The E! experiment leaves Canada today after heavy losses for Canwest. Two over-the-air stations with a long history in Victoria and Red Deer are fading to black, and three others - including a former CTV station - are switching to new ownership at fire sale prices.
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/a-week-of-reckoning-for-canadian-tv/article1269988/ Rabbit ears and TV towers in Canada, even with the dawn of HDTV, have mostly been replaced by cable and satellite. There are so many niche channels on cable and satellite for a population equivalent to California that there isn't enough ad revenue to go around. Further, cable and satellite are still able to retransmit the over-air-station stations without paying any carriage fees. You can't even find mention of DTV boxes or TV antennas in major electronic stores in Canada - if you want HDTV, you're told to pay some serious monthly fees to Bell or Rogers. When Canada completes their switch to DTV in August 2011, stations in only 29 communities (provincial capitals, larger metropolitan areas) will be forced to switch as part of their license. Small markets will lose over-the-air TV completely, as these stations will be allowed to distribute to cable and satellite without a transmitter. Ironically, the CTV network - who own a significant number of stations in smaller communities - is owned by Bell, who supply TV to a good portion of the satellite market in Canada. (This is the same Bell that is squeezing everyone with capped Internet bandwidth to stop us from downloading TV by not only Bit Torrent but also via iTunes.) --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
