GATINEAU — The first day of the CRTC’s hearing on local and community television painted a picture of traditional TV in flux, as operators of conventional stations said declining ad revenue is making local TV unsustainable, while Vice Media LLC said it’s moving into traditional TV in order to capture a wider range of advertisers. Channel Zero Inc., which recently restructured operations at its Hamilton local TV station and cut local news programming from 80 hours a week to 17.5, told the CRTC Monday that the commission should rebalance funding for local TV programming,...
Channel Zero Inc. said Friday that it has restructured the news operations for CHCH-TV, the Hamilton TV station it owns, and that the company that produced news for the channel, Channel 11 L.P., has filed for bankruptcy. Channel Zero said in a press release that the changes, which include fewer hours of news programming, were made so that the over-the-air station stays in business. “Despite ongoing efforts over the past two years to make CHCH sustainable following serious cuts to local broadcasting support and declines in national advertising, Channel Zero is no longer in a position to continue subsidizing the losses stemming from the station’s local news operations," Channel Zero CEO Romen Podzyhun said in the release. An official with FleishmanHillard Inc., which is...