Canadian Broadcasters Showing No Love For HDTV

[fredr123]

From the Globe and Mail (also hit the front page on slashdot.org):

During the opening day of a two week regulatory probe into Canada's television industry, the head of the CBC said there's no business model for HDTV. Apparently, according to Robert Rabinovich, advertisers in Canada and the USA aren't willing to pay a premium to advertise on shows broadcast in HD. Rabinovich adds that broadcasting in HD costs roughly 25% more than standard definition shows and the networks have had to foot the bill themselves.

Wah wah you say? Well, this part is a bit more troubling (to me at least):


The transition to HD has been likened to the shift from black and white to colour, or the move to stereo in the 80s. Mr. Rabinovich said the networks won't see any increase in their business despite the higher cost, so the CBC is arguing the regulator should allow the conventional broadcasters to start charging cable and satellite companies to carry their signal.


The feeds from conventional broadcasters, such as CBC, CTV, Global, City TV and others, are currently provided free. Specialty cable channels such as Showcase, HGTV and TSN are allowed to collect a fee as compensation for their lower placement on the dial and, arguably, the smaller ad revenue they attract because of their channel location.


All broadcasters are pushing for these fees to be introduced, which could increase a monthly cable bill by between $3 and $7 by some industry estimates, depending on what the rate is set at.
It is likely that the regulator would require the networks to pour more funding into Canadian content and productions if it did agree to the fee.

[ericschand]

He's right in that it is like the shift from B&W to colour.
He's also correct in that there is a cost to shift to HD content (the
sets, makeup, etc approach movie quality detail, something that does not
necessarily happen in SD content), HD equipment, re-training, and so on.
He is probably right in that HD won't generate more business, when
every broadcaster has it, how would it? I don't know, but I can
acknowledge his comment(s) on it.

Where he is wrong is that cable subscribers should start paying for
his service. CBC, CTV, Global, CityTV and a few others, are mandated
to have over-the-air service. The service should also be available in
most parts of Canada. I believe you can freely re-transmit the
over-the-air signals as well, without having to pay them.

If any of those TV stations feel that they cannot provide the service,
as their CRTC agreements require them to, then move aside and let
someone else do it.

For Mr. Rabinovich specifically, if you cannot get "your" company
to do it, step down, let someone else take over.

But to sit and whine that you have to follow the industry, well,
to me that's just a disservice to us, the taxpayers paying you to
make it work, and doesn't make me confident in Mr. Rabinovich's
abilities.

ers

[Bobblehead]

I read something else this weekend that was saying if the shows you produce aren't HD you are going to have a much more difficult time selling those shows to other markets. The article stated that even though there was a definite cost to broadcasting in HD, if Canadian producers didn't start doing it they were going to lose the foreign markets for their shows.

[fredr123]

Well, reading a bit more into the letters and position papers sent in prior to the hearings, Shaw is (thankfully) opposed to a fee for carraige proposal. They think it's unfair to make consumers pay for stations on cable that would be free over the air. Nice.

CTV likes fee for carriage but seems to support any move that would increase the level of HD and digital Canadian programming available. They also want to remove restrictions on the number of minutes of commercials per hour. Boo.

[ericschand]

You may have recently read in the news that Canadian Broadcasters like CBC, CTV, Global and Chum are lobbying the CRTC to impose fee for carriage for our customers to pay for their local TV stations. This means our customers would have to pay for something that today they are receiving at no charge.


...



Customer FAQ’s

Who is the CRTC?
The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) is a government body who regulates the industry.

I don’t want this to happen. What should I do?
You can visit SHAW.CA where you can send an email to the CRTC to share your views. You can also contact your Member of Parliament to let them know your thoughts.

Why do the Broadcasters want us to pay fees now?
Some broadcasters feel that the model of funding coming from advertisements could change in the future.

[fredr123]

Bumping a really old thread (sorry).

http://www.crtc.gc.ca/archive/ENG/No.../pb2007-53.htm

The CRTC released their decision today. No fees for you! But you get an extra two minutes of commercials every hour. Oh, and you have to have all-digital OTA signals by 2011.

[ken0042]

Am I reading that right? Basically a broadcaster can now request a signal substitution even in a market where they don't provide OTA signals?

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by ken0042

Am I reading that right? Basically a broadcaster can now request a signal substitution even in a market where they don't provide OTA signals?

I think it is saying the current rules stand.

CTV asked to be able to refuse the ability of Sat providers to carry their "distant" stations unless they are able to "negotiate fair compensation".

The CRTC then explains what rights the Sat providers have (I looked up the Broadcast Distribution Regulation) and what regulations they were given (it spoke about Contour B which, if I recall, is the same as current).

Then the CRTC said that this request (by CTV) would essentially give boadcasters the right to negotiate programming rights that they don't own (programming right in another area), and the CRTC didn't want to do that.

[troutman]

I want my . . . I want my . . . HDTV

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by fredr123

Bumping a really old thread (sorry).

http://www.crtc.gc.ca/archive/ENG/No.../pb2007-53.htm

The CRTC released their decision today. No fees for you! But you get an extra two minutes of commercials every hour. Oh, and you have to have all-digital OTA signals by 2011.

Actually, you get an extra 2 minutes starting Sept '07, another minute in Sept '08, and as of Sept '09 they can give as much commercial time as they want.

I think in the US they already use more commercial time/hour, so instead of having more commercials, we'll have fewer public service announcements.

[burn_baby_burn]

The broadcasters should be allowed to us as much time on commercials as they see fit. Then we the consumer can decide if we want to watch that channel that shows 20 minutes of commercials per hour. In the end, the consumer should dictate what is broadcast and what isn't.

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by burn_baby_burn

The broadcasters should be allowed to us as much time on commercials as they see fit. Then we the consumer can decide if we want to watch that channel that shows 20 minutes of commercials per hour. In the end, the consumer should dictate what is broadcast and what isn't.

Then Sept. '09 is the date you want.

[fredr123]

Originally Posted by burn_baby_burn

The broadcasters should be allowed to us as much time on commercials as they see fit. Then we the consumer can decide if we want to watch that channel that shows 20 minutes of commercials per hour. In the end, the consumer should dictate what is broadcast and what isn't.

Sure, show as many commercials as you'd like AS LONG as you let tivo (or whatever PVR you like) skip over them. Otherwise I think you'd just drive more people to downloading shows off the interwebs.

[burn_baby_burn]

Originally Posted by fredr123

Sure, show as many commercials as you'd like AS LONG as you let tivo (or whatever PVR you like) skip over them. Otherwise I think you'd just drive more people to downloading shows off the interwebs.

And ratings would go down. Right. Then maybe the channel that has the least amount of commercials but the highest number of people watching could charge more for advertising. If you don't like it. Don't watch.

You definately notice that US stations have more time alloted for advertising. MTV seems to be pushing at least 40% commercial time.

[Vulcan]

Let me get this straight, advertisers won't pay a 25% difference for HD so they want us to subsidize the advertisers? Crazy.
This problem should disappear once most stations convert to HD and costs will be the same for everyone, but once an extra charge is levied, it'll never be taken off.
Good news that they will be changing to all digital by 2011.

[ken0042]

Originally Posted by Vulcan

Good news that they will be changing to all digital by 2011.

Keep in mind that digital does not always mean HD.

As an example- NHL Network on Shaw is digital. It is not however HD. On the other hand- all HD signals are digital.

In case that has confused more people that it helped; think of the basic logic we learned as kids:

- All chickens have feathers.
- This creature has feathers; therefore it must be a chicken.

We know that is flawed logic, because many other animals have feathers. Now substitute "HD" for "chicken."

[Vulcan]

Originally Posted by ken0042

Keep in mind that digital does not always mean HD.

As an example- NHL Network on Shaw is digital. It is not however HD. On the other hand- all HD signals are digital.

In case that has confused more people that it helped; think of the basic logic we learned as kids:

- All chickens have feathers.
- This creature has feathers; therefore it must be a chicken.

We know that is flawed logic, because many other animals have feathers. Now substitute "HD" for "chicken."

Supposedly all channels on my Bell sat are broadcast in digital but some have lousy pictures because the cameras used and the signal Bell gets is analogue. If everything is high quality digital from start to finish, the picture still should be pretty good even if not HD.

Understood, I've heard certain stations such as PBS divide their signal so that they can broadcast more than one channel during the daytime, say for kids shows as they won't notice whether it's HD or not. I think once regular OTA digital stations start, they'll use HD in primetime, just to compete.