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July 24, 2019 1:27 pm  #1


Zoomer Media Gets Licence Revoked For Station You Never Heard Of

On Wednesday, the CRTC officially agreed to revoke the broadcast licence for a Moses Znaimer Zoomer outlet called “The Beautiful Little Channel.”
 
Who?
 
Exactly.
 
Since I read about the revocation, I’ve been trying to find any information on this thing. And there’s very little. I had to go back to the CRTC archives to find anything. Turns out the “BLC,” as the folks at Zoomer call it, went on the air in 2010 as a specialty service “devoted to classical music and related fine arts programming.” It “broadcasts beautiful images, quotes, scriptures and music that soothe the mind and spirit.”
 
<sarcasm>Gee, who could have guessed that format wouldn’t be a success? </sarcasm>
 
A filing with the Commission from 2012 goes on to add that they had “great hopes for this service” but it had limited distribution and was operating at a loss.
 
It took until now for them to throw in the towel.
 
Has anyone ever seen or heard of this before? Who was it aimed at? (I can see how it might have been background for hospital waiting rooms or meditation centres, but otherwise, just the very idea sounds like a money-loser.)
 
It’s amazing how many ideas the CRTC licences that either never see the light of day or wish they hadn’t. I guess “BLC” now stands for “Big Losing Concept.”

CRTC Decision
 
The only tangible proof that this ever actually existed appears to be on this YouTube video, which purports to show the channel’s IDs. It was uploaded in October 2012. As of this posting, it had 9 views. 

 

July 24, 2019 1:39 pm  #2


Re: Zoomer Media Gets Licence Revoked For Station You Never Heard Of

Oh no! Maybe they cancelled the station too soon!

     Thread Starter
 

July 24, 2019 3:56 pm  #3


Re: Zoomer Media Gets Licence Revoked For Station You Never Heard Of

Speaking of Zoomer Media and its spin-offs, while I was scanning through the original document from 2012, I came across something very interesting. In this particular plea to the CRTC, Zoomer asked the Commission to lower its Canadian content burden for Vision TV, and pleaded with the regulators not to remove it from a mandatory must carry status on cable and to grant it a seven-year licence renewal, instead of the usual five.
 
 Check this out:
 
“There would be a significant administrative and financial burden placed on our small and independent company – which is already heavily burdened by regulatory proceedings.
 
“…As a small media company, we have limited staff and resources. We are not in a position to hire a battery of external lawyers and consultants…
 
“If Vision TV is not granted a 9(1) h mandatory order, the future of this service will be very much in jeopardy…There will be a further debilitating financial impact on our service which will cause it to go dark immediately.”
 
Sound familiar to anyone here? This is exactly the same threat that Zoomer used to convince the CRTC to give it a piece of increasingly scarce FM spectrum for the 96.7 downtown signal simulcasting AM 740,
 
Here’s what they said in 2015:
 
“…the licensee indicated that severe degradation of CFZM’s coverage in Toronto’s core has eroded the station’s revenues. It stated that should the Commission deny the application, the station would no longer be viable.”
 
"The station would no longer be viable." Hmm, reading all this, one could begin to believe that the company always seems to cry “we’re going to go broke and go off the air!” unless they get what they want. It’s worked both times. But you have to wonder about these claims after they got away with it twice. Is a third time coming if they ask for something else?

     Thread Starter
 

July 24, 2019 5:15 pm  #4


Re: Zoomer Media Gets Licence Revoked For Station You Never Heard Of

BLC is not necessarily going away.  revocation of the licence only lessens the regulatory burden on zoomer.  provided BLC stays under 200,000 total subscribers, the station is exempt from licensing requirements -- although it must still maintain logs, has Cancon quotas, etc.
 

 

July 24, 2019 5:22 pm  #5


Re: Zoomer Media Gets Licence Revoked For Station You Never Heard Of

I'm not aware of a single place or person who even knows this thing exists. How Zoomer Media can make any money off it is beyond me. 

     Thread Starter
 

July 24, 2019 8:35 pm  #6


Re: Zoomer Media Gets Licence Revoked For Station You Never Heard Of

In this business, sometimes losing money can be far FAR more profitable for the owners than making it.  

RadioActive wrote:

I'm not aware of a single place or person who even knows this thing exists. How Zoomer Media can make any money off it is beyond me. 

 


Madness takes its toll.  Please have exact change.