From Victoria Ahearn of The Canadian Press:
Link: Netflix tells Canadian Heritage it makes ‘substantial’ investments in Canada
Netflix makes “substantial” investments in film and TV productions in Canada and should not face regulation, argues the streaming company in a submission to Canadian Heritage’s public consultation on homegrown content in a digital world.
The submission, filed Thursday, comes two years after Netflix suggested to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission that its service did not fall under the Broadcasting Act since it is not a conventional broadcaster. Continue reading.
I have mixed feelings about this. Many of those Canadian shows Netflix is making or contributing to are telling Canadian stories set in Canada about Canadians. One of my longstanding issues with Cancon, especially from Shaw and Bell, is that they are making Cancon aiming for American sales and trying to keep the “Canadian-ness” out of their stories. I hate Canadian shows that are benefiting from public funding that try to pretend they’re American by having generic settings. Honestly, American networks have deeper pockets to tell their own stories and Canadian public funds shouldn’t be used to tell American stories. That’s one of my sole reasons for defending the CBC’s existence in several arguments with various people who think it’s a waste of taxpayer money. CBC is telling stories that aren’t being told and probably wouldn’t be told by a private broadcaster. My brother, father and best friend,all fiscal conservatives to the core, while admitting to seeing the value of Canadian stories being told in television, insist that the private sector should do this on its own. Well, I disagreed although you have to hand it to Netflix. They have already contributed significat funding to Alias Grace, Degrassi, Frontier, Between, Anne of Green Gables and Travelers without any government regulation mandating them to do so. I’m gonna save my complaining for the Global tv network which to my memory hasn’t had much scripted Canadian-set cancon (the only one I can think of off the top of my head is Bomb Girls) in regular season prime time in years. Sure, there was Rookie Blue (a show I really liked,) but it was fairly generic in setting and storytelling.
Alicia
1)Most Canadian don’t like Canadian style shows now is that right or wrong that’s up for debate but that’s the reality.
2)As with the Cbc there getting away from Canadian style shows there new ones are more American story line based.
3)Cancon is one of the big things holding Canadians shows back and I very well could see the Crtc/feds dropping it.
What’s a “Canadian-style” show?
Jayme, there’s not a single thing you’ve said that’s backed by either data, viewership, or reality.
If you’d like to show data, show data.
If you’d like to make an argument that isn’t fallacy-based, make it.
Otherwise, you’re just another guy on the internet taking dumb opinion and trying to present it as gospel.
Stop saying dumb things.
I know I’m beginning to sound like a Netflix-promoter but I think Netflix is doing a good job and I think many Canadian shows benefit from Netflix deals. I like that Netflix is such an international entity. Its full of Korean soap operas, Bollywood blockbusters, French cinema, British dramas, along with American and Canadian fare. And I’m in favour of having a “Canadian style”. I think that, in this age of global television, it’s necessary to produce shows distinctive from American ones. We don’t need to produce American knockoffs. Its like when you have kids in junior high. There’s those rich kids with name brand clothing and then there’s the kids that have cheaper clothing that try to look like the rich kids. Then there’s the kids with less money that develop a sense of style all their own. I want Canadian television to be that third kind of kid. I see it in a lot of Canadian shows and many people, particularly non-Canadians, like these shows. I just wish more people would realize that. There’s still this sense (such as what Jayme above commented) that Canadian TV sucks and nobody likes it. That’s bulltweed because lots of people watch and like Canadian TV.