Videotron’s MYtv launch delayed by year

A complaint against Quebecor Inc. subsidiary Videotron Ltd.’s French-language community channel MAtv is holding up the launch of its English-language equivalent, MYtv. Peggy Tabet, Videotron’s senior director of broadcasting and regulatory affairs, said in a phone interview Monday that the launch of the channel will be delayed about a year after the initial launch date, which had been planned for this June. In Sept. 2013, Videotron applied to the CRTC for a licence to launch MYtv, a new community TV channel catering to Montreal’s English-speaking community. That October, a coalition of activists and community broadcasters, who referred to themselves as the Steering Committee for an Independent Community TV Channel for Montreal, asked the CRTC to postpone its decision to allow them to prepare their own competing application. In December, Independent Community TeleVision (ICTV) Montreal filed a complaint with the CRTC stating that Videotron’s French-language station, MAtv, was not in accordance with the CRTC’s regulations regarding community television. The group also asked for a broadcasting license. In response, the CRTC “decided to only consider the complaint by the ICTV and to consider the aforementioned Vidéotron application in conjunction with the complaint,” CRTC secretary general John Traversy wrote in a Feb. 6 letter. “Before it can consider an application for a community programming undertaking licence under the scenario contemplated by the ICTV, the Commission would first have to determine whether is operating the community channel in question in accordance with the Policy and/or the Regulations,” Traversy wrote. Tabet said Monday that the company needs to ensure it has the authorization from the CRTC to operate MYtv before it can launch. “We need to get ourselves organized to launch. By the time we get the approval and organize ourselves, it’s going to take at least a year,” she said.

Videotron’s MYtv launch delayed by year

Brief | March 31, 2014

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Videotron’s MYtv launch delayed by year

Brief | March 31, 2014

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