The Southern Ontario/WNY Radio-TV Forum » Does A Cdn. Radio Or TV Stn. Have To Say Its Call Letters Once A Day?

RadioActive · June 20, 2022 3:14 pm

It's not the most important question you'll ever hear, but it's long been something I've wondered: does a Canadian radio or TV station have to legally I.D. itself by its call letters at least once or twice a day?

I've noticed that most radio stations are pretty good about putting the four letters out at the top of each hour. For example, Boom 97.3 regularly lets listeners know the real station's name is CHBM. Newstalk 1010 reminds those at home that they're on CFRB just before their hourly newscasts. And what is normally referred to only as AM 640 becomes CFIQ as the clock hits a new hour.

But do they have to do that? And what about TV stations? City TV's branding is City TV, so that's not a problem there. And yet I can't recall a single time in decades where CTV Toronto has let viewers know they're watching CFTO. Global is CIII, but you'd never know it viewing any of their channels. And as for the CBC, I can't recall hearing the letters CBLA-FM on radio or CBLT on the tube in eons.

To partially solve this time-wasting mystery, I actually emailed the CRTC. It took over a month to get an answer, but today, they finally replied. Not that they made it all that much clearer. Here's some of their response:

"Call letters are handled by Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED). The onus is on the licensee to advise the CRTC of any changes in the call letters when approved by ISED.

"There is no CRTC regulation overseeing the number of times a call sign designation is used on air for television and radio stations, unless a station has a specific condition of licence to that effect (i.e. in cases of severe and repeated non-compliance where the CRTC may impose, as a condition of licence or through a mandatory order a specific reference to on-air announcements).

"However, ISED may have requirements. ISED is responsible for administering the technical standards and certification of equipment, managing the radio spectrum and allocating frequencies in Canada. As such, we encourage you to contact them.

"In official documents filed with the CRTC, a licensee must refer to the official call letters as approved by ISED. In some instances, a licensee may be using band names to identify a station, especially when they are part of a network for example, the Bear, Virgin, Rouge, etc. The band names should not be used in official documents or licence as ISED does not use and regulate band names when issuing broadcasting certificates."

"We trust that this answers your questions."

Actually, it doesn't and their suggestion that I try to find the answer on the ISED pages and phone them was met with the usual confusion, runaround and endless unanswered voicemail. But from the gist of the one response I got, it does not appear there are any laws that require a proper station I.D. Yet nearly every radio station I've heard does it and nearly every TV station I've seen doesn't.

That strikes me as a little odd and in the end, I'm no further ahead in knowing if there are any rules about this, and if so, why Canadian TV stations appear to be allowed to ignore them while Canuck radio outlets - which rely much more heavily on branding - don't.

djwildbill · June 20, 2022 3:40 pm

For some reason I was always under the assumption that a radio station had to properly ID themselves near or at the top of each hour. Years ago when I was MD at 1220 CHSC, I made up a carted ID that said “This is 1220 CHSC in St. Catharines, Ontario Canada - a Pelpropco radio station”. Even on-air, I occasionally would mention the city name. So, I don’t know if it has to be done but I was always under the assumption one did.

mace · June 20, 2022 4:00 pm

Most U.S, television stations no longer give a voiced ID. The legal information is usually flashed briefly across the bottom of the screen as the next program begins.

turkeytop · June 20, 2022 4:51 pm

It seems most radio stations today ID using some stupid name or slogan.

"105 The Coffin."

"Orgasm 99"

RadioAaron · June 20, 2022 5:08 pm

Single words are far easier to remember than a meaningless four-letter combination.

paterson1 · June 20, 2022 5:52 pm

I hear some stations do their call letters, every hour like Newstalk 1010 (odd that their ident sounds like it was voiced by Jamil Jivani ) and Boom. Other stations like Virgin in Kitchener, I hear occasionally but not as consistent as others. Virgin will do their calls sometimes out of long commercial sets, so this could be why I haven't noticed. Boom's sister station Today radio, I can't recall hearing the call letters, but doesn't mean they don't do them.

Other than City and CHCH, I haven't heard or seen the call letters for Canadian television stations in years. Global Kingston I believe still refers to itself as CKWS TV sometimes, and CHEX in Peterborough recently moved to the Global ID. CKWS used the call letters on their video and story of retired sportscaster Doug Jeffries a few weeks back, saying that Doug was retiring from CKWS television.

Still strange why Global Kingston gets two local news, weather, sportscasts per day but their station in Ottawa only gets a feed of Toronto and no local newscasts.

RadioAaron · June 20, 2022 6:00 pm

paterson1 wrote:
Still strange why Global Kingston gets two local news, weather, sportscasts per day but their station in Ottawa only gets a feed of Toronto and no local newscasts.

Because CKWS is the only TV station in Kingston and they're funded in part by Shaw's community TV fund. It will be interesting to see what CKWS's future is if the Rogers deal is approved and they lose that money.

Starting a new TV station in Ottawa in 2022 is a non-starter. Global gets to add the market's ratings for its national sales rates without the expense of a local operation.

paterson1 · June 20, 2022 6:34 pm

RadioAaron wrote:
paterson1 wrote:
Still strange why Global Kingston gets two local news, weather, sportscasts per day but their station in Ottawa only gets a feed of Toronto and no local newscasts.
Because CKWS is the only TV station in Kingston and they're funded in part by Shaw's community TV fund. It will be interesting to see what CKWS's future is if the Rogers deal is approved and they lose that money.

Starting a new TV station in Ottawa in 2022 is a non-starter. Global gets to add the market's ratings for its national sales rates without the expense of a local operation.

Global would not be starting a new local station. They already have a studio, bureau, some staff and a channel on the dial. So they have much of the expense already. All Global needs to do is a couple of local newscasts, and could utilize what is already there augmented with new staff.

Global will always be an "also ran" in the ratings for news and public affairs programming until they have something more permanent out of Ottawa. Local news in Ottawa would mean better ratings and mix of national and local advertising. This works in other markets and a affluent underserved local television market like Ottawa is no different. The station in fact could be quite successful and not at a huge additional cost.

Much smaller communities like Regina can support three local television newscasts, no reason at all why Ottawa cannot either.

RadioAaron · June 20, 2022 6:45 pm

paterson1 wrote:
RadioAaron wrote:
paterson1 wrote:
Still strange why Global Kingston gets two local news, weather, sportscasts per day but their station in Ottawa only gets a feed of Toronto and no local newscasts.
Because CKWS is the only TV station in Kingston and they're funded in part by Shaw's community TV fund. It will be interesting to see what CKWS's future is if the Rogers deal is approved and they lose that money.

Starting a new TV station in Ottawa in 2022 is a non-starter. Global gets to add the market's ratings for its national sales rates without the expense of a local operation.
Global would not be starting a new local station. They already have a studio, bureau, some staff and a channel on the dial. So they have much of the expense already. All Global needs to do is a couple of local newscasts, and could utilize what is already there augmented with new staff.

Global will always be an "also ran" in the ratings for news and public affairs programming until they have something more permanent out of Ottawa. Local news in Ottawa would mean better ratings and mix of national and local advertising. This works in other markets and a affluent underserved local television market like Ottawa is no different. The station in fact could be quite successful and not at a huge additional cost.

Much smaller communities like Regina can support three local television newscasts, no reason at all why Ottawa cannot either.

It's still starting a new station as it would take a massive marketing campaign for people to even notice/care that there's a new local newscast.

Local advertising is becoming less of a factor every year - there are fewer and fewer local businesses in the first place. Much like media, chains and franchises are taking over.

Local attempts to get ratings from CTV Ottawa have never amounted to much. If the NewRO had made money, CTV could have kept its newscasts intact and benefited from two profitable stations. They didn't. CBC lags in ratings by a huge margin.

Stations in places like Regina live completely on inertia. They can't dump local news without losing their licenses. If adding local news in Ottawa were a profitable proposition, it would have been done.

Long story short: starting a new legacy media TV station in Ottawa is a suicide mission.

Last edited by RadioAaron (June 20, 2022 7:02 pm)

torontostan · June 20, 2022 8:02 pm

Back to the original topic. No City-TV is not compliant either as technically they should be identifying themselves as CITY-DT Toronto within 10 minutes of the beginning of an hour.

Here's the info you're after:

"Pursuant to section 18 of the Radiocommunication Regulations, a broadcasting station for which a call sign has been issued must identify itself in accordance with the provisions of BETS-11."

BETS-11:

"2.1 Using the call sign issued to the broadcasting station, the holder of a Broadcasting Certificate shall, during any time that the broadcasting station for which that certificate was issued transmits a radio signal, identify the broadcasting station at least once every hour on the hour or within 10 minutes thereof, or at the beginning and end of a program where the program lasts longer than one hour, by a voice announcement in English or in French that
- articulates each letter and states any accompanying designator of the call sign of the station; and
- names the principal city or community that is served by the station.

2.2 In the case of a television broadcasting station, the voice announcement may be replaced by a visual announcement of not less than three seconds in duration that identifies the call sign assigned to that station and the principal city or community that is served by that station."

Therefore nearly all TV stations in this country are in violation of the Radiocommunication Act by way of the Radiocommunication Regulations. I believe the CRTC response you received was sufficient, as they don't regulate call signs nor care much about them.

Are these stations breaking the law? Yes. Are there fines that could be imposed on them? I don't believe so. Does anybody care except readers of this forum? No. Honestly they should scrap it. I'm confident nobody listening or watching would know why it's still necessary in 2022.

Glen Warren · June 20, 2022 8:24 pm

paterson1 wrote:
RadioAaron wrote:
paterson1 wrote:
Still strange why Global Kingston gets two local news, weather, sportscasts per day but their station in Ottawa only gets a feed of Toronto and no local newscasts.
Because CKWS is the only TV station in Kingston and they're funded in part by Shaw's community TV fund. It will be interesting to see what CKWS's future is if the Rogers deal is approved and they lose that money.

Starting a new TV station in Ottawa in 2022 is a non-starter. Global gets to add the market's ratings for its national sales rates without the expense of a local operation.
Global would not be starting a new local station. They already have a studio, bureau, some staff and a channel on the dial. So they have much of the expense already. All Global needs to do is a couple of local newscasts, and could utilize what is already there augmented with new staff.

Global will always be an "also ran" in the ratings for news and public affairs programming until they have something more permanent out of Ottawa. Local news in Ottawa would mean better ratings and mix of national and local advertising. This works in other markets and a affluent underserved local television market like Ottawa is no different. The station in fact could be quite successful and not at a huge additional cost.

Much smaller communities like Regina can support three local television newscasts, no reason at all why Ottawa cannot either.

Hey P1...   You do realize that Global never had a local licence in Ottawa / Hull ???   The original Ottawa facility was a two camera studio in the National Press Building on Sparks St. This was the Global Ottawa bureau for many years, but only housed Reporters, Producers, Writers and technical field and operations technicians to staff and service the Ottawa News Bureau.

Other than news, Global Ottawa never had its own programming, sales, marketing, traffic or MCR facilities... Its purpose was to produce national interest news reports/stories for insert into the Toronto produced Global News.
This was unique in that the newscast was presented by two anchors in different cities. Peter Trueman in Toronto and Peter Desbarats in Ottawa.

The original vision/plan for Global was severely parred down when the licence was awarded in '72... no national network. What was approved was for an Ontario Regional network or chain of six terrestrial TV transmitters with one common feed. Ottawa was served from the Channel 6 transmitter at Camp Fortune in Hull, Que. It had a relatively small contour due to the power being approx. 12,600 watts, and the directional pattern which protected eastern Ontario so as to not encroach on the CJOH re-broad for the Cornwall area. Previously, Global was denied permission to locate a regional network transmitter in Cornwall, as this would have been received in Western Quebec, and would have had potential impact on CFCF-12, Montreal.

Global never had local ads, they were always National brands/spots... ie. Coke, Pepsi, McDonalds...   and the Regional Spots ie. "Your Ontario Ford Dealers Association"

RadioActive · June 20, 2022 8:26 pm

That is excellent info, and yes, you're right - most people don't care about the call signs. But I watched this casually disappear over the years and wondered where it went. Radio seems to do it quite regularly. On most Canadian TV stations, it's non-existent.

paterson1 · June 20, 2022 8:27 pm

Thanks for all of the information Glenn Warren. Just saw the comments now. However it is time for Ottawa to have their Global outlet capable of local newscasts. The new RO was 25 years ago and originally in Pembroke which is an hour and a half away from Ottawa. Years later everything was moved to Ottawa. Disagree with Aaron, they are not starting a new legacy media TV station, much of it is already there.

A huge marketing campaign is not necessary, and they have a station to promote the change. They just need to do it, words travel fast in the nation's capital. I am sure the CRTC would not have an issue of Global running local newscasts.

Regarding local advertisers. I am not talking about a local downtown shoe store with one location. Ottawa and area has many large building supply outlets, car dealerships, realtors, boat and trailer companies, local furniture outlets, city of Ottawa, dealer associations, colleges and more. All of these are prime for local advertising on a local newscast, mixed with national. Local advertisers of this size have the money, and in many cases co-op dollars available for them to use.

Global will never be a major news force nationally until they have a bigger presence in Ottawa and that includes local news in this large and rich market of over 1.4 million.

Last edited by paterson1 (June 20, 2022 9:28 pm)

mike marshall · June 20, 2022 8:30 pm

djwildbill wrote:
For some reason I was always under the assumption that a radio station had to properly ID themselves near or at the top of each hour. Years ago when I was MD at 1220 CHSC, I made up a carted ID that said “This is 1220 CHSC in St. Catharines, Ontario Canada - a Pelpropco radio station”. Even on-air, I occasionally would mention the city name. So, I don’t know if it has to be done but I was always under the assumption one did.

Don’t know about now but back in the olden days: call letters, frequency and city of license, within 10-minutes of straight up, either side, hourly, ‘live’ or recorded and you were legally covered.
That could be embellished, if you wanted to hit a post or the vocal.

Add: In the late ‘60s in Windsor, you could do what you damn-well pleased because the CRTC had
no idea what was going on there.

Last edited by mike marshall (June 20, 2022 8:42 pm)

ED1 · June 20, 2022 10:39 pm

I do to remember in the analog days the station call sign and network affiliation was broadcast on one of the CC channels, and depending on the TV you had it would show it.

Nowaways on over-the-air DTV, the call sign appears when you tune in to the station (eg. 9.1 CBRT-DT). So maybe that's how they're "meeting" that rule? Plus, people on cable/satellite have EPGs that show the call sign or at least the station brand. As far as radio, where I am (Calgary), probably all the commercial stations in town include the call sign in their imaged IDs (except CBC Radio One, where it doesn't even give the frequency here unlike other CBCR1 stations).

What the CRTC should have done when Bell bought CHUM was to force the players to sell CHRO to someone else (maybe Global? or to Rogers to make it Citytv?) so that one company wouldn't control two full-powered television stations in the city. Perhaps CHRO's news operation would have probably ended up like the other Global stations in Eastern Canada today, or a bare bones CityNews TV operation, but at least there would have been a 3rd English TV news outlet in a metro of 1 million+ people.

Forward Power · June 21, 2022 7:04 am

ED1 wrote:
As far as radio, where I am (Calgary), probably all the commercial stations in town include the call sign in their imaged IDs (except CBC Radio One, where it doesn't even give the frequency here unlike other CBCR1 stations).

Same here in the National Capital Region... pretty much everyone throws in something of an hourly legal ID. Jump 106.9 (CKQB-FM) even goes so far as to include their Pembroke rebroadcaster (CKQB-FM-1 99.9) in the legal IDs. Some stations in Ottawa and the Valley have also begun including Indigenous land acknowledgements in their legals *and* on their websites.

mace · June 21, 2022 7:30 am

It was October 2005 when CTV ceased using call letters for their affilliates, replacing them with CTV Toronto, Ottawa, etc.

RadioActive · June 21, 2022 8:17 am

Forward Power wrote:
ED1 wrote:
As far as radio, where I am (Calgary), probably all the commercial stations in town include the call sign in their imaged IDs (except CBC Radio One, where it doesn't even give the frequency here unlike other CBCR1 stations).
Same here in the National Capital Region... pretty much everyone throws in something of an hourly legal ID. Jump 106.9 (CKQB-FM) even goes so far as to include their Pembroke rebroadcaster (CKQB-FM-1 99.9) in the legal IDs. Some stations in Ottawa and the Valley have also begun including Indigenous land acknowledgements in their legals *and* on their websites.

I remember when CKBB in Barrie was on 950 AM, and was rebroadcast on CKCB 1400 AM in Collingwood. The announcers used to have to say both in every break or intro, which made it ridiculously long and a mouthful every time they turned on the mic.

CKBB is now CIBQ-FM, with CKCB-FM also converting to the other band in 1994.

paterson1 · June 21, 2022 9:29 am

In Owen Sound from June 1978 CFOS had a repeater station in Port Elgin with CFPS at 1490. Whenever you identified the station it was always CFOS/CFPS. All of the logos had the two call letters and usually the frequencies, 560/1490. But CFPS always had offices in Port Elgin with a few reporters that would cover Port Elgin/Southampton and area. The Port Elgin office also had a receptionist Mon-Friday 9 to 5.

Oddly enough about three months before I left the company in 1986 we usually dropped the CFPS calls in our breaks. It seemed to be that you could do both calls but it was not necessary every break, or every time you identified the station. So over song intros the announcers would just go with CFOS. You would hear CFOS/CFPS more on newsbreaks or from reports from news staff.

CFPS became it's own station in May 2005 with an adult contemporary known as 98 The Beach. The station is now Active Rock/Alternative and goes by 97.9 The Bruce. Ironically with station, which still has the calls of CFPS has a repeater in Tobermory at 91.9, which launched last year. There are plans in the future for 91.9 to have some of it's own programming. Announcers seem to normally just go with 97.9 in their breaks. Any official ID's identify both frequencies with 97.9 and 91.9 and the calls CFPS.

Radiowiz · June 21, 2022 10:19 am

RadioAaron wrote:
Single words are far easier to remember than a meaningless four-letter combination.

Sounds like you're saying CHUM was way ahead of it's time.

Radiowiz · June 21, 2022 10:36 am

torontostan wrote:
Are these stations breaking the law? Yes. Are there fines that could be imposed on them? I don't believe so. Does anybody care except readers of this forum? No. Honestly they should scrap it. I'm confident nobody listening or watching would know why it's still necessary in 2022.

The only thing really needed is clear indication of which City, Global or CTV one is tuning into.
There's always a reason for a local something. It's easier to find if one clearly understands which channel they have.
Local news for Toronto is not going to air on City TV Montreal, and so on...
(using news as a prime example as I am unable to offer a good example of a local program otherwise, at this time)

Having the wrong City TV is not a fun situation to be in.

Dan Sys · June 21, 2022 11:11 am

Mike wrote:

"Don’t know about now but back in the olden days: call letters, frequency and city of license, within 10-minutes of straight up, either side, hourly, ‘live’ or recorded and you were legally covered.
That could be embellished, if you wanted to hit a post or the vocal"

Hasn't changed Mike. Legal ID's are still required at or near the top of the hour (except for CBC stations). However the city of license requirement seems to have morphed into the "city served" (ie-CKNW 980 is licensed to New Westminster, but only mentions Vancouver in their legal ID).

RadioActive · June 21, 2022 11:16 am

Radiowiz wrote:
Local news for Toronto is not going to air on City TV Montreal, and so on...

Global's noon newscast out of Toronto is simulcast in Montreal. Which means they feature local stories from both cities, often very specific to the market.

Meteorologist Anthony Farnell does a weather forecast that offers separate Toronto and Montreal 7-day forecasts.

It's one of the reasons I almost never watch Global's noon news. Too much irrelevant stuff that appeals to neither audience. I really don't care what new municipal law they just passed at Montreal City Hall. And I'm assuming those in Quebec could care less what John Tory has to say.

It's a disservice to both markets and I wish they wouldn't try to serve so many different audiences. You can get away with this kind of "tale of two cities" thing on music radio formats to a certain extent. But on supposedly local TV news, it's a non-starter.

RadioActive · June 21, 2022 12:47 pm

paterson1 wrote:
In Owen Sound from June 1978 CFOS had a repeater station in Port Elgin with CFPS at 1490. Whenever you identified the station it was always CFOS/CFPS. All of the logos had the two call letters and usually the frequencies, 560/1490. But CFPS always had offices in Port Elgin with a few reporters that would cover Port Elgin/Southampton and area. The Port Elgin office also had a receptionist Mon-Friday 9 to 5.

Oddly enough about three months before I left the company in 1986 we usually dropped the CFPS calls in our breaks. It seemed to be that you could do both calls but it was not necessary every break, or every time you identified the station. So over song intros the announcers would just go with CFOS. You would hear CFOS/CFPS more on newsbreaks or from reports from news staff.

CFPS became it's own station in May 2005 with an adult contemporary known as 98 The Beach. The station is now Active Rock/Alternative and goes by 97.9 The Bruce. Ironically with station, which still has the calls of CFPS has a repeater in Tobermory at 91.9, which launched last year. There are plans in the future for 91.9 to have some of it's own programming. Announcers seem to normally just go with 97.9 in their breaks. Any official ID's identify both frequencies with 97.9 and 91.9 and the calls CFPS.

I'd almost forgotten I had this, but it demonstrates the dual I.D. the station had at the time.

RadioAaron · June 21, 2022 4:39 pm

paterson1 wrote:
Thanks for all of the information Glenn Warren. Just saw the comments now. However it is time for Ottawa to have their Global outlet capable of local newscasts. The new RO was 25 years ago and originally in Pembroke which is an hour and a half away from Ottawa. Years later everything was moved to Ottawa. Disagree with Aaron, they are not starting a new legacy media TV station, much of it is already there.

A huge marketing campaign is not necessary, and they have a station to promote the change. They just need to do it, words travel fast in the nation's capital. I am sure the CRTC would not have an issue of Global running local newscasts.

Regarding local advertisers. I am not talking about a local downtown shoe store with one location. Ottawa and area has many large building supply outlets, car dealerships, realtors, boat and trailer companies, local furniture outlets, city of Ottawa, dealer associations, colleges and more. All of these are prime for local advertising on a local newscast, mixed with national. Local advertisers of this size have the money, and in many cases co-op dollars available for them to use.

Global will never be a major news force nationally until they have a bigger presence in Ottawa and that includes local news in this large and rich market of over 1.4 million.

When CTV shut down A-Channel's 6p and 11p newscasts, it was a fully an Ottawa station with studios downtown, local marketing and a local sales team. If running a third local 6p and 11p newscast were a profitable venture, they would have kept them. It would have kept them in total control and prevented any chance of Global or CITY ever trying.

It wasn't, and it would certainly not be today as conventional TV revenues have declined further.

Rogers and Corus like making money. If a new local TV station in Ottawa were a profitable proposition, they'd apply to the CRTC to turn them into local stations. It's not.

paterson1 · June 21, 2022 6:53 pm

You have just highlighted a big problem with companies like Bell, Rogers, Corus. They always want a guarantee of a sure thing, or that any venture will make money right away. Sadly these companies always seem like they are defeated before they even start. Where is the risk, or understanding that yes, you will lose money initially, but the station will be successful, if you actually work at it and give it time.

Look at WWJ CBS 62 in Detroit. They haven't had any local newscasts for over ten years and are an O&O station for CBS. In fact they have tried two other times over the years for local Detroit news and failed.

But early this year CBS announced that the station is in the game of local news again. CBS 62 will have half hour daily local newscasts this year. CBS is building expanded facilities and hiring news staff. The local newscasts will begin in the fall or late summer.

CBS is well aware the station and news operation will lose money initially. Detroit has a lot of slick and highly rated local newscasts already. The FOX station in the city does over 14 hours of local news every day. CBS 62 is starting with ZERO ratings for local news. Global in Ottawa is already in a much better and stronger situation.

Corus/Global expanding what they already have in the national capital region with a couple of local daily newscasts is totally doable. What happened with CHUM/CTV/A Channel/The New RO doesn't matter. That is done and gone. The weak argument of "if it was profitable they would have done it" is sooo lame and bogus. No they wouldn't have done it, because they can't be bothered and are afraid of any risk.

Having a look the local CTV and CBC newscasts in Ottawa, there absolutely is room for a third, and Global could do very well. Their job is also to take away viewers and revenue from their competition, and not to just sit and wait til Ottawa/Gatineau is 2 or 3 million people and maybe now we could be profitable right away with a third station. It is up to them and could be done now but it requires work. Come on Global, get in the game.

Last edited by paterson1 (June 21, 2022 7:05 pm)

RadioAaron · June 21, 2022 7:06 pm

You're really underestimating the dire situation for OTA. Conventional TV in Canada hasn't made a profit it 10 years. Any manager who proposed adding a new product to that mix would be removed by the Board, ASAP. Audiences are shrinking fast - revenue faster. There isn't time to take a loss for a few years, and maybe make a profit later.

The decline in the US has been delayed by a favourable regulatory environment that guarantees transmission fees and network exclusivity.

In the next ten years, you will see a significant shut-down of Canadian broadcast TV stations.

Last edited by RadioAaron (June 21, 2022 7:07 pm)

paterson1 · June 21, 2022 7:46 pm

True the situation is somewhat different in the US with the guarantees of transmission fees and network exclusivity. But that becomes sort of moot however when Bell, Rogers, Videotron and Shaw control most of the cable here and own most of the OTA stations. Easy for them to pay another division of the company.

A mistake was made in my opinion by allowing so many owned and operated stations for CBC, CTV and Global. This cut the legs off for local news or programming, even local advertising. Everything is national with not a lot of room for local ads.

Sounds good and looks good on paper, but isn't working that well. Like local radio, television in Canada is connecting less and less with local viewers and the industry only has it's self to blame, or maybe they don't care. This is only serving themselves and not the public. But I still disagree, it does not need to be this way.

RadioAaron · June 21, 2022 8:03 pm

paterson1 wrote:
Sounds good and looks good on paper, but isn't working that well. Like local radio, television in Canada is connecting less and less with local viewers and the industry only has it's self to blame, or maybe they don't care. This is only serving themselves and not the public. But I still disagree, it does not need to be this way.

The internet has made local less relevant. Much of the ratings/revenue "local" got in the past was on account of medium exclusivity. Local came along for the ride.

If there's a future for local TV, it's in the CHCH/CHEK model where they don't spend on prime-time and then super-serve the local audience outside of those hours. Still, you're looking at maybe one station like that per market.