Carleton U channel moving to digital only carriage, expanded distribution possible

The expansion in distribution of Crossroads as an analog channel has thrown a wrench into negotiations between Rogers Cable Inc. and Carleton University’s educational access channel. Carol Miles, director of the Educational Development Centre at Carleton University, tells Canadian Communications Reports that Rogers had begun negotiating with Carleton to move the school’s channel to digital so that it could split the analog channel into space for numerous digital channels. During previous discussions, Miles says that Rogers was dangling carrots such as carriage on all Rogers digital systems in Ontario and moving Carleton’s programming onto video-on-demand (VOD) as enticements to switch to digital carriage. But negotiations have slowed now that the CRTC is allowing Hamilton-based Crossroads Television to add transmitters in Ottawa and London. Rogers in Ottawa must now use the newly free spot for the religious channel. "Now, there is nothing in it for Rogers," Miles states. "One of our main negotiating points, something that we thought we had negotiated that they are not offering at the end of the day, is that we would be available on all of Rogers’ digital systems in Ontario," she notes. "But what we have right now is an agreement that says we are going to look at going into other Rogers markets, depending on the numbers. Just as we were in the final stages of negotiations, this Crossroads channel got licensed, which seems to have kind of broadsided everybody." Carleton’s channel will be available to digital subscribers only come May 1, 2004. The channel’s switch from its current spot on channel 65 of the dial in analog to channel 95 on Rogers’ digital service in Ottawa will also be accompanied by a channel rebranding campaign. Under an agreement currently being worked out between the university and Rogers, students will likely also see drastically reduced digital subscription rates. Miles points out that expanding the service through Ontario and even into Rogers systems in Atlantic Canada could generate additional revenue as students in other areas could sign up for the TV courses. At the moment, she estimates that about $600,000 of the Educational Development Centre’s $1.3 million budget goes toward the TV channel. "We are definitely looking at improving and upgrading some of our programming, especially if we are going to look at going into broader markets, like Toronto," she says. The upgrades could include anything from better recording equipment to interactivity to video field trips rather than just a single camera rolling in a university class. Once a deal is finalized with Rogers, Miles says Carleton also hopes to ink a similar deal with Vidéotron ltée to bring its TV courses to Quebec residents, particularly those in nearby Gatineau. A wider coverage area for the channel, even if it’s only on the digital tier, could also reduce the university’s reliance on its Tapes to You program, which involves sending tapes for the courses to students by courier outside Ottawa. Carol Ring, GM of Rogers Cable in Ottawa, says VOD remains a possibility, but doesn’t expect Carleton’s educational programming to be available before January 2005 since the new service won’t be introduced to the Ottawa market until this spring. The plan is to have the Carleton programming offered free on VOD for viewing by students at any time. Ring adds that having to carry Crossroads on the analog channel vacated by Carleton rather than splitting it into several digital channels will not endanger Rogers’ overall plans for digital expansion. "The Crossroads decision certainly limits to a small degree some digital capacity that could have been made available. But that’s not going to impact our ability to offer a full VOD service, high definition and things like that," she says. "We’re concerned that we will not have as broad a viewership (in digital as it does in analog) because we have people channel surfing and they find us and watch the channel," says Miles. "We also have logistical concerns, such as how do we identify which students are (watching the channel)? How do we identify that to Rogers and how do we get all these boxes in all these students’ homes? You know what their hope is that they are going to get in there and all these university students are going to start buying additional digital packages." She adds that Rogers has offered free digital box installation to Carleton students, and a discounted price of $5.50 a month for the rental of a digital box and access to free digital services, such as Carleton’s channel, along with the interactive program guide. For students that buy a box, the fee would be $2.95 a month to get the basic digital channels. But even these rates are being opposed by Carleton’s student body, unhappy that they are being asked to pony up more to access the educational TV access. The students’ association at the university has started a petition that calls on Rogers to offer them the digital service free. Ring says that negotiations are ongoing on the rates that will be charged, but notes that the cableco is putting up front $1.5 million to buy the digital boxes that will support the channel’s transition to digital. "I think Rogers has a history of offering discounted services to students. We do it for cable and the Internet," she says. Miles says that when Rogers tried to push Carleton’s channel to digital in 1997, it caused such an uproar that the university headed to the CRTC for an independent licence to ensure continued analog carriage. Under current conditions, the educational channel operates as special programming service under Rogers’ broadcast distribution licence and thus is at the mercy of the cableco. "When they asked us back in 1997 to move to digital, there was a big fight and that is when we started to put together our own CRTC licence application. We sort of got to the final stages and all the money had been spent and the lawyers paid, when the CRTC said…‘this is not an issue for us,’" states Miles. "The CRTC told us, ‘forget it, go work it out with Rogers, you don’t have near the viewership to get a broadcasting licence for a channel of your own.’"

Carleton U channel moving to digital only carriage, expanded distribution possible

Broadcast | January 30, 2004

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