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Link: Derek Miller challenges the Canadian entertainment industry with TV show

From Lindsay Monture of Two Row Times:

Link: Derek Miller challenges the Canadian entertainment industry with TV show
Derek Miller is no stranger to the challenges of establishing freedom of expression in the face of the Canadian government. Derek’s performance variety TV series The Guilt Free Zone had been in conflict with some Canadian entertainment industry policies and had fought to bring it into its second season. Continue reading.

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CRTC improves support for local news

From a media release:

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) today took measures to ensure Canadians continue to have access to local programming that reflects their needs and interests.

Local News
New minimum thresholds for local news will be imposed on all local private television broadcasters. Also, through a rebalancing of resources, the large private broadcasters will now have the necessary flexibility to keep local stations open and fund the production of local news programming. This represents up to $67 million that could be available for local news.

In addition, the CRTC is creating the Independent Local News Fund to give independent stations access to approximately $23 million dollars in resources to produce high-quality local news programming.

The Independent Local News Fund will support independent operators in the following localities: Victoria, Prince George, Kamloops, Medicine Hat, Lloydminster, Thunder Bay, Hamilton, Rouyn-Noranda, Val d’Or, Gatineau, Montreal, Trois-Rivières, Sherbrooke, Québec, Saguenay, Rivière-du-Loup, Carleton and St-John’s.

Canadians value local news and they watch it on a regular basis. Local news and information is also a key part of a democratic society. However, new technologies are making it harder to monetize viewership on traditional platforms.

Community television
The thorough public record shows that, overall, the framework for community television continues to be valid and relevant, ensuring that citizens have access to content production across Canada.

Cable companies will continue to have the stewardship of the community channel on behalf of their subscribers as they have for decades. The CRTC was not persuaded that this successful model should be changed.

Nevertheless, the CRTC is taking steps to ensure that this programming continues to reflect local citizens and events, and that more of the overall funding is directed to on-screen results rather than overhead.

Quick Facts

  • The CRTC has issued its new regulatory framework for local and community programming, following a process that began in September 2015.
  • During this process, Canadians reiterated that they place great importance on local news to stay informed.
  • Average weekly viewing hours for Canadian news and actualities broadcast by Canadian television services is over 23% of total hours viewed in the English market and over 28% in the French market.
  • The emergence of new technologies allowed Canadians to easily have access to local and international news. However, new digital media do not yet have adequate funding and the expertise necessary to replace traditional local news.
  • There are currently sufficient sources of funding within the system to fund the creation of locally produced, locally reflective programming.
  • Canada’s television system provides a strong foundation on which to build for the future. It employs nearly 60,000 people and invests more than $4 billion in public funds alone each year in the creation of content made by Canadians.
  • The allocation of some of the funding sources has been reviewed to ensure that local programming continues to be of high quality and receive adequate funding.
  • The CRTC expects broadcasters to fulfill their social responsibility to produce programming that informs and reflects local communities.
  • English-language stations will be required to broadcast at least seven hours of locally relevant programming (especially news) per week in non-metropolitan markets, and 14 hours per week in metropolitan markets (namely Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary).
  • French-language stations will be assessed on a case-by-case basis, using a benchmark of five hours of local programming per week.
  • Canadians still value community television programming, especially in smaller communities.
  • In the digital era, it is increasingly easy to create and share content online at lower cost. Community channels are encouraged to make content available on multiple platforms to all Canadians.
  • The CRTC today also published a notice of consultation that launched the renewal process for television licences owned by large ownership groups.
  • The public hearing to review the applications from the French-language ownership groups, namely Bell, Corus, Québecor and Groupe V, will begin on November 22, 2016, in Laval, Quebec.
  • The public hearing to review the applications from the English-language ownership groups, namely Bell, Corus and Rogers, will begin on November 28, 2016, at our headquarters in the National Capital Region.
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Multicultural TV for All Canadians

From a media release:

OMNI Television announced today that it has filed an application with the CRTC to operate a new national multilingual and multicultural channel called OMNI Regional, the first of its kind in Canada. The national channel would be comprised of four feeds: Pacific, Prairies, and East, which would mirror OMNI’s local stations in those regions, and ICI Quebec, made possible due to a strategic partnership with Montreal ethnic television station International Channel/Canal International (ICI) to serve French-language ethnic communities in the province of Quebec. If approved by the CRTC, OMNI Regional would have priority access to basic TV packages (pursuant to section 9(1)(h) of the Broadcasting Act).  Today’s local OMNI stations in Toronto, Edmonton, Calgary, and Vancouver would continue to operate as free over-the-air channels, as would ICI’s local station in Montreal.

As part of its proposal, OMNI Television is committing to bringing back four daily newscasts in Italian, Mandarin, Cantonese and Punjabi, making it the only national ethnic programming service in Canada to provide daily newscasts, seven days a week, in multiple languages.

OMNI Television’s proposal also includes the following:

  • A commitment to devote 80% of OMNI Regional’s schedule to ethnic programming – a 20% increase over current – and maintaining the requirement to devote 50% of the schedule to third-language programming;
  • A commitment to devote a minimum of 40% of OMNI Regional’s annual revenues to the production of Canadian programming;
  • A commitment to maintain local daily current affairs shows in Mandarin, Cantonese and Punjabi languages;
  • The creation of a national cultural affairs series produced in Alberta that is designed to showcase important cultural and social contributions from Canada’s ethnocultural communities;
  • A commitment to re-establish in-house production in all of the markets served by OMNI’s OTA stations; and
  • The creation of four regional feeds that comprise the national network will be specifically tailored to ethnic Canadians living in B.C., the Prairies, Eastern Canada and Quebec by including English and French-language ethnic programming as well as third-language programming produced by local independent producers that reside in those regions.

OMNI Television expects the CRTC to post its application for public comment shortly.

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marblemedia and Omnifilm Entertainment partner to remake 90’s favourite THE ODYSSEY

From a media release:

International award-winning producer marblemedia and long established television powerhouse Omnifilm Entertainment today announced they are joining forces to develop their newest scripted series, The Odyssey.

The Odyssey — a fun and suspenseful adventure with a tone reminiscent of the classic adventure comedy The Goonies — will be adapted by the award-winning showrunners Simon Racioppa and Richard Elliott (Fangbone, My Babysitter’s a Vampire), who are also currently creating and writing an original one-hour pilot for Robert Kirkman’s Skybound Entertainment (The Walking Dead).

The Odyssey is an adventure comedy series about a group of kids who wake up to find themselves in a mysterious forest called Downworld — without knowing why they are there or how to get home. With no adults to guide them, the kids quickly learn how to take care of themselves as well as each other and to enjoy this curious and exciting world while they continue to search for a way home.

With an ensemble cast, featuring characters from around the world, some kids will find their way home while new kids will arrive in Downworld — creating an evolving cast of characters. Downworld is a wondrous place with traffic lights in a forest, an awesome hideout, a swimming pond and a monster, Mr. Mask, whose powers are derived from the kids’ own fears.

marblemedia’s Carrie Paupst Shaughnessy, Vice President of Scripted, will be working together with Brian Hamilton, Partner and Executive Producer, Omnifilm Entertainment, to bring this project to life. A robust digital presence will also be created to support the adventures of The Odyssey which will be produced by marblemedia’s award-winning interactive team.

International sales will be handled by Distribution360, a marblemedia company.

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Link: Canadian TV is not dead, it boasts about being alive

From John Doyle of The Globe and Mail:

Link: Canadian TV is not dead, it boasts about being alive
In the Canadian TV racket, everybody is No. 1 at something.

Either the broadcaster has more hits in the Top 10 or it reaches more women viewers or it has more specialty channels that reach twentysomethings or it has Don Cherry or it offers better coffee to TV critics. It’s a bewildering, boastful business, the Canadian commercial TV arena. What it needs, though, are hits, and mostly those are bought in Los Angeles and then trumpeted as must-see shows to advertisers back in Canada. This is done with fingers crossed and silent prayers behind the boasting. Continue reading.

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