (@DanBilefsky) November 22, 2017

• The New York Times has a new Montreal correspondent, Dan Bilefsky, moving from London. Bilefsky grew up here but hasn’t lived here since the 1980s.
• The Montreal Gazette has a new column, Quebec Culture Roundup, written by Brendan Kelly, which recaps news affecting francophone culture in the province.
• The Globe and Mail is reorganizing its sections next week. The sections will all have giant coloured squares in their top corners, which seems to be the industry trend these days (La Presse, Postmedia, etc.)
• The Journal de Montréal is also refreshing its weekend lineup, explicitly to entice La Presse subscribers to switch once that newspaper stops printing at the end of the year.
• Le Devoir has also reorganized its weekend paper, combining the Culture, Livres, Plaisirs and Agenda sections into “Le D” magazine.
• Unions in Quebec wrote an open letter to the federal government to ask for urgent measures to save print media.
• The people behind Toronto’s Your Ward News newspaper have been charged with promoting hate against women and Jews, and say they plan to challenge Canada’s hate speech laws.
• The Journal de Québec has a whole section devoted to celebrating its own 50th anniversary, including articles on how much its readers love it, and how radio hosts use its coverage to keep updated on the news.
• Métro in Montreal has lost five jobs as uncertainty continues over whether owner Transcontinental will sell it, and if so to whom.
• Changes at Postmedia’s board of directors: Chair Rod Phillips has stepped down because he’s seeking an Ontario PC nomination. President Paul Godfrey adds the titles of Executive Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, and Peter Sharpe has been named “Lead Director.”

Online

• Facebook’s huge amount of data on its users provides lots of customization potential for advertisers, which is usually pretty good, but as this story shows, it also makes racial or other forms of discrimination very easy, despite Facebook’s promise to stop it.
• Lucas Powers, a CBC Toronto employee who got into a political argument about Halloween costumes using the official account and believed doing so was justified, has learned via CBC’s ombudsman that it was not.

News about people

Video: @joannevrakas shares how much she misses us (And we miss her too!) pic.twitter.com/U7sIG4Baun

— CityNews Montreal (@CityNewsMTL) November 24, 2017

• Joanne Vrakas checked in with Breakfast Television to give an update on her and her new baby Axel.
• Amanda Lang, formerly of Bloomberg TV Canada and before that of CBC News Network, has been hired by Bell Media. Starting in January she’ll work (again) for BNN, as well as contribute to CTV News and Bell Media’s radio stations.
• Andrew Yates, who has worked at CBC, CTV, City TV, the National Post and elsewhere, has been named the new managing editor of news at Huffington Post Canada. Davide Mastracci has also been hired to lead opinions and blogs.
• Lisa Christensen, of the CJAD Car Show, whose election as borough councillor was the only one in Montreal that went to recount (excluding her from the group swearing-in ceremony), has been declared elected. She was sworn in on Nov. 22.
• Alain Marcil, engineer at Global Montreal, has retired.
• Don Connolly, host of CBC Nova Scotia’s Information Morning out of Halifax, is retiring after 42 years. His last show is Jan. 26.
• Amanda Connolly has left iPolitics for Global News, covering national security.
• More Weinstein fallout: New York Times White House correspondent Glenn Thrush has been suspended and CBS and PBS personality Charlie Rose has been fired after allegations of sexual misconduct.
• Vanessa Hrvatin is the latest recipient of Postmedia’s Michelle Lang fellowship, named in honour of the Calgary Herald journalist who died reporting in Afghanistan. Hrvatin will work at the Herald and National Post researching fetal alcohol spectrum disorder.
• Florence Turpault-Desroches got a promotion to “directrice principale de l’information” at La Presse, in charge of the weekend arts and Pause sections.
• Chelsea Lacroix is moving from Jump 106.9 in Ottawa to become afternoon drive announcer at 104.5 Fresh in Cornwall. Both stations are owned by Corus.

Obituaries

• Jean Lamarre, chair fo the boards of Le Devoir and Télé-Québec

Jobs

• Fellowship for aboriginal investigative journalism (deadline: Dec. 1)

Upcoming events

• CBC Montreal Christmas Sing-In, Dec. 10