CNM Short Takes

Alliance Atlantis chops 35 full-time broadcast positionsAlliance Atlantis Communications Inc. announced April 24 that it was eliminating 35 full-time, permanent positions from its broadcast group. The move is expected to save the company $1 million on a one-time basis and result in annual operating cost savings of $3 million. Garth Turner production enlists iLoveTV interactive helpGarth Turner’s BangTV has struck an accord with Toronto’s iLoveTV Entertainment Inc. to build a web site for the show with future use of the iLoveTV technology in mind (CNM, April 19/02). The system, which inserts markers into broadcast television to automatically update web content, will be used as an interactive technology and ecom tool. The two companies say they will share new revenues from the technology equally. BangTV is a production of Turner’s Millennium Media Television. Turner tells CNM the company is "absolutely 100% committed" to the iLoveTV system, and it’s likely the technology will be employed across several other of Millennium’s productions in the near future. One likely candidate will be the producer’s next venture, a show called GirlzTV slated to launch this fall. Millennium produces 250-300 half hour episodes of different television shows per year. CANARIE e-learning program launches third competitionThe 2002 competition for the CANARIE Inc. E-learning Program launched on April 22 with $7 million in the kitty. The program seeks to enable innovative partnership projects to effectively use advanced networks for education and training. Full details are available from the CANARIE site at www.canarie.ca. Heritage offers free spot in virtual Asia trade showThe Department of Canadian Heritage is offering a spot to Canadian companies that wish to profile their operations to South Asia interests via the Virtual Trade Show. There is no cost for the virtual presence. More information is available at http://vts.ic.gc.ca. Heritage officials are touting the opportunity as an alternative to physical presence at the BroadcastAsia 2002 show. C-48 legislation to be sent to Justice this week?Several CNM sources indicate that a new draft of regulations to define Bill C-48 could be finalized and sent to the Department of Justice for tweaking as early as late this week or next. There is no word on whether the revised draft will be significantly different from that circulated to stakeholders in March (CNM, Mar. 27/02). Massive changes would likely be necessary to garner the support of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters (CAB), which continues to hold out on the issue of Internet retransmission. As late as last week, CAB head Glenn O’Farrell told CNM affiliate Canadian Communications Reports that, "C-48 is a critical issue for us, one we’re acting very, very diligently. We are acting with the government to find the right wording and regulation to ensure that the hole is filled and that we do not see compulsory licensing for Internet re-broadcasting of programmers’ signals." Once Justice lawyers have dotted the "i"s and crossed the "t"s on the document, it will be sent to the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage for debate and amendments before passing to third reading. Cold North digitizes King diariesThe diaries of William Lyon Mackenzie King, which date from 1893-1950, have been digitized and will be posted by the National Archives of Canada. The documents were prepared by Ottawa’s Cold North Wind Inc. and represent a departure from the company’s core business of selling its services to newspapers both current and historical. Cold North president/CEO Bob Huggins had told CNM in 2001 that the company wasn’t pursuing federal contracts since it had failed to generate interest in its services at Canadian Heritage (CNM, Mar. 8/01). Huggins says the King contract was the result of the Archives approaching the company, not of "knocking on the doors of Heritage." In fact, he says, one of the company’s prior pitches to the department, a comprehensive database of newspapers available to students and built in partnership with the Canadian Library Association, was refused. Though money is now flowing through the Canadian Culture Online Program, he says the small company doesn’t have the time to "run down every government program," but doesn’t rule out the possibility of further digitization of culturally significant Canadian documents in future. CNMA finalists announcedCollideascope Digital Productions, Critical Mass, Devlin Applied Design, Radical Entertainment and Snap Media have each been named as finalists to receive the Canadian New Media Awards (CNMA) company of the year prize. The April 29 announcement rounds out a full slate of 60 finalists across the various categories for the CNMAs, available at http://www.cnma.ca/finalists.html.Mainframe works with "Angela" creator on new seriesVancouver’s Mainframe Entertainment Inc., a CGI house, will launch a new computer animated series with Honest Entertainment titled Family Values. Honest Entertainment is the creator of Angela Anaconda and Fido Dido, and the new series was created and written by Tom Brady (The Simpsons, The Critic). Jeff Goldstein (Dilbert, NewsRadio, The Simpsons) will serve as executive producer. No sale for the show has yet been announced. CA*net 4 details unveiledThe highly-awaited CA*net 4 national fibre backbone to be built under the leadership of CANARIE Inc. was announced April 29. The network will be a partnership project of GT Group Telecom, Shaw Communications Inc.’s Big Pipe subsidiary, and CANARIE. The network is slated to cost $25 million over five years, at a minimum, and is expected to be fully operational by July 2002. 120Seconds gets Webby nodCBC Radio 3’s award-winning site 120seconds.com is poised to potentially win yet more hardware after receiving a nomination in the broadband category of the 2002 Webby Awards. Producer Robert Ouimet is thrilled, he tells CNM, to be in the good company of sites such as that for New York City’s Guggenheim Museum, and peer-to-peer phenomena KaZaA.com. Only one other Canadian site was nominated, Pinholespy.com (Mod7 Productions, Vancouver). Interestingly, one of Pinholespy’s principals is a contributor to 120seconds. Each of the Webby awards has two components, a juried prize and people’s choice award. Voting for the latter is on now and continues until June 17 at http://www.webbyawards.com. Awards will be announced June 18 in San Francisco.

CNM Short Takes

News | 05/01/2002 4:00 am EDT

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