Category Archives: Montreal

| Media, Montreal

24 Heures gets Metro-like redesign

The day after labour day tends to be a good one to unveil new redesigns. Quebecor is tweaking the look of its 24 Hours papers across the country today, including 24 Heures in Montreal. Each includes an article praising itself for the new design and how much better it is. (The articles aren’t online yet, but you can read the 24 Heures version on their digital edition on Page 5.)

The biggest change in the layout is that the headlines and photos look bigger, which of course means less room for actual news (but nobody cares about that if they’re reading 24 Heures, right?)

You’ll also notice more use of yellow, particularly in highlighter-style behind smaller headlines and labels. I make note of that particularly because there’s a certain other newspaper in town that redesigned in May – and it too promised bigger headlines, bigger photos and more use of yellow highlights.

But to suggest that 24 Heures and its sister papers across the country redesigned so they could look more like the more successful direct competitor Metro, now that would be silly.

Here’s a before and after:

Old New

And a couple of other news pages from the new design:

| Media, Montreal

Rue Frontenac puts it on paper

Rue Frontenac's first attempt at a paper edition last September

You might remember last September, just before the start of the Canadiens’ season, the locked-out journalists and other workers of the Journal de Montréal published a special print edition. It was just a one-time thing, but it got read and now they want to try for something more permanent.

Last week, Rue Frontenac announced that a print edition would be made on a weekly basis (Thursdays) and distributed throughout the Montreal area (from St. Jerome to St. Jean sur Richelieu) starting in late October.

Like most newspapers these days, this one promises to have more features and analysis, keeping the day-to-day breaking news for the website.

The announcement was enough to prompt stories in other media:

From those stories we get some more details:

  • The paper will be called Rue Frontenac
  • Distribution will be a minimum of 50,000
  • The paper will be big – at least 48 pages to start
  • The union expects that non-labour costs will be paid by advertising and other revenue
  • Distribution will be through newsstands and in person by locked out workers (the other newspaper primarily distributed by handing it to people is 24 Heures, which is sure to make for some interesting mornings in front of metro stations)
  • BV!Media, which owns Branchez-Vous and provides online advertising for Rue Frontenac, will help supply advertising for the print product

The Gazette’s story also provides some stats on RueFrontenac.com: 300,000 unique visitors and 2.2 million page views monthly.

A paper edition was successful in Quebec City during the Journal de Québec lockout, mainly because there are no free daily newspapers in that city. In Montreal, there are two free dailies, three francophone subscription dailies, the weekly Voir, plus all the anglo publications, community newspapers and weekly news magazines.

It remains to be seen how many people will opt for the union paper over the many other options out there.

| Montreal, Opinion

Sergakis’s ad turn and the development “loophole”

In Thursday’s Gazette, I noticed a mostly-text ad from the Station des Sports, signed by local … uhh … entrepreneur … Peter Sergakis, who owns the bar and many other bars around town. It was to thank people around the sports bar for supporting its plan to expand its footprint.

As you can imagine with these ads, there’s a lot of missing context. The project has been under fire recently because of Sergakis’s use of a “loophole” in the law that allows him to bypass a register (that could force a referendum on the subject if it gets enough signatures) by having more than half the people affected sign a petition.

The ad itself isn’t what surprises me, though. What’s interesting is that the ad turns onto a different page. Like newspapers that (used to, at least) start major articles on the front page and continue them inside, this one ends a colour ad on Page A3 with “advertisement continued on Page A8”.

Peter Sergakis ad for Station des Sports (Page A3 of Thursday's Gazette)

Part 2 of the same ad, from Page A8

Not something you see often in advertisements. Most likely this was done because A3 has colour and exposure but limits the space given to advertisers to ensure most of it is editorial copy.

Why is this a loophole?

Anyway, back to that loophole. In this city, if you don’t like a by-law change that affects the area immediately around where you live, you can sign a register to demand a referendum on the subject. If you get the required number of signatures, the city/borough must either hold a referendum or withdraw the project.

The “loophole” is a little-used way to get around this, by having more than half the people who would be able to sign that register and vote in that referendum sign a petition supporting the project. So if the area around a new development had 1,000 people, you’d need to get 501 to sign a petition and then there wouldn’t be a register or referendum.

The reasoning makes sense to me. If those 501 support the project, why bother having a referendum where they would, presumably, all vote no? How is this a “loophole”? Isn’t it just democracy at work.

I asked around, and the answers I got pointed to how ancient and unused this law is, and how it wasn’t designed to be used in this way (even the city admits that). I see that, but it hardly makes it undemocratic.

The other answers mentioned how unfair it is compared to the trouble one has to go through to force a referendum. The petition can be passed around over months, while registers are open only for a day. The petition can be brought to people’s homes, while registers can only be signed at borough offices.

On the other hand, though, far fewer people are required to sign a register to force a referendum than sign a petition to quash one. And again, if more than half the affected residents support the project, isn’t that still the will of the people? Or should the minority overpower the majority?

What’s left unsaid in calling this a “loophole” is the implication that those who sign petitions supporting projects don’t really support them. That they’re being fooled by people hired by developers to bribe people into signing petitions they don’t fully understand. That when exposed to the issues in a referendum, they would change their minds and vote against.

That’s not a far-fetched idea or a conspiracy theory. It’s a legitimate concern. And the process should probably be changed, both to ensure that people have better access to registers and to ensure that those signing petitions in support of a project understand the implications of doing so.

But don’t call direct democracy a “loophole” just because you disagree with a decision that you think is uninformed.

| Montreal, Public transit

STM fall schedules: “10 minutes max” and a new seniors’ route

UPDATED Aug. 31 with STM’s claims of increased West Island service

STM’s “10 minutes max” network (click for PDF)

The Société de transport de Montréal went all out announcing a new gimmick this week. It’s called “10 minutes max network” and it seeks to reassure transit users (and potential transit users) that buses within this network will arrive in no more than 10 minutes from when you get to a stop. Affected bus lines (there are 32 in all, or 31 if you count the 106 and 506 as one route) will have this graphic added to stop signs.

It comes into effect with schedule changes on Monday morning.

There are, of course, some caveats: It’s only between 6am and 9pm, only Mondays to Fridays (excluding holidays), and for 21 of the 32 routes, it only applies in one direction at a time (6am-2pm in one direction, 2pm-9pm in the other).

Affected routes:

  • In both directions: 18, 24, 51, 67, 69, 80, 105, 121, 139, 141, 165
  • One direction at a time: 32, 33, 44, 45, 48, 49, 55, 64, 90, 97,103, 106-506, 132, 161, 171, 187, 193, 197, 211, 470*

UPDATE: A blogger has created a subway-style map of these routes here.

Even under those rules, I spotted quite a few cases where it didn’t apply, particularly at the edges of those time blocks. A departure might be set for 8:45pm, and the next one after 9pm. I guess “close enough” is good for the STM here.

Despite my criticisms though, looking at the before and after schedules for the affected routes, there are serious efforts at improving service (at least during these time blocks – with a few exceptions it seems very little effort has been made to improve service after 9pm or on weekends).

Most of the routes on the lists are the STM’s most highly trafficked. In many cases, no change in schedule was needed to comply with the “10 minutes max” rule. In others, the headway was already as low as 12-15 minutes, so bringing it down to 10 wasn’t a huge deal.

But changing the headway from 12 minutes to 10 means going from five departures an hour to six.

There is also significant improvement for 7pm-9pm, when many routes which had headways of up to 20 minutes now see the number of departures as much as doubled.

Some highlights:

Continue reading →

| Montreal, TV

TV gets shut down for maintenance

CBC antenna atop Mount Royal, and the giant crane working on it

A lot of people who rely on old-fashioned antennas to get their television service have noticed this summer that all the TV stations in Montreal disappear after midnight.

The reason is simple: The transmitters are being shut off for maintenance work.

For the past couple of months, workers have been busy replacing antennas and doing other work on the 50-year-old CBC transmission tower atop Mount Royal (just northwest of the Belvedere, at the mountain summit, in case you’ve never seen it before).

Old antennas laying on the path of Olmstead Rd.

One of the main purposes of the maintenance is to replace antennas as television broadcasters make the switch to digital. An antenna that CFCF-12 has been using since it launched in 1961 has been replaced with a new one that will be used for digital transmission. The station even did a news piece on it (skip to the 8:40 mark). Though the station got approval today to operate a 10,600-Watt digital transmitter, it looks like it won’t be put into service until after the transition deadline of Aug. 31, 2011.

For safety reasons (we’re talking about transmission power in the hundreds of thousands of watts), all the transmitters have to be shut down while the maintenance takes place. To minimize disruption, this work is taking place overnight, when Mount Royal Park is closed and when TV viewing is at its lowest.

Continue reading →

| Montreal, Radio

CFQR gets license renewal – and a slap on the wrist

This week, the CRTC gave approval for a license renewal to CFQR-FM, commonly known as Q92 (but who prefer to refer to themselves now as “92.5 the Q”). They can keep broadcasting until Aug. 31, 2014.

The approval is considered “short-term” because CFQR was in violation of one of its conditions of license, a minor one that requires that 20% of music from the jazz and blues category be Canadian. (The station exceeded its requirements for Canadian content overall.)

The station blamed this on improper labelling involving a new program:

Our non-compliance related solely to the introduction of a new three-hour program on Sunday evenings called Chill. This program is a showcase for Canadian smooth jazz. We experienced a problem with the labelling of songs in this three hour program block. The result was that we could not correctly identify individual selections as to whether they did or did not qualify as Canadian content. This in turn led directly to the compliance question raised by the Commission.

We deeply regret our failure to comply with the category 34 requirement. We take our responsibilities seriously and understand the importance of meeting our regulatory obligations. The non-compliance was not intentional and it was for a short duration.  It only related to this program feature.   We want to assure the Commission that it will not happen again.

This isn’t the first time CFQR has gotten a slap from the national regulator. The last time their license was up for renewal, the commission noted that the station was not in compliance with a condition of license requiring no more than 49.9% of music broadcast be hits. (You know, so it doesn’t sound too much like CJFM AM radio.</sarcasm>)

The CRTC has also renewed the license of CKLX-FM, Planète Jazz 91.9, even though the station was in non-compliance on its financial obligations.

| Montreal, Public transit

Doo-doo-doo immortalized

The STM announced this morning that it is testing a warning sound for metro doors closing that it plans to have installed on all MR-73 trains by 2012. Right now, trains in Montreal’s metro don’t give any visual or audio indication that their doors are about to close, which sometimes causes people to get caught in them. Other metro systems around the world have such a chime and/or blinking light to indicate that doors are about to close or are closing.

This isn’t the first time the STM has come up with this idea. In 2008, it tested a train that had a high-pitched beeping sound. I imagine it wasn’t received very well, considering how annoying that beep can be when heard over and over again.

The sound they’ve come up with this time – you can listen to it in .WAV format (WAV? Really STM?) on the STM’s website – is a vocal warning with the famous doo-doo-doo sound of departing trains in the background.

This is significant because the doo-doo-doo sound associated with Montreal’s metro system is endangered.

The sound is heard on the MR-73 trains used on the blue and orange lines (a similar sound is heard on three MR-63 trains with middle elements from a specially-designed train). It’s not an artificial or intentional creation, but rather a byproduct of a current chopper that regulates power going to the electric motor. This chopper has five stages, which give off sound at different frequencies (three of which are audible by most people).

In new trains that will be built hopefully sometime before the next millennium, the motors will have a much more advanced power regulation system that will result in a continuous frequency change rather than discrete notes. It will sound more like a car engine accelerating than the metro we know now (assuming it makes much sound at all – new trains are supposed to be much quieter).

There has been suggestions among transit fans of artificially emulating the sound by just playing a sound file when the trains start moving, but that seems a bit silly and unnecessary.

Using the three-note sound for a door chime, on the other hand, makes sense. It’s a pleasant sound, instantly recognizable, and has a bit of heritage value, I’d argue.

Assuming the STM sticks with this sound for its new trains, we won’t have to worry about doo-doo-doo going the way of the dodo.

UPDATE (Aug. 13): I happened to be on the train that’s testing this new chime. The doors begin closing at the word “fermons” in “nous fermons les portes,” which on the plus side means there’s little additional delay caused by adding the warning, but on the minus side means that by the time someone who hasn’t heard the notice understands what it says (by the time it gets to the keyword “portes”), it’s already obvious that the doors are closing, and the warning becomes unnecessary.

I kind of agree with the commenters below: keep the chime, but lose the voice.

UPDATE (Nov. 12): I was on this train again today, and noticed that they’ve done exactly as I and others have suggested. The sound remains the same, but the voice announcement has disappeared completely.

| Montreal, Radio

Cogeco’s self-serving plan for Quebec radio

Three months after announcing a deal to buy Corus Quebec’s radio stations (with the exception of CKRS in Saguenay, which has been sold to an independent group including Guy Carbonneau), Cogeco and the CRTC yesterday both released Cogeco’s proposal for how it will run those stations.

Among the highlights:

Cogeco News

In addition to the above, Cogeco is talking big about creating a “news agency” that would serve all its stations (I guess they mean something bigger than Corus Nouvelles). Here’s what they say in their press release:

The news agency that COGECO proposes to set up will play a key role in enriching local information and will provide a complement to the other information sources available in Quebec. All of the stations of the COGECO group as well as independent stations in the regions and community stations will be asked to contribute to the content available through the agency. In return, they will be able to select the most relevant news for their respective listening audiences and produce their own news bulletins locally.

Pooling resources through the news agency, which will be coordinated by FM 98.5, will create a full information source available 24/7 – because news happens nights and weekends, too.

Furthermore, sharing information resources will allow regional stations CHLN-FM Trois-Rivieres, CHLT-FM Sherbrooke and CJRC-FM Gatineau, which will remain predominantly spoken-word radio services but will now primarily target men between the ages of 25 and 54, to devote their resources to producing local shows. Most significantly, this means the return of local public affairs programming in the morning and at noon, as well as locally produced news bulletins.

Finally, a night-time show and a weekend morning public affairs show will be produced and offered to all stations of the group. Community stations and independent stations in the regions will also have the benefit of these new resources and information content.

“We want to put information radio in Quebec back on top,” commented Mr. Lachance. “Since COGECO is a business that is close to its people, it is a natural fit for us to make local information and local interest content the heart of our strategy. The decision to include independent stations in the regions and community stations in the agency aligns with that, and we think this is great news for radio in Quebec.”

Unless I’ve misunderstood, this sounds a lot like what the TV networks have done to local television stations. They still produce local newscasts locally (well, except Global), but many of the stories they produce are prepackaged by the national network. Without the resources and staff to put together a full newscast, the local stations are forced to use these prepackaged reports, even if they’re local stories from local newscast hundreds of kilometres away that have little interest to their communities.

And Cogeco is trying to sell this as a good thing for local radio.

Of course, if the alternative is no news at all, or a straight rebroadcast of a Montreal signal, I guess it is good news.

Let us cheat, but only where we get rich

Cogeco doesn’t try to hide the fact that its request to keep its stations in Montreal is all about money. Rythme FM is the No. 1 station in Montreal, 98.5 has the most popular morning show, and CKOI also does very well here.

Their excuse for wanting to keep all these money-generating stations? They’re throwing out a bunch:

98.5 is special: “The proposed exception affects only FM 98.5 in Montreal’s French-language radio market and would allow COGECO to operate three French-language FM radio stations, each in its own niche.”

Are Rythme FM and CKOI so different that they qualify as their “own niches”? And the exception applies equally to them. Nothing stops Cogeco from keeping 98.5 and selling Rythme FM or CKOI. It’s selling both stations from those networks in Quebec City and shutting down CKOI’s sister station in Sherbrooke.

It saves the French language: “The distinctiveness of the bilingual Montreal market and the importance of keeping talk radio like FM 98.5 strong in order to ensure the sustainability of French-language spoken-word radio in Quebec justify our request for an exception”

I have no idea what bilingualism has to do with this, nor how “the distinctiveness of the bilingual Montreal market” somehow means it makes sense to concentrate ownership. I don’t know whether 98.5 is profitable. If it is, they can sell it to someone who will keep the talk radio format. If it isn’t, there’s no guarantee Cogeco won’t change the format and make it a music station or something else that’s cheaper to produce.

It helps the regions financially: “Without that exception, it will be next to impossible for COGECO to indefinitely support regional spoken-word radio stations that have been running heavy deficits for many years.”

That’s an argument for converting CKOY in Sherbrooke from a station to a retransmitter, but what does it have to do with Montreal? Does Cogeco expect us to believe that if we give them an exception to media concentration rules that they’ll subsidize money-losing regional stations indefinitely?

It helps the regions with programming: “The limited exception sought by COGECO would breathe new life into stations in the regions by providing them links to strong programming sources – to FM 98.5 primarily, for information and public affairs, and to CKAC-AM for sports and CKOI-FM for its expertise and music content.”

Again with the distraction. CKAC has nothing to do with the exception, since it’s an AM station. And as for CKOI, you just said you’re selling its sister station in Quebec City and shutting down its sister station in Sherbrooke. If Montreal-based programming would save these stations, why do you insist on getting rid of them?

We should include anglo stations too: “… a very high number of francophone listeners tune in to English-language music stations.”

Sure. CHOM and CJFM get a lot of francophones listening to them. But so does CFQR, which you’ll recall is one of the stations you’re buying. Add in the anglo stations, and Cogeco wants to own five of the 13 commercial radio stations in the city, and four of the eight commercial FM (mainstream) music stations. This doesn’t support their argument very well.

Straight-up bullshit: “Our plan is without a doubt the best opportunity to increase diversity of voices across Quebec that the broadcasting system has seen in many years.”

You’re buying a former competitor. Don’t pretend it’s the opposite of what it is.

Ooh, money!

Oh, and that last part they mentioned about “an exceptional contribution of 9% of the total transaction value, an amount of $7.2 million, to various organizations and initiatives to support the radio system”? Sounds kind of generous, doesn’t it?

It’s CRTC policy that when a broadcaster is sold, the buyer proposes a “tangible benefits” package of 10% of the purchase price to contribute positively to the development of the broadcasting system. The money doesn’t go to the CRTC, but to organizations that support independent productions and other good things.

You math majors might notice that their 9% proposal is less than the 10% CRTC policy. In other words, it’s another exception they’re asking for, one that they’re selling to the public as a generous donation on their part.

What the CRTC should do

Cogeco hasn’t made anywhere near a solid case for keeping three FM stations in the Montreal market. It’s selling or shutting down Rythme FM and CKOI-branded stations elsewhere in Quebec, and freely admits its only motivation for wanting to keep these stations here is money. The CRTC should order Cogeco to sell one of the FM stations in Montreal, and let someone who isn’t Cogeco or Astral Media take a shot at making money from commercial francophone radio in Montreal.

Cogeco’s point about the unprofitability of regional stations is a good one, but giving the company what it wants in Montreal won’t suddenly make those stations profitable (even with all the big talk about a news agency they promise). It will at best simply delay their eventual decision to either sell or shut down those regional stations.

In Quebec City, Cogeco’s plan to sell two stations would put it in compliance with CRTC guidelines. No problem there.

In Sherbrooke, Cogeco is presenting its plan as a “win-win-win”, proving it doesn’t give a crap about local radio. The CRTC should order Cogeco to find a buyer for CKOY. Corus found a buyer for CKRS in Saguenay, and those Quebec City stations are going to someone. I’m willing to bet there’s interest in CKOY if it’s on the block for cheap. If Cogeco is interested in having a CKAC retransmitter in Sherbrooke, it can apply for a new license on a vacant frequency.

The CRTC will hold a hearing on Sept. 28 at 9am at Le Nouvel Hotel (1740 René-Lévesque W., corner Saint-Mathieu) to consider the application.

UPDATE (Aug. 6): Cogeco VP Richard Lachance does interviews with Infopresse and Paul Arcand explaining the plan, saying the new news service will create about a dozen jobs (including reporters in the federal and provincial legislatures), and there’s no Plan B if the CRTC decides it doesn’t like Cogeco’s plan.

Trente, meanwhile, takes another look at the plan, referencing this blog post.

| Media, Montreal, Navel-gazing

No more Sundays

A note atop Page A1 on Sunday thanks readers

So that’s it, the last Sunday edition of the Gazette is on the newsstands now, just over two weeks after the stunning announcement that it would be stopped because of financial reasons.

The coverage

Other media gave brief mentions of the last Sunday section:

The Gazette itself certainly didn’t hide from this notable moment in the paper’s history. In addition to the giant note above and yet another reminder of how the paper and its contents will change, today’s paper has a retrospective from Walter Buchignani, who was one of many hired to launch the Sunday paper in 1988. He became “Action Man” – doing a different activity every week and writing about it. More recently, Buchignani has worked behind the scenes, supervising the paper’s production over the weekend as the night editor, in addition to his regular Formula One column. (His piece includes a humorous bit about having to call the Living Legend of Sports Journalism, Red Fisher, late at night to do an obit for Gump Worsley). Buchignani was in charge last night, too, as we toasted the final issue.

The Sunday tab

The last Gazette Sunday Sports tabloid

I, meanwhile, had the honour of putting together the last ever Sunday Sports tabloid section. It was a small section, and pretty short on news (no Habs game, no Alouettes game, no big tennis or golf tournaments). The biggest story was the Canadiens signing their first-round 2009 draft pick Louis Leblanc (and his announcement that he would play for the Montreal Juniors next season instead of staying at Harvard), and Pat Hickey pointing out how odd it is that they would release this news late on a Friday night.

There’s also a Stu Cowan column saying Andrei Markov should learn some French, which I’m sure will spark some debate.

The first Gazette Sunday sports tabloid, Feb. 26, 2006

The Sunday tab is young enough that I remember its origins (though I needed a bit of database help to remember the date). It began on Feb. 26, 2006, the day after the Gazette launched the new “Saturday Extra” section in a reorganization of the weekend papers.

The editor in chief at the time, Andrew Phillips, introduced it thusly:

Sunday Sports is now an easy-to-handle tabloid. We think that format is ideally suited to displaying our best sports writing and photographs on the biggest sports  news day of the week. Today, for example, the section opens with a dramatic poster-size photo from Turin of gold-medal skater Clara Hughes.

The poster – which celebrated Hughes’s gold medal in the women’s 5000-metre speed-skating event at Turin (it would be Canada’s last of seven golds at those games, the men’s hockey team having been humiliated in the quarterfinal by Russia) – actually formed both the front and back pages of the 36-page section, an experiment that wouldn’t be repeated. But I saw that particular cover many times over the following months – one Gazette staffer taped it up to the wall like an eight-year-old would do to a poster of their hero. Hughes had that effect on people.

The Gazette didn’t have much experience putting out tabloid sections at the time. The Books tabloid launched only the previous day, while the West Island section was put together as one file in QuarkXPress, something that wasn’t feasible on a three-person sports desk.

There were quite a few growing pains. At first, the section was split up into pairs (the plates were broadsheet-sized, so each tabloid page was paired with a mate as it was typeset), so a 20-page tabloid section (not including the 12 classified pages tucked into it) would have 10 Quark documents. And each document would have the full 32 pages in it (and not in sequential order either), only two of which would be used. After a couple of weeks they got each document down to the two live pages, and eventually managed to split those up so each editorial tabloid page would have its own Quark document (with the exception of the centre spread, which would be in one file).

The Sunday tab was a lot of work for two reasons: first, it was a lot of editorial space. The norm was 20 pages. Take away three for the scoreboard stats (which are done by Canwest Editorial Services in Hamilton), one for the full-page ad on the back and another for the full-page photo on the front, and that leaves 15 pages, or the equivalent of 7.5 broadsheet pages, a pretty large section.

Second, it was laid out in a different way than the section was the rest of the week. Unlike broadsheet pages which would have at least three or four stories, the tabloid pages would have one or two, and each page would have a photo, which meant a photo for almost every story. For the most part, each page would be devoted to one sport (multiple pages in the case of hockey, of course). To me, it always seemed more organized than the broadsheet section, not to mention easier to read.

I’ll miss the fun of laying that out. But I won’t miss the stress of putting it all together on deadline.

What’s changing

Taken from the note to readers, here’s what’s going to be changing next weekend, by section:

Finally, a new section is being added to the Saturday paper, called “Diversions”, which will take all the puzzles and comics pages from the two weekend papers and add a few extras.

It will include:

  • The black-and-white Saturday comics page
  • Three colour Sunday comics pages (previously, two of these pages would be in the Saturday paper and a third in the Sunday paper)
  • The Saturday and Sunday puzzles pages, which includes horoscopes, Wonderword, the Sunday New York Times crossword and cryptic crossword and those little Sunday puzzles
  • The L.A. Times Sunday crossword, which is being added for the benefit of those who objected to removing the Tribune Crossword a while back
  • A new page called “Looking Back”, which features John Kalbfleisch’s Second Draft column, as well as “feature photos from Gazette archives” and some other yet-to-be-announced historical stuff

The last Sunday paper left mixed emotions among some editors. It’s sad, but many of them will get their Saturday nights back now.

Not me, though, at least not at first. I’m back at work next Saturday night – on the online desk.

| Fun, Montreal

Water gun fight this Saturday

If you’re not doing anything on Saturday afternoon, a water gun fight is being planned for outside city hall.

About 100 people have confirmed their presence on Facebook (which usually means about 10 people will show up).

It’s at the fountain at Place Vauquelin, which is just outside city hall on Notre Dame St. at Place Jacques Cartier (Champs de Mars metro), at 2pm.

Weather so far calls for sunny sky and 25 degrees.

UPDATE: Turnout was better than I expected, a good 50 or so. My pictures are below in a slideshow or on Flickr.

There are also photos on Facebook.

| Media, Montreal, Opinion

Fab Fabrice does the unfathomable

Fabrice de Pierrebourg

La Presse scored a major coup last week, hiring investigative reporter Fabrice de Pierrebourg, who has been breaking stories for Rue Frontenac since he and 252 others were locked out from the Journal de Montréal in January 2009, a lockout that just marked its 18-month anniversary.

De Pierrebourg was the posterboy for the lockoutés’ argument that the true value of the Journal de Montréal came from hard-working investigative journalists, which their newspaper has replaced with wire stories, freelance opinionators and overhyped reporting from managers.

Henry Aubin named him one of the “watchdogs of democracy” in December for his scoops about city hall and the municipal election campaign. He was just as useful before he got locked out, perhaps best known for breaching security at Trudeau airport to prove a point.

De Pierrebourg was also one of nine employees fired by the Journal for storming the office while locked out – as part of a peaceful but illegal demonstration – in July 2009. While Patrick Lagacé says it’s unrelated (because negotiations began weeks ago), de Pierrebourg tells Rue Frontenac that was the final straw.

The news of de Pierrebourg’s hiring was met with mixed reviews. It’s a huge move for La Presse (though not unprecedented – the guy who made the announcement was himself hired from the Journal de Montréal back in 2006).

And speaking of La Presse, I guess those financial problems that nearly forced them to shut down less than a year ago, until the union made serious concessions, are a thing of the past. Not only did they take on a new high-profile hire, but they’ve made 17 temporary workers permanent. (One of those workers I spoke to had no idea why, though that person wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth.)

Aside from being good news for La Presse, de Pierrebourg’s hiring is also good for him. He has a proper job again. The anxiety and stress is gone.

It’s bad news for the Journal de Montréal (at least at first glance), which has lost a solid investigative reporter.

But it’s also bad for Rue Frontenac. And if the comments attached to its story are any indication, his now ex-colleagues are supportive of his escape but still saddened at losing a high-profile member of their cause.

The beginning of the end?

Though I hate to use the term “trend”, I have to wonder about who else might follow in de Pierrebourg’s footsteps. Bertrand Raymond, the most high-profile columnist on the picket lines, announced in January that he would “retire” – and never again return to the Journal.

Raymond has, of course, hardly retired. He writes now for RDS, putting out a column about twice a week on average. Like de Pierrebourg, Raymond has simply found an employer that he can live with.

Both Raymond and de Pierrebourg gave similar reasons for leaving: they couldn’t fathom the idea of going back to work for the Journal de Montréal, for Quebecor and the managers who put them out on the street.

It’s a sentiment echoed by Jean-François Codère, when I interviewed Rue Frontenac’s technology guy in January. I asked him how they would be able to work out their differences with their managers once the conflict ends, and he said he didn’t know. Codère has turned down other job offers to stay at Rue Frontenac, but can he and the rest keep this up forever?

The Journal de Montréal isn’t showing any signs of cracking. It’s still publishing seven days a week (soon it will be the only Montreal newspaper to do so), and so much of the work of producing it is outsourced that they’ve made it seem almost transparent to its readers. (The number of people who have moral objections to reading a newspaper produced during a lockout are far outweighed by people who don’t give a rat’s ass about it.)

De Pierrebourg said he felt bad leaving his colleagues at Rue Frontenac. He should. Not because what he did was wrong, but because whether he wanted to or not his departure hurts the cause of those still locked out.

As this labour conflict drags out into the long term, more departures like this are inevitable. Some who are close to retirement age will just decide to give up. Some who aren’t might take better jobs elsewhere. And as the union’s strike fund starts running out, the rest might not have a choice.

And as the cream of the crop gets poached, what’s left will be those who can’t get jobs elsewhere. Those who work in classified sales or other non-editorial jobs, who have spent decades in a highly specialized function that doesn’t translate well into the job market.

By then, the argument that the Journal is a lesser paper without these people begins to fall apart.

| Montreal, Sports, Video

The Expos: Even the best memories are heartbreaking

Annakin Slayd, known best for his songs about the Canadiens (so popular they’ve been parodied) but also a die-hard Expos fan, has produced a music video honouring Montreal’s former baseball team.

The look back comes just as Andre Dawson is set to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame tomorrow as an Expo (even if he preferred a Cubs cap on his head).

And if that isn’t enough, here’s another video (well, it’s more about the song than the video) to remind you of the Team of Heartbreak:

And a preview of what might be the last Expos Hall of Famer someday, Vladimir Guerrero:

Meanwhile, The Gazette’s Andy Riga explores what to do with that giant monstrosity that the Expos used to call home, including what to do with the space around it, what to do about its roof, and what to do about getting events there. There’s also some numbers worth looking at, and his blog has a whole truckload of suggestions from readers about the stadium’s future (some serious, some not so much).

And the Bleacher Report has compiled a list of the top 25 Expos.

| Montreal, Radio

CBC finally picks Daybreak host, and it’s … Mike Finnerty?

Now CBC will need to put a giant Mike Finnerty poster on top of this Mike Finnerty poster which covers a Mike Finnerty poster

Okay, I didn’t see this one coming. Four months after posting the position of Daybreak host, and after months of rotating in guest hosts and having a show with no real direction, CBC has settled not on Steve Rukavina or Sue Smith but on bringing back former host Mike Finnerty.

The Daybreak website has a release and The Gazette has a story (UPDATE: And a longer one in today’s paper). CBC.ca also has a story, which entirely glosses over what happened to former Daybreak host Nancy Wood.

The release has the usual quotes of how thrilled everyone is. Similar comments directly from Finnerty via email:

I’ve had a blast at guardian.co.uk and learned so much that I sometimes thought my head was going to explode.  I hate the idea of leaving.  It’s a great job.

But I miss broadcasting.  I miss being on air.  I miss live radio.  And yes, I miss Montreal.

I have a notice period here to serve out, three months, but I am taking two weeks off in August to host The Current for Anna-Maria Tremonti.  That’s starting August 9th.

…

I think you know I’m a fan of Fagstein and a regular reader (and occasional visitor to the threads).

So y’all better be on your best behaviour, okay?

Back and forth, but this time to stay

Finnerty left Daybreak just over a year ago to take a job as multimedia news editor at London’s The Guardian. He was replaced by a TV reporter and former Radio Noon host, Nancy Wood, and … well, we all know how that turned out. (Wood has since taken a job at Enquête.)

Finnerty said when he left that the big reason for doing so was his partner, Dom, who moved with him to Montreal but had trouble finding work here. An opportunity opened up in London, and they decided they’d both move back across the Atlantic.

Now, Finnerty says, they both found they missed Montreal:

I think it’s fair to say that it was on moving back to London last year that he realized how great a city Montreal is. He used to say, “I finally get the Montreal state of mind”. He is totally onboard with the decision to return to Daybreak.  He thought I did a pretty good job at it and might even do better this time around :-)

Finnerty says his contract with the CBC – which he signed on Saturday – is until June 2014. This is much longer than that given to Wood, which suggests that either the CBC has more confidence in Finnerty than it had in Wood (you’ll recall they referred to her as an “interim” host) or that they’re tired of searching for new hosts every six months.

Even with the four-year contract, Finnerty expects the kind of pressure on him to perform that his predecessor had:

A friend of mine who hosts on the BBC once said to me that when you’re on air for a living, you need to accept that you could be tapped on the shoulder at any time.  I don’t expect the CBC to keep me on air if I’m not doing well. That’s being honest.

I am comfortable with management’s ratings expectations because they’re the same as mine.  I expect that if you, taxpayers, fund CBC Radio we have to deliver something of demonstrable public value, in this case a type of local coverage of Montreal that you cannot get otherwise.  Good, solid, reliable, essential, surprising, Montreal listening.  When you listen to Daybreak, I want you to think you’ve had Montreal for breakfast, that you’ve got your money’s worth.

If no one is listening, or if just seniors are listening and not a broad range of Montrealers, than how do we justify spending your money?  Daybreak doesn’t need to be Number One – though why not? – but it has to show that it is of clear, public value.  It has to have good ratings.  The CBC management are right to insist on that, and I am totally onboard.

The last time Finnerty was host, Daybreak on CBME-FM had an average minute audience of 15,100 listeners and a total audience of 61,000 with a 14.4% market share, according to numbers dug up by Mike Boone. Wood’s ratings were lower than that, with an average audience of 12,800 listeners, a total audience of 53,000 and a 12.4% market share. Wood’s ratings were the major reason for her being pulled from the host’s chair.

Even though the numbers suggest fewer people tuned in to his replacement, Finnerty acknowledged to The Gazette’s Basem Boshra that has has some hearts to win back: “I know there were a lot of listeners who were upset at Nancy’s departure, and what I would like to say to them is that it’s time for the page to be turned. It’s time for me to get to work on winning their affection back, winning their respect back, and proving to them that, day in and day out, we’re going to bring them the stories and voices that matter and make a difference to Montreal.”

Aggressive? Me?

Online reaction to Finnerty’s return is mixed. The Daybreak Facebook page, the Gazette story and CBC story have some messages congratulating Finnerty and others questioning the choice. A Facebook group originally setup to protest Wood’s removal also has some comments, as well, of course, as the Radio in Montreal group.

Finnerty was known for his confrontational style with guests (even where it seemed unnecessary), which turned off many listeners. Asked about it, Finnerty agreed people think that of him, but he disagreed that it was either aggressive or unwarranted:

I accept that some people think that of my style, yes.  I read all the feedback that comes my way and I do care, and take it onboard.  I also get a lot of positive feedback from people for putting the tough questions to people in positions of power.  I don’t think my style is aggressive. I think I have a role to play hosting the CBC morning show in Montreal.  I don’t think it’s fair to have someone on air to talk about an issue that demands a tough or assertive question and not ask it.  I think Montrealers want me to pursue questions of importance, and if they aren’t answered, I think it’s fair to point that out or ask again.  Fair is the watchword.  Call me on it.

The bottom line is that I want Daybreak to be an interesting listen.  I want its journalism to be robust.  I want people to tune in because they know they will get good interviews where we focus on the issues that matter and try to find out what’s new, what’s important, what’s really going on.

Finnerty asked to add, even though it sounded “a bit luvvy”, that “the Daybreak team is bloody brilliant:  Monique Lacombe, Sonali Karnick, Pierre Landry, and David Blair. Steve Rukavina is a tremendous host and one of the biggest assets at the station.  I loooooooooove Sue Smith. They’ve been working really hard.  I can’t wait to join them.”

Finnerty’s start date as host of Daybreak hasn’t been set yet, but will be in the fall, possibly around Thanksgiving. In the meantime, he’s filling in as host of The Current for two weeks starting Aug. 9.

UPDATE (June 22): Mike Boone, in his column yesterday, didn’t mince his words about Finnerty being replaced by Wood and then coming back within 14 months:

What a joke.

But there is continuity at CBC Montreal. The same gormless twits keep making hare-brained programming decisions. On our dime.

UPDATE: You can listen to Finnerty’s interview with Daybreak the next day in their podcast (MP3).

| Media, Montreal, Navel-gazing

Au revoir aux lecteurs du dimanche

It was a year ago this month that, in a drastic cost-cutting effort, La Presse stopped printing a Sunday edition. The Gazette tried to take advantage, putting banners on Page 1 for two successive Sundays welcoming francophone readers whose only other option was to read the (locked-out) Journal de Montréal.

Similar cost-cutting moves have been made at other Canadian newspapers. The National Post, already a six-day paper, stopped printing Mondays last summer. The Victoria Times-Colonist, one of the few with a strong Sunday paper, also stopped printing Mondays. The Winnipeg Free Press stopped its Sunday paper and replaced it with a newsstand-only tabloid.

Next month, it’s The Gazette’s turn to make a drastic cut of an entire day of publication.

In case you haven’t heard the news, The Gazette announced on Wednesday that they would stop printing a Sunday edition in August. The last Sunday paper will appear Aug. 1, and starting Aug. 7, Sunday features will appear in the Saturday paper.

Re-reporting of the announcement has spread to other media: Globe and Mail, Rue Frontenac, CTV, Canadian Press, Radio-Canada (with anti-Gazette comments from the peanut gallery below), Agence QMI (who are a bit slow to update their story), CJAD (with their usual three-sentence story), CBC (which originally misspelled the publisher’s name – but to its credit has since corrected it) and Cyberpresse, which illustrated its story by stealing a photo of the old Gazette building that I took in 2002 and posted on this blog last year (and to its not-credit has offered no explanation, correction or apology for this).

Romenesko also linked to the announcement, and J-Source has republished it.

As the stories say, the Sunday paper was born in 1988 thanks to competitive pressure from the Montreal Daily News, a short-lived attempt by Quebecor to crack the anglo Montreal market. The Daily News had a Sunday edition, forcing The Gazette to create one. The Daily News folded less than two years after it launched, but the Sunday Gazette continued for 22 years.

A surprise, but not

The announcement was made mere minutes before I entered the office. Everyone was buzzing, gossiping about what this would mean – particularly for their jobs. Though a meeting is scheduled for Thursday to answer questions, the company has already said that this move isn’t coming with any layoffs.

That comes as some relief to permanent employees. What it means for contract workers like me is another story, not to mention the subcontractors who handle distribution and others whose living is directly or indirectly linked to the newspaper.

I’d like to say I saw this coming, that the writing was on the wall when La Presse stopped its Sunday edition, but while it’s not the most shocking move in the world, I didn’t expect it. The Gazette is profitable, I’m told, and hardly on the path to insolvency. In fact, it had just been purchased the day before.

But the paper was already incredibly thin, and even then there was a noticeable dearth of advertising. Last Sunday’s paper had only three full-page ads, and another two in the sports tabloid section. Add a half-page ad on A3, and a handful of smaller ads spread across four pages of a 24-page A section, and that’s it for paid ads.

Editorial content on Sundays has diminished slowly over the past few years. Insight, which was its own eight-page section when I started five years ago, giving a huge canvas to large feature stories from news wires, has since become two pages incorporated into the A section, one of which has to make room for two weekly columnists and a bi-weekly columnist.

Because news tends not to happen over the weekend (at least, very few stories about governments, businesses, or anything else that operates during business hours), much of the news that goes into Sunday and Monday papers is prewritten features which can be moved to another day. Breaking news can still go online.

The real victim here will be the sports section, the only one that stands alone on Sundays. Some features like editor Stu Cowan’s column can easily be moved to another day, but coverage of Saturday night Canadiens games will now have to wait more than a day for those who prefer to get their news on paper instead of online.

But even though it sucks, even though I never really minded working Saturdays (it’s the worst day for TV) and even though it’s really bad for my future employment prospects, I can’t really denounce the decision. It just doesn’t make sense for a newspaper to publish an edition that advertisers won’t support.

Here’s to hoping that this moves ensures a strong financial future for The Gazette – or at least slows down the march to oblivion.