By David Farrell
Corus announces international content deals ahead of MIPCOM
The broadcaster repots as many as a half dozen licensing deals to various international cable and television companies in front of the annual 4-day trade show in Cannes this month. The marketplace event is geared towards the television industry where attendees buy and sell new programmes and formats for international distribution. – Newswire
The case for making political parties follow the same privacy rules as corporations
Many Canadians might be surprised to learn that political parties are not subject to the same privacy rules as other organizations, such as governments and corporations, both of which must adhere to the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA).
"Corporations and government need to obtain an individual's consent before collecting or using their data, but campaigning parties are not prevented from using people's personal information, which can be collected without opt-in, to pitch their politics," said Ann Cavoukian, the former privacy commissioner of Ontario and founder of the Privacy by Design framework, which encourages organizations to create technologies that are private by default and let users opt-in to data-sharing features. – Ramona Pringle, CBC News
Indigenous journalist given short shrift at federal debate
APTN lobbied to have one indigenous journalist represented at Monday night’s televised debate. Instead, an APTN reporter was offered the chance to hold a mic at the forum. The offer was declined. – Jesse Brown, CanadaLand
Can copyright law protect indigenous culture? If not, what is the answer?
This is one of the questions that arose during the recent review of Canada’s Copyright Act by two Parliamentary Committees, the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage and the Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology (INDU Committee). Among the issues that Parliamentarians looked at was the issue of indigenous culture and its relationship to copyright law. The fundamental dichotomy between western notions of copyright and indigenous culture relates to a couple of issues; the fact that western copyright is a right asserted by individual creators (for the most part)—joint authorship and collective works are clearly an exception to this rule—and the fact that protection is limited to a set period of time, usually the life of the author plus a period extending from 50 years or more beyond the author’s demise. That may seem like a long period of time, but it is not very long when it comes to protection against misuse or misappropriation of traditional cultural artifacts and expressions. – Hugh Stephens’ Blog
Canadian TV production is making the wrong kind of shows and falling behind
Canada’s 50-year-old broadcasting and cultural policy framework is hopelessly out of date and in need of reform. The recent Emmy Awards offered clear lessons on how we can retool to properly support a Canadian content creation industry that is poised for global success.
Subscriber-supported platforms, including cable channels like HBO and “over-the-top” (OTT) streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime, soaked up most of the nominations and awards. If that wasn’t enough to convince you that OTTs are on the rise, the commercial breaks were filled with lavish ads for Disney Plus and Apple’s new streaming service. – Jill Golick, The Star
Whatever happened to Ingrid Schumacher?
For the benefit of new List Members, in 1978, Ingrid became the first female in Canadian Radio to perform as a D.J. in a Drive Time Shift in a Top 5 Market. CHUM-FM was the Station. I was the PD. But it was J. Robert Wood's Idea. Trivia? She replaced Rick Moranis. Ingrid remained with CHUM-FM for 40 years.
The last I had heard from Ingrid a son of hers was moving near Windsor, so I thought I send her an email to ask what was new. As you'll see.... quite a lot. In retirement, she is using her married name.... Ingrid Anderson.
Hi Warren: About 6 months ago, the local volunteer-run community radio station out here (Northumberland 89.7) asked me if I might like to contribute something to their airwaves. I started in June, doing a live, weekly, half-hour gardening talk show. Fun! They’re running repeats these days as I have less content just now (gardening coming to an end for the season), although I will go in for at least two more live shows this year, one on the 21st of this month … one at the end of November (Christmas tree farmer joining me for that one). I have no interest in being on commercial radio ever again, but this is a nice little something that keeps me “in the biz”, sort of … and is ultimately satisfying, which is the goal. I have also joined the Radio Broadcast Advisory Committee at Loyalist College and look forward to contributing there, and mentoring the up and comers (with Kathleen Rankine and Steve Bolton).
Aside from that, I am also still delivering Meals on Wheels weekly (just about to head out for that now) as well as driving seniors etc. to MD appointments and such. Those are through Community Care Northumberland, and again, very satisfying and a great way to connect with my community. And I am part of 2 other local groups … I Chair a not-for-profit arts board called The Mill at Piper Creek, and am part of a Santa Claus Pet Parade committee. That event taking place yearly in a village about 10 minutes north of where I am.
Busy? Yep. Happy? You bet. Country life suits. – Warren’s Network
Alex Trebek’s regret about going public about sharing his diagnosis
In early March, the 79-year-old Jeopardy! host disclosed that he had been diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer. He is currently undergoing chemotherapy.
Apple Kills off iTunes in new Mac update
Apple has officially killed off iTunes with its latest Mac software update, Catalina.
Apple’s new Music app, which gets the old iTunes icon, is now the new home for music on your Mac. That includes songs previously bought from the iTunes store or ripped from CDs, as well as Apple’s free online radio stations. It’s also the home for Apple’s $10-a-month music subscription.
With Catalina, Apple Music subscribers will no longer see the iTunes music store, unless they restore it in settings. Non-subscribers will see the store as a tab, along with plenty of ways to subscribe to Apple Music. (On iPhones, iTunes Store remains its own app for buying music and video.) – Juliette Jagger, Celebrity Access
Randy Rainbow parodies Trump’s possible impeachment
South Park offers a tongue-in-cheek apology to China
“Like the NBA, we welcome the Chinese censors into our homes and into our hearts. We too love money more than freedom and democracy. Xi doesn’t look just like Winnie the Pooh at all. Tune into our 300th episode this Wednesday at 10! Long live the Great Communist Party of China! May this autumn’s sorghum harvest be bountiful! We good now China?” – Twitter
