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SOWNY » Why Is This Cable Station Allowed In Canada - & Does Anyone Watch It? » March 2, 2022 5:07 pm

Retaw
Replies: 41

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torontostan wrote:

Didn't Australia pull Fox News some time ago? 

No, that was a lie spread by dimwitted political tribalists.

SOWNY » Ottawa Protestors Police Action Coverage » February 20, 2022 10:35 pm

Retaw
Replies: 25

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paterson1 wrote:

=12pxThanks for commenting Retaw.  First off I am not totally disagreeing with your post.  However, watch some of Tucker Carlsons posts and comments on this and tell me he is not passing along misinformation and misleading the audience watching.

I'm not going to argue on the specifics of what Carlson did or didn't say because I don't watch his show or really, any talking heads. My issue is with claiming misinfo regarding things that at least in your characterization, didn't seem all that inaccurate with what other outlets had reported.

Truthfully, I've found the federal government's response to this protest to be abhorrent long before they brought out an act whose last incarnation was only used once in peacetime in response to a terrorist group who kidnapped and killed people. I don't know what to say when I read things like this. If these restrictions are meant to protect people then ... I must be too dimwitted to understand the science.

SOWNY » Ottawa Protestors Police Action Coverage » February 20, 2022 8:50 pm

Retaw
Replies: 25

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Chrisphen wrote:

Why does Bell and Rogers continue to carry Fox News?

You know they also carry state-owned broadcasters from China, Russia and Qatar, right? 

Fearmongering over the availability of Fox News on this country's cable systems has always been bizarre to me. It's never been widely available. I can't speak to every market in this country, but where I'm at, you have to specifically buy news packages that include the channel. It's not like CNN, which you can be saddled with just because you went with the "popular" bundle. I'd argue all of the U.S. news channels should be pushed to higher tiers. They've long become gong shows that have worsened discourse and not just in their own borders. Truthfully, it's all a little too late. You don't need cable to access their garbage.

SOWNY » Ottawa Protestors Police Action Coverage » February 20, 2022 5:13 pm

Retaw
Replies: 25

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paterson1 wrote:

=12pxFox News predictably has been misinforming Americans both on air and on their website. Trudeau controls Canadians bank accounts!  Horses trample protesters in crowd! Martial Law declared in Canada! Canadian government takes freedoms away on a whim! Canadian State News (CBC) suggests Russian forces behind trucker convoy! Canadian state media (CBC) hiding information from Canadians!   And many more.  Fox News many opinion hosts like Tucker Carlson have been salivating about this story for weeks now.

Trudeau and Freeland have outright said they would seize the bank accounts of the protesters. That's a big part of them pushing the Emergency Act. Trampling is maybe an overstatement, but people were clearly hit by a horse. The police themselves have confirmed a woman has suffered serious injuries as a result. CBC's Nil Koksal did ask on-air if Russians could be behind the protest. They were smart enough to not republish that elsewhere (suggesting it might've been a conspiracy of Nil's creation alone), but that doesn't mean it didn't happen. Outside of Martial Law (no one's being gunned down), the rest of what you're claiming is misinfo is going to vary by personal opinion. 

betaylored wrote:

https://twitter.com/Gray_Mackenzie/status/1495226976847728640?t=coQKGoT_8XzXt25FXVcaBg&s=19

is it time for every media corporation to get serious and come up with a good strategy about the personal safety of reporters and production teams when they're on the job?

It should've been time when Global's reporters were physically assaulted by the left-wing "protesters" years ago. Verbal abuse is nothing new and frankly, shoul

SOWNY » Degrassi Headed Back To TV - On HBO » January 13, 2022 7:09 pm

Retaw
Replies: 1

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HBO Max doesn't exist in Canada. As it's a show owned by a Canadian company (WildBrain), it'll likely either show up on Family Channel (same corporate ownership) or another outlet willing to pay more. Given the franchise's history with Bell, I wouldn't be shocked to see it land on Crave - especially since it can further mirror their HBO Max clone image.

It does make it kind of amusing that WildBrain sold off their Toronto live-action studio to just revive the show the studio was made to produce.

SOWNY » Former Producer Explains Why She Felt Forced To Quit Her CBC Job » January 11, 2022 8:01 am

Retaw
Replies: 11

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That Canadaland interview does little else but emphasize that Brown is a staunch believer in the nouveau religion and that Henley seems unwilling to commit to anything. You can't honestly believe an environment that suspends a veteran journalist for reciting a book's title is one where people aren't on eggshells. The most unbelievable part is that she suggests this is a recent development. 

While I think it's fair to question someone's motives, I'm not sure that Gawker article (why would someone revive that site?) is fair to Henley. Her writing does seem to have mainly consisted of CBC.ca fluff, but that wasn't the extent of her work history at the company. I'm not sure how you'd track down which radio and TV stories she contributed to as a producer - especially given her complaint was about being stifled. I also don't think the jilted journalist grift is as lucrative in Canada as that piece suggests it could be. Though, I guess if Levant and Brown can make a career out of it ... 

It used to be that I was the one furthest to the left in any newsroom, occasionally causing strain in story meetings with my views on issues like the housing crisis. I am now easily the most conservative, frequently sparking tension by questioning identity politics. This happened in the span of about 18 months. My own politics did not change.

Makes you wonder what happened to those other journalists. Did they all retire or "coincidentally" lose their jobs?

SOWNY » This Media Move Should Scare The Hell Out Of You » April 30, 2021 11:28 pm

Retaw
Replies: 33

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You linked to the bill in its original incarnation, when it left user-generated platforms exempt from the CRTC's perview. The current issue is that it's been quietly amended to now include them. 

SOWNY » This Media Move Should Scare The Hell Out Of You » April 30, 2021 3:50 pm

Retaw
Replies: 33

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I have a very mixed relationship with Michael Geist and Open Media. I appreciate the activism for things that would otherwise be swept under the rug. However, I don't think it would be wrong to say they're often crying wolf. In fact, their website currently has a campaign pushing to change the FCC's stance on net neutrality, despite the doomsday scenarios we were warned of seemingly not materializing. It's been years and I haven't heard of U.S. internet providers charging more for access to certain sites.

The shady handling of C-10 does make me fear this might be one of the times the wolf is real. A last-second addition to any bill raises alarm bells. Especially so, when the heritage minister and his staff are unable to agree on the purpose of it.

Prod Guy wrote:

Can you guys knock it off with the politics? It’s getting really tiresome. This is supposed to be a media board not the Toronto Sun comment section.
You’re old and white. You don’t have to tell people how you voted. We already know.

You expect a thread about a government bill regulating media to not touch upon politics? The subject of discussion is literally politics impacting media.

I don't usually remember users lacking avatars, but I did recall your fixation on demeaning the perceived race and age demo of this site. That behaviour is far more toxic than political jabs about socks. You bring it up specifically to stifle discussion.

SOWNY » Viewer Alert: CNN's New DocuSeries "The History Of Late Night" TV » April 30, 2021 3:07 pm

Retaw
Replies: 51

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Prod Guy wrote:

Something tells me that you wouldn’t have seen that if the main Fox Network was still owned by News Corp and not Disney.

Newscorp did not sell the Fox broadcast network to Disney.

SOWNY » Holmes Family Effect Soft Ratings on Fox » March 28, 2021 5:06 pm

Retaw
Replies: 4

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I get the COVID desperation + Fox's limited internal abilities, but it's still weird they picked this up. I don't think Mike Holmes has Property Brothers-levels of popularity internationally. It's absolutely cable fodder.

SOWNY » Should Chris Cuomo be taken off CNN? » March 12, 2021 11:53 pm

Retaw
Replies: 51

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It's hard to express how deeply disappointed I am that it wasn't the downplayed elder genocide that condemned Fredo's brother, but his lecherous behaviour. I'm not trying to take away from the latter, but the former should've been more than enough.

SOWNY » NBC Closing Sports Cable Network » January 26, 2021 11:56 pm

Retaw
Replies: 18

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Radiowiz wrote:

Retaw wrote:

Radiowiz wrote:

Interesting. Does this mean that Stacked TV will suddenly have a Stacked Sports option to carry all the Peacock Sports content?

That would require Corus to buy into sports programming, which is not something they usually do. Their contract for Peacock shows only covers stuff NBC Universal owns outright.

Then how do Canadians (legally) watch WWE content once this takes effect?

Unless stated otherwise, I wouldn't expect any changes on the Canadian side of things yet. AFAIK, WWE never actually offered the SVOD service in Canada - just a programming deal licensed to Rogers.
 

SOWNY » NBC Closing Sports Cable Network » January 26, 2021 11:29 pm

Retaw
Replies: 18

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Radiowiz wrote:

Interesting. Does this mean that Stacked TV will suddenly have a Stacked Sports option to carry all the Peacock Sports content?

That would require Corus to buy into sports programming, which is not something they usually do. Their contract for Peacock shows only covers stuff NBC Universal owns outright.

SOWNY » Another CBC Show To Get U.S. Network Exposure On Fox » January 26, 2021 11:15 pm

Retaw
Replies: 5

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paterson1 wrote:

I think this is hilarious, all these so called CBC "make work" shows that many like to trash and that nobody watches in Canada are good enough for FOX and the CW.  And the CW has been regularly running CBC programming for years. 

This programming only has value to U.S. networks when they have no other options. Last year, Fox ran a TV show where alleged celebrities react to other TV shows. To say they're scratching the bottom of the barrel would be putting things lightly.

In a non-COVID world, this series would continue to be ignored by mainstream U.S. platforms. Fewer than 200,000 people watched Diggstown live. That's likely the lowest audience out of any ongoing Canadian broadcast drama. I imagine that's why so many other shows were picked up in the U.S. before it. Nurses is a trashy show, but its ratings on Global were multiple times that.

SOWNY » Charlie Brown Returning To The Airwaves » November 19, 2020 12:36 am

Retaw
Replies: 4

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Prod Guy wrote:

They're usually on YTV here as well.

For the last few years, they've been airing on Family Channel. Their parent company WildBrain (formerly DHX Media) bought The Peanuts in 2017. The Halloween one didn't air on linear here either, which makes me think the Apple deal has also prevented that.

The new stuff being produced for Apple is animated in Vancouver with voice acting done in Toronto.

SOWNY » Sports, yes all sports T.V. ratings are down... » October 10, 2020 3:45 pm

Retaw
Replies: 9

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I'd be curious to know if leagues in Asia, Australia and Europe are suffering from similar ratings drops. If it's isolated to North America, that would suggest there might be more at play here than just no crowds = no atmosphere, weird scheduling, etc.

Finding out that the NBA finals are down significantly year-over-year is actually very surprising to me. LA and Miami are two of the largest markets in the United States. Last year had a team in a city not even tracked by Nielsen.

 

SOWNY » The Incredible Deep Fake Election Ads U.S. Cable Refused To Run » October 8, 2020 8:07 pm

Retaw
Replies: 10

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It is weird they'd go with Un over Jinping, especially given the recent TikTok drama. Of course, seeing that there's Hollywood involvement makes me think they wouldn't want to upset the CCP.

SOWNY » Another Streaming Only Show Coming To OTA TV To Fill A Schedule Gap » October 5, 2020 9:02 pm

Retaw
Replies: 1

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Warner actually owns The Gilmore Girls and produced this revival for Netflix. Since it's been a few years, it's likely their exclusivity agreement has expired.

SOWNY » Bad Canadian TV shows? » September 27, 2020 6:58 pm

Retaw
Replies: 23

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Second Jen is probably the worst scripted Canadian series produced for a major network in a very long time. You've probably never heard of it (for good reason), but the IMDB score isn't unjustified. I'm certain the only reason it's gotten three seasons is because of some mixture of nepotism, diversity quotas and undiscerning government funding agencies.

SOWNY » New PBS Streaming Service Coming to Canada – At A Price » September 17, 2020 10:44 pm

Retaw
Replies: 10

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Radio111 wrote:

I believe the other direction should be true as well- Canadian services should be available to anyone in the US who wants them.

I doubt our major broadcasters could put together a compelling SVOD service for international markets. The independent speciality ones could (and in some cases, already) do niche services. 

With the exception of CBC, most of our channels are dominated by foreign-owned programming whose rights are more often than not already tied to competing U.S. services. Because of regulations preventing vertical integration to promote marketplace diversity, the major broadcasters don't even own the scripted Cancon they do fund. Usually, they simply have the exclusive Canadian linear/VOD rights for a few years. The shows are typically owned by independent distributors who are able to sell them internationally, cut merchandise deals, and do second window releases elsewhere. That's why, for example, Degrassi: The Next Generation, a show Bell funded, is nowhere to be found on Crave but is currently airing on YTV, a channel Corus owns. That applies to the CBC, too. Schitt's Creek is ITV, Burden of Truth is eOne, etc. So if any of them wanted to launch a service with their primetime Cancon, they'd have to buy out foreign rights.

As linear viewership continues eroding, I do expect the CRTC to start rolling back those requirements. It's nice to want to promote the independent production community when times are good, but clearly times are not good in the broadcast world anymore. Demanding companies dump millions into a show they can only monetize in Canada, in limited ways and for a short period of time is only going to get harder to justify. I know they've already tossed most of that for the speciality channels.

RadioAaron wrote:

This thread is a great read that I'm not going to get involved in as I'm not yet retired, but for the topic at hand - I'm not sure how viable this will be. If you're at the point where you're layering stream

SOWNY » Major News Agency’s Bizarre Fact Check About Fox News In Canada » September 16, 2020 3:02 pm

Retaw
Replies: 3

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RadioActive wrote:

Did you know there’s a story on the Internet claiming Fox News is not available in Canada? Apparently, it’s a big deal – posts about the “fact” the conservative news service has been barred here has met with predictable outrage (everyone on the Internet seems perpetually outraged about something all the time) and the story has been shared more than 20,000 times.

Is there outrage? The article you linked to implies this is being spread by a demo who are envious of this nonexistent law, not conservatives crying over alleged censorship.

One has to wonder if that claim was initially made to fool those who suggest only their political opposites fall for nonsense.

SOWNY » Does Erin O'Toole get your vote next election » August 29, 2020 11:24 pm

Retaw
Replies: 29

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Erin is another cold suit, just like Sheer. You need someone with fire in their eyes. It's sad that this is what politics have devolved into, but we live in a world where no matter how many scandals our Prime Minister finds himself in, there will always be someone voting for him because he has a nice smile. And wears Star Wars socks. Can't forget that one.

SOWNY » It's a dogs day in August on the set of Hudson and Rex.. » August 9, 2020 1:11 pm

Retaw
Replies: 6

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Radiowiz wrote:

The dog is the star of the show, so it's a good thing he can't catch anything. 

He can.

newsguy1 wrote:

And a little trivia. I have the MHZ Choice streaming service which is all foreign stuff. Hudson and Rex is actually a Canadian remake of a German show called "Inspektor Rex." They even found a dog that is a dead ringer for the one (or ones) in the German show.

The Canadian dog is actually a distant relative to the original.

SOWNY » Rogers' "Sort-Of But Not Really" Answer To Crave » July 23, 2020 9:14 pm

Retaw
Replies: 8

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I don't get it. You're paying $5/month just for content aggregation?  

RadioActive wrote:

I'm was never a huge fan of Ted Rogers or his company, but I will give him this - he had the ability to see into the future as far as melding business and technology were concerned. I'm convinced that if he had been alive at the time, he never would have let Shomi be shut down, because he likely would have had that rare ability to see that streaming was the next big thing.

=12pxHe did it with cable. He did with cell phones. And he did it with the Internet. Very often, a step ahead.

I'm not so sure of that. This isn't a traditional telecommunications battle. It's a content war that uses pre-existing telecommunications infrastructures. There's no proprietary technology that gives one SVOD service a benefit over the other. The costs are so low that people have subscriptions to multiple services. There's no logistical nightmares comparable to cell tower coverage and cable rollout that guarantees you regional revenue. There are no regulatory bodies keeping foreign entities away. 

SOWNY » Jessica Mulroney (Meghan Markle's BFF) gets called out » July 16, 2020 1:04 pm

Retaw
Replies: 18

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Is CTV going to drop The Masked Singer? I don't think many would argue against Nick Cannon's comments being far more offensive than what ended Jessica's media career.

Of course, I'm just a "lesser" "savage" so maybe my view is wrong.

SOWNY » Lord Black weighs in on CBC » June 29, 2020 5:40 pm

Retaw
Replies: 36

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Charlie wrote:

Who will replace him, Desmond Cole?  Wouldn't be surprised in this day and age.

Don't give people free ideas.

SOWNY » Jessica Mulroney (Meghan Markle's BFF) gets called out » June 13, 2020 3:53 pm

Retaw
Replies: 18

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I'm impressed by how quickly she's been unpersoned. The international Netflix rollout of her show has likely been cancelled. All the work to produce a show ignored because the host got into an online catfight at a sensitive time.

First it was Don, then it was Wendy, now it's Jessica. Who will the mob get next?

SOWNY » Live TV Streaming Reaches Canada as Netflix Alternative » June 4, 2020 8:49 pm

Retaw
Replies: 10

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Disruption to the Canadian pay TV market has only grown with the arrival of Disney+, Apple TV+, Peacock and HBO Max.

Someone didn't do their research.

Weird to launch a VMPD service in Canada now when it's well established that the U.S. ones are burning money. 

SOWNY » cable is great for breaking/ongoing news » June 2, 2020 9:51 am

Retaw
Replies: 4

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Radiowiz wrote:

ABC Buffalo cut into Match game @ 10:30 last night to report that they are now officially in lock down (curfew) mode.
Most protesters there left for the evening, but some chose to stick around to be up to no good.
Therefore, lock down it is.
It is believed that these not so smart people are most likely not even from Buffalo. 
    

It seems like things are starting to turn ugly.

What a great time for tonnes of people to be huddled together, too. Even if all they're are wearing correct PPE (which is being optimistic) there's no way they're maintaining proper social distancing. Hopefully, they stay far away from the elderly for the next while.

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