CACTUS Presentation
to the CRTC on April 26, 2010.
To view CACTUS's presentation, move the slider to 1/8 of the way, as shown below,
where Catherine Edwards will begin speaking.
Cable companies collect $130 million of public money
designated for community channels and use it for other
purposes.
Catherine Edwards says that previous CRTC commissions ruled
that community TV should be treated like community radio,
run by the communities.
CACTUS proposes that money collected by cable companies
should go to a Community Access Media Fund
which would fund 250 media centres which would create
community-owned multi-media access channels.
|
The number of distinct community channels has declined from
294 in 1982 to only 20 in English-speaking Canada.
Much of the decline is the result of amalgamation of small
stations by cable companies.
Less than one-third of programming on the remaining channels
is made by the community.
While only 10 per cent of Canadians watch TV over the air,
that figure is misleading in terms of local TV production.
Satellite TV doesn't produce and community TV. Therefore it
can't be included -- only cable and over-the-air stations
produce local TV.
So, if you remove the 30 per cent who watch satellite TV,
that leaves 70 per cent of the TV suppliers to produce local
TV(60 per cent cable and 10 per cent over-the-air). Since
cable is providing more regional TV than local, over-the-air
broadcasters become more significant.
Community TV has been criticized for having low viewership
numbers but If you consider the size of the target audience.
Viewership may be less than one per cent in cities but in
small centres the percentage is higher because TV is a one
of a few windows on the community.
Programs need to be assessed on whether they are reaching
the niche target audience. If 10 per cent of gays and
lesbians watch programs produced and directed for them, the
absolute numbers are small but the impact on that small
group is large.
 back |
