AHN Staff
Gatineau, Quebec (AHN) - Warring Canadian television and cable TV firms were scolded Monday by Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission Chairman Konrad von Finckenstein at a public hearing. The hearing had as its agenda a proposal by Canada's large TV networks to charge cable and satellite companies for airing their programs.
Finckenstein lashed out at the two groups for refusing to negotiate, but instead try to destroy each other in advertisements portraying the other party as greedy.
In his statement, the CRTC chairman said, "This hearing is about the future - a future where the old distinctions between over-the-air and discretionary television services will be irrelevant to most Canadians. It is about ensuring that Canadians continue to receive high-quality Canadian programming regardless of where they live of how they receive their television programming. It is also about ensuring that Canadian broadcasters and distributors have the flexibility to respond to changing audience demands, revenue opportunities and new paradigm-changing technologies, while using the most effective platforms."
Finckenstein emphasized, "This hearing is not about the past. It is not about enshrining or protecting old business models. And it is not about taxing consumers."
The TV networks want to charge cable and satellite firms 50 cents monthly per subscriber for reselling their signals to consumers. But the distribution firms are against the charge and said they will pass the fees instead to consumers as TV tax.
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