Tag Archives: CFCF

| Media

Quebec Press Council roundup

A new round of decisions from the Quebec Press Council has been posted to its website. In addition to the Gazette case I mentioned earlier, and other dismissals, were some slaps on the wrist:

UPDATE (April 3): Le Devoir reports on these decisions a week later, saying the decisions were released “yesterday” which I guess means I’m psychic.

| Montreal, TV

CFCF cancels morning newscast, lays off three

Morning news anchor Herb Luft will return to regular reporting

Morning news anchor Herb Luft will return to regular reporting

The news hit insiders this morning, and the press release was issued just after the end of business: CFCF (aka CTV Montreal) is cancelling its 6am morning newscast, effective immediately, and replacing it with another half hour of its national morning program Canada AM. (Previously, CFCF would cut into Canada AM after the first half hour.) They’ve already updated their weekly schedule to reflect the change.

The decision, which is being made to cut costs, will mean the cutting of four positions (one of which is already vacant). Herb Luft, who has been anchoring the morning newscast since it started in March 2000, will return to general assignment reporting.

CFCF’s license requires a minimum of 15.5 hours a week of local programming. Since the cancellation of Entertainment Spotlight and SportsNight 360 in January, this has been entirely made up of local newscasts (and the late sportscast at 11:45). The cancellation of the half-hour weekday newscast drops CFCF’s local programming hours from 18.5 to about 16 hours a week with a one-hour weekday noon newscast, one-hour daily evening newscast and 35-minute daily late newscast.

It also means that there is now no morning local news from any of Montreal’s anglophone television stations. Global Quebec cancelled This Morning Live last year and replaced it with a repeat of the previous night’s News Final. CBC Montreal airs a national morning news program.

First News, as it was officially called, was also the last local morning newscast in the CTV network. All the other stations ran all three hours of Canada AM from 6 to 9am.

UPDATE: The Gazette has a brief about it (that’s open to comments), which pretty much repeats everything already in this post. Evening anchor Todd van der Heyden mentioned the cancellation in the middle of the evening newscast (the website has a brief about it as well), pointing out that even with this reduction CFCF has more local news than its competitors.

UPDATE (March 11): How’s this for irony? CTV has laid off 24 people from Canada AM.

| On the Net, TV, Web design

CFCF, welcome to Web 1.0

The new Pulse ... err, CFCF ... err, CTV Montreal website

The new Pulse ... err, CFCF ... err, CTV Montreal website

It’s not even that we made fun of CFCF’s website for how bad it was, how it looked like it hadn’t been redesigned since the 90s (actually, its last redesign was in 2004, but that wasn’t much better than its 90s look). It’s that it was so bad it was completely off the radar. You couldn’t link to news stories because there was no archival system for them. Forget Web 2.0, it wasn’t even Web 1.0.

Well, some of that’s changed now. CTV has rolled out new websites for all its local stations, including CFCF in Montreal. It includes crazy Web 1.0 features like having individual stories on their own pages, links to wire stories, and individual pages for special features. The weather page has actual graphics from the show and even an embedded video of the latest local forecast (which for some reason is done exclusively for the web instead of just taking video from the latest newscast). It’s even got an RSS feed, and the video player is improved (it’s embedded instead of being a popup).

Looking for crap? Well they have that too. The community calendar page and lotteries page both have that vintage 90s feel to them. The traffic page is nothing but links to Transport Quebec highway cameras.

If you’re expecting bleeding-edge features like the ability to comment on stories, sadly you’re out of luck. They point you to a contact form if you want to comment on a story. But they include handy Facebook and Digg links, so you can comment on the story on someone else’s website. There’s hints of a mobile site, but apparently that’s available for every local station except Montreal.

Melissa Wheeler continues the tradition of hot web reporters

Melissa Wheeler continues the tradition of hot web reporters

The About Us page includes bios of all the “personalities”, which now (finally) include Daniele Hamamdjian and Maya Johnson, as well as this Melissa Wheeler person, who I’m sure is doing the best she can with this antiquated technology. They also list important executives like Barry Wilson and Jed Kahane.

Radio-Canada redesigned

RadCan also rolled its new design into service recently. It’s apparently to spotlight audio and video (which, coincidentally, is what RadCan is all about), but the audio and video player is just as crappy as it was before, mainly because it’s still based on Windows Media instead of Flash.

| Media, Montreal, Opinion, TV

We must do something about the poor reporters

Despite the dire warnings of cold snaps, the depressing weather forecasts that call for highs in the range of -20 and wind chills that drop right off the scale, there are professionals out there ready, willing and able to brave those awful conditions unnecessarily for the sake of their jobs.

I’m speaking, of course, about television reporters.

Every day, dozens of them roam the city, looking for a suitable backdrop for their story about health care or education or politics, and for many the ideal spot for a stand-up report is standing on a street corner. It’s active, it’s bright, in some cases it might even be relevant to the story.

But in most cases, they’re patently unnecessary.

Something must be done.

Continue reading →

| TV, Video

I love you too, smoke-free TV people

CFCF's Rob Lurie, at his most smokalicious

CFCF's Rob Lurie, at his most smokalicious

A smorgasbord of government organizations and nonprofits is sponsoring Quebec’s anti-smoking week next week, and part of the campaign features videos with TV personalities giving heart-felt thank-yous to loved ones who helped them quit smoking, while sitting on the floor of the same living room. Each video ends with “je t’aime” (or “I love you”) in a serious, look-you-in-the-eyes way that seems to walk the line between tear-inducing and creepy (though maybe I’m overly sensitive in this regard).

Included in that list is token anglo CFCF’s Rob Lurie (above), TVA’s Dominic Arpin (who writes a blog post about the experience shooting this piece), RDS’s Pierre Houde and Jacques Demers, and a bunch of other people equally split between the media partners (they even got the two guys left at TQS).

Kidding aside, they’re pretty gut-wrenching videos, designed to make people uncomfortable and get them to talk to their parents, kids, siblings, spouses and other loved ones about quitting smoking.

| Montreal, TV

CTV to expand weekend newscasts

Bill Brownstein reports in The Gazette that CTV Montreal is expanding its weekend evening newscasts from 30 minutes to 60.

That sounds pretty cool except when you consider that, in exchange, they’re cutting two weekend shows: Entertainment Spotlight and SportsNight 360.

I won’t shed too many tears over Mosé Persico and Entertainment Spotlight (ok, maybe one for Natasha Hall having to find new work – again). But the cancellation of CTV’s weekend sports show and the final indignified push out the door for Ron Reusch might ruffle some feathers (UPDATE: A Facebook group has already started).

To make up for the cancelled shows, the weekend newscasts will have expanded entertainment and sports-related features. The changes will take place in January.

| Opinion, TV, West Island

CTV Montreal’s $23,600 “clarification”

CTV Montreal issued a rare on-air apology today to Pointe Claire Mayor Bill McMurchie for saying he spent $23,600 on meals at taxpayer’s expense (about $65 a day):

Last July 15, we reported on several occasions that Bill McMurchie, mayor of the city of Pointe-Claire, had spent $23,600 on meals at taxpayers’ expense.

We wish to clarify that the mayor actually spent less than $1,500 on meals during 2007 as shown in a statement prepared by Lyne Goulet, Pointe-Claire city treasurer and posted on the city’s web site.

CTV apologizes to Mayor McMurchie and the elected council of Pointe-Claire for any embarrassment or prejudice that may have been caused.

I can’t find the original story, since CTV Montreal doesn’t archive its news, so I have to go on what’s being written here.

But “clarify”? You inflated a figure more than ten-fold, accusing a man of corruption and left the record unfixed for almost a month, and you’re clarifying?

Unless I’ve missed something, this is a correction. And a major one.

| TV

CTV Montreal gets kudos for diversity

Mutsumi Takahashi is really happy about CTV Montreal's employment equity award

Mutsumi Takahashi is really happy about CTV Montreal's employment equity award

CTV’s Herb Luft drew the short straw today and got to report on his workplace being honoured by the federal government for employment equity. According to his report (video), the station scored straight As in all four categories: women, aboriginals, visible minorities and people with disabilities.

Though there are definitely women and visible minorities (Mutsumi Takahashi fills two of those slots simultaneously, as do Maya Johnson (below), Danielle Hamamdjian and others who aren’t listed on the station’s almost-all-white host bios page), I haven’t seen any aboriginal people in visible positions, nor any people with disabilities (unless you count Stéphane Giroux’s accent).

CTV Montreal reporter Maya Johnson: Brown and loving it

CTV Montreal reporter Maya Johnson: Brown and loving it

All that said, kudos to CTV Montreal.

| Montreal, TV

Britt leaves CTV Montreal

CTV Montreal announced Thursday on the air that veteran Brian Britt is leaving his anchor chair, retiring from TV journalism less than two years after taking it from the only man more gravitasial than him, Bill Haugland.

Naturally, this being CTV Montreal, the news didn’t appear on their website until Monday. The news came suddenly to viewers and even some of Britt’s coworkers. Britt didn’t want anything announced ahead of time and didn’t want any big fanfare as was done to Haugland. He simply said his goodbyes a the end of Thursday’s broadcast.

Unsubstantiated rumours that would be journalistically irresponsible to report without verification suggest he was pushed out the door a bit earlier than he would have wanted, but they don’t seem to have any real traction. Prevailing opinion is that this was Britt’s decision.

For those who had Britt as the next off the island, give yourself a pat on the back:

Kristian Gravenor has Todd van der Heyden being promoted to the top anchor spot. That makes sense, since he has all the manufactured gravitas and the boyish looks. But I’m still pulling for ol’ Herb Luft, who’s felt at home in the anchor chair since back when he had hair.

UPDATE (July 28): CTV announced today (video) that van der Heyden will indeed replace Britt and will co-anchor both the noon and 6pm newscasts. Executive Producer Barry Wilson finally got around to giving Britt’s career the obit it deserved.

July 29: The Gazette has a story about the anchor change.

| Media, Radio, TV

Natasha has a new job

Natasha Aimée Hall, who won 940 News’s Talk Show Idol and was hosting a show on Sundays until the station as a whole went under, is now working for CTV, co-hosting its Entertainment Spotlight program with perennial Mirror Tackiest Personality winner Mosé Persico.

I’ll let her explain the rest:

I shot my first show last Thursday and it will air this Sunday, June 29 at 6:30. Here’s hoping I didn’t do anything really weird on camera! I can only hope because shooting was a total blur. Doing it all again this Friday.

I’ll be doing jazz fest blogging again for the Gazoo (can’t believe that starts on Thursday!) and I’m still waiting to find out what the future holds for me at Corus Quebec.

Natasha blogged the Jazz Fest as a freelancer for the Gazette last year.

| Montreal, TV

Why is CBC Montreal’s News at Six sucking a bit less?

The Suburban crunches some numbers in the evening TV news race here, and theorizes that Frank Cavallaro’s move from CTV to CBC had something to do with the latter’s 25% jump in viewership over last year, prompting Inside the CBC to wonder if weathermen are the magic ticket to success.

I think we should take a step back here. 25% seems large, but only represents about 6,000 actual viewers. CBC Montreal’s news audience is still an order of magnitude smaller than CTV, which has dominated the race since CBC gutted Newswatch.

Though I’m sure Cavallaro has a loyal audience, the numbers probably have more to do with people slowly trickling back to CBC after the network decided to bring back a local one-hour newscast. And the station still has plenty of ground to make up. It needs a new studio (well, actually, it needs its own studio), a graphics department, and other things that only money can buy.

Meanwhile, The Suburban notices that Paul Graif, a victim of Global Quebec’s job cuts, is now at CTV. Another example of why we have one local news program here and two pretend local news programs.

| Montreal, TV

Live hits gone mad

Dear Rob Lurie, CTV News,

I see you’re reporting on Habs Ryan O’Byrne and Tom Kostopoulos being arrested. OK, sure.

Why are you standing outside in the cold? This story happened in Tampa, Florida. You’re clearly not in Tampa, considering the fog coming out of your mouth as you talk. How does being outside instead of in studio (as you did this afternoon) help us understand the situation any better?

As for you, CBC News, is a streeter really necessary here? Are you going to find someone on the street who’s going to take the players’ side? Why did you waste a reporter on getting idiots on the street to say they don’t approve of stealing ladies’ purses?

And why is that reporter, Stéphanie Tremblay, reporting on her streeter package live from the middle of a forest somewhere? It hardly needs an introduction anyway.

(CTV took a more nuanced approach, asking viewers if this would have an impact on the team. Their streeter ran as-is with no introduction)

There’s gimmickry for gimmickry’s sake and then there’s wasting resources on stupidity.

Incidentally, tonight is Frank Cavallaro’s debut on CBC News at Six. Though the production quality is much lower than CTV News, the voice is the same and I don’t think his groupies will take issue with the transition.

| Montreal, TV

CTV News about to get less Cavallarific

According to Coolopolis, CTV weatherman Frank Cavallaro‘s days are numbered, thanks to a decision by management not to renew his contract.

One can guess at why this decision was made: hair not blond enough, boobs not perky enough, insufficient ratings boost from teenage boy masturbation (though I dispute that last one, see below).

But no matter his meteorological credentials or his mad witty-banter skills that he displays with other hosts, Frank has always been a polarizing figure, as evidenced by two Facebook groups: one praising his giant zucchini, another recommending his lynching, that are fiercely competing for membership (28 members in the former, 26 in the latter as of this writing).

Of course, with looks like these, the World’s Top Weather Presenter probably won’t be out of a job long:

Frank Cavallaro

The news also has a funny timing to it. Tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of the departure of Bill Haugland.

So who’s next off the island?

CTV News personalities

Here’s a quick cheat sheet of CTV News’s big personalities (hey, where’s Rob Lurie?), assuming of course that looks is your only criteria. It’s ordered by seniority, with the newest members on the left. I’m discounting lead anchors Mutsumi Takahashi and Brian Britt (lower left), since I’m pretty sure they’re set for as long as they want the jobs.

UPDATE (Dec. 21): The Suburban’s Mike Cohen has some career suggestions for Frank: either radio or a job at CBC.

| Montreal, TV, Video

More CFCF12/Pulse News nostalgia

Speaking of old YouTube clips from CFCF, here’s some more fond memories of Montreal’s 1/2 Watch:

And as a special bonus, a pair of clips of Tarah Schwartz (Tarah Black back then) doing a light-hearted Halloween-themed anchoring on the Weather Network in 1996.

| Montreal, TV, Video

Howard Schwartz, Pulse News

The progression of Howard Schwartz

Remember Howard Schwartz? Yeah, neither did I at first, until investigative reporter J. D. Gravenor (who’s a great guy by the way) pointed out this video he posted interviewing Luciano Pavarotti at the airport in November 1982.

Schwartz was a reporter for Pulse News (which has since been de-branded into the pathetically generic CTV News Montreal) from 1982 to 1995. He left the station to enter the evil world of public relations (for, among other things, giant pharmaceutical companies), and now lives in the U.S.

He’s also a prolific YouTube user, having posted a couple of dozen videos. Perhaps the most interesting one is this video of him anchoring Pulse News in 1994: