CTV 2 Alberta is a Canadian English language entertainment and former educational television channel in the province of Alberta . Owned by the Bell Media subsidiary of BCE Inc. , it operates as a de facto owned-and-operated station of its secondary CTV 2 television system .
100-761: Citytv Saskatchewan (formerly the Saskatchewan Communications Network , or SCN ) is a Canadian English language cable television channel in the province of Saskatchewan . Headquartered in the provincial capital of Regina , the channel is owned by the Rogers Sports & Media subsidiary of Rogers Communications and operates as a de facto owned-and-operated station of its Citytv television network . Its studios are shared with CBC 's Regina studios on 2440 Broad Street in Downtown Regina. Citytv Saskatchewan
200-693: A Crown corporation of the Government of Alberta that also operated CKUA Radio . Prior to this point, English-language educational programs aired on Radio-Canada 's television station CBXFT in Edmonton . For its first decade, Access was only available through cable, and did not broadcast over-the-air. It competed with KSPS-TV in Spokane, Washington , a member of the American Public Broadcasting Service ( PBS ) that
300-530: A change towards industrialization, and during that time both the materials and products manufactured as well as the investors and consumers were American. The Canadian dependency on American capital and markets persisted through the Great Depression and its aftermath. This situation remained during the emergence of television and affected its development in Canada. Even with the emergence of radio, Canada
400-667: A distinct popular culture. With the fear of the United States stunting the growth of Canada as well as the country becoming increasingly divided by language, the government showed huge concern with how television affected Canadians. Graham Spry, founder and spokesperson of the Canadian Radio League, stated about the radio system: "The question is the State or the United States." According to the Canadian government,
500-524: A friendly takeover bid to buy CHUM Limited. Due to CTVglobemedia's plans to keep CTV and Citytv , Rogers Communications was expected to purchase Access (along with CHUM's A-Channel stations, CKX-TV in Brandon, Canadian Learning Television and SexTV: The Channel ) as announced on April 9, 2007, pending CRTC approval (and approval of CTVglobemedia's purchase). With the CRTC electing to force CTV to sell
600-657: A halt to television experiments. Television in Canada on major networks pre-date any telecasts that originated in the country as thousands of television sets that were capable of receiving U.S.-based signals were installed in homes near the Canada–US border between 1946 and 1953. Homes in southern and southwestern Ontario and portions of British Columbia , including the Toronto, Hamilton , London , Windsor , Victoria and Vancouver areas, were able to receive television stations from Buffalo , Cleveland , Detroit or Seattle with
700-544: A large proportion of the Canadian content on most stations, with each of the commercial networks rarely having more than one or two Canadian-produced drama or comedy series on their schedules at any given time. Among the English language broadcasters, only the public CBC Television airs a schedule that consists almost entirely of Canadian-produced programming, although even it will sometimes air selected programming from Britain, Australia or PBS ( American Public Television ) in
800-482: A later revision. The government-created corporation held the responsibility of establishing a national service and to monitor the entire broadcast system. Because of Canada's large land area, it would be difficult for one corporation to control the broadcasting system throughout the country, all while establishing a network to compete in that system as well as in the American system. Before 1958, Canadian law prohibited
900-543: A majority of Canadian content, both throughout its schedule and in its primetime schedule. Industry Canada regulates the technical aspects of broadcast stations and certain aspects of other licensed undertakings. Unlike specialty services, conventional (or over-the-air ) broadcast stations are permitted to air a wide variety of news, information, entertainment, sports and other programming without any restriction as to theme or content, and none restrict themselves in that regard. Religious television stations are an exception to
1000-457: A mixture of stations, albeit one dominated by CTV. Also, it is not uncommon to find multiple affiliates of one network, and no affiliates of another network, available in the same market on basic cable , particularly in smaller markets. For instance, in Kingston, Ontario , two CBC affiliates are available, a local privately owned station and a CBC-owned station from Ottawa , while CTV Two
1100-608: A national identity. The Broadcasting Act of 1932 created a national network for each electronic medium in Canada's two official languages, French and English. When it was created, the Act referred mostly to radio broadcasting but it also included television once TV came to the country in 1952. The Act resulted in the creation of the CRBC, which would be replaced by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) in
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#17327648261981200-479: A private service. Despite receiving criticism from a number of groups, most notably from Ontario educational broadcaster TVO , the CRTC approved the request on May 15, 2017, citing the lack of intervention from the provincial government, as well as talks between the government and British Columbia's Knowledge Network to potentially launch a new publicly owned and operated educational broadcast service in Alberta. As
1300-508: A result, CTV 2 Alberta dropped all educational programming but continues to air the newsmagazine Alberta Primetime . As part of Canada's transition to digital terrestrial television , broadcast television stations in Calgary and Edmonton were required to convert to digital broadcasting or sign off completely by August 31, 2011. Prior to this deadline, Access' only over-the-air transmitters were located in Calgary and Edmonton. As Access/CTV 2
1400-621: A review by the Diefenbaker government in the late 1950s, a number of new, "second" stations were licensed in many major markets, many of which began operating before the end of 1960. CTV , the first private network, which grew out of the inevitable association of these new stations, began operating in October 1961. About the same time, CHCH-TV in Hamilton disaffiliated from the CBC and became
1500-520: A rut of American popular culture during a time when Canadian national identity was very vague. Canada was not only made up of Francophones and Anglophones, there were also immigrants from around the world, at that time mostly from Europe . That fear of American influence convinced the Canadian government that its involvement was necessary in order for Canadian broadcasting to express and encourage Canadian identity and national unity. Though French-speaking Canadians feared expansion of American influence and
1600-538: A scenario would be virtually unheard of in a major American market. Despite a general CRTC policy that limits station ownership to one station per market per language per company, several exceptions have led to twinstick operations in several markets. In some cases, this allows multiple stations to serve a small market that could otherwise support only one station. In larger markets, however, Canwest and CHUM had justified several instances of twinsticks, generally two stations based in separate but neighbouring regions. This
1700-482: A single locally owned company operated both CTV and CBC affiliates in a community, is also now rare – within English Canada, only the cities of Thunder Bay and Lloydminster still receive television service from a twinstick operation, and of those two, only Thunder Bay's Thunder Bay Television is still locally owned. In 2012, Bell Media attempted to acquire Astral Media in a takeover . This initial attempt
1800-524: A single, if influential, newspaper, The Globe and Mail . Canwest continues to pursue its strategy; in late 2005, BCE announced it would sell most of its interests in Globemedia to a consortium of investors including the Thomson family and Torstar , although it still retains a minority stake in the company. In many respects, particularly since the consolidation phase of the late 1990s and early 2000s
1900-628: A variety of languages, while Telelatino airs programming in Italian and Spanish on basic cable. Numerous third-language channels have been licensed as Category 2 services on digital cable . The Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN) airs programming targeted to the Indigenous peoples of Canada ; 28 per cent of the network's content is broadcast in aboriginal languages. The Canadian broadcasting industry, including all programming services (over-the-air or otherwise) and all distributors,
2000-406: A very large percentage of the airtime in peak viewing hours (in most areas, 7:00 to 11:00 p.m.) can be devoted to programs of foreign origin, in large part due to the significant amount of programming available from the U.S., not to mention the availability of the major U.S. broadcast networks themselves via cable or satellite, or even as terrestrial signals in border markets. A Canadian network
2100-597: Is allowed to override the cable or satellite feed of an American broadcast signal when they air the same program simultaneously, ensuring that the Canadian broadcaster, not the American broadcaster, is able to benefit from the advertising revenue associated with broadcasting to the Canadian audience. Arguably this right has led to an even greater glut of American programming on Canadian stations, including programs of little relevance to Canadian audiences, or poorly received series that may never be seen outside North America. In addition, higher rated American shows cannot be seen if
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#17327648261982200-477: Is far more popular than imports. As of 2003 the top ten shows on television in Quebec were written and created by Quebecers. The Standing Committee report found that Canadian French networks made a profit of $ 40,000 per hour of French-language drama, compared to $ 10,000 per hour of American drama. The Quebec television industry produced two and one half times more TV series per capita than American networks. While
2300-506: Is licensed by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) as an educational programming service for the province of Saskatchewan. It was formerly operated by the government of Saskatchewan as a public broadcaster . In March 2010, the government announced that it would shut down the network due to low viewership. In June 2010, the government announced that it would instead privatize and sell
2400-482: Is not available in that market. In many markets, including some major cities, there is only a handful of local stations, with other network services provided by an affiliate based hundreds of kilometres away. For instance, in Ottawa, only three English networks/systems – CBC, CTV and CTV Two – have stations based in the market; the "local" Global and Citytv stations are in fact rebroadcasters of Toronto-area stations. Such
2500-770: Is now the privately owned CTV 2 Alberta , was launched on June 30, 1973.) As a publicly owned entity, SCN received funding from the Government of Saskatchewan and from the general public in the form of donations. At the time, SCN frequently stopped between shows to ask for pledges like other public broadcasters such as PBS in the United States. Noted programming on the channel included the music performance series The Neighbors Dog . The Government of Saskatchewan (then led by Premier Brad Wall ) announced on March 24, 2010, that it would wind down SCN's operations, citing low ratings, with some operations such as distance education broadcasts to be transferred to SaskTel . The channel
2600-489: Is often aimed at a broader North American audience, although the similarities may be less pronounced in the predominantly French-language province of Quebec . The first experimental television broadcast began in 1932 in Montreal, Quebec, under the call sign of VE9EC. The broadcasts of VE9EC were broadcast in 60 to 150 lines of resolution on 41 MHz. This service closed around 1935, and the outbreak of World War II put
2700-710: Is regulated in regards to ownership and content by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), which in most cases issues licences for each such operation. The CRTC issues licences pursuant to Canadian laws and the Commission's own regulations and conditions of licence, which regulate such matters as Canadian content, domestic ownership and accessibility issues such as closed captioning . Among other regulations, all Canadian broadcasters and distributors must be at least 80% owned and controlled by Canadian citizens; also, all conventional stations, and most established specialty services, are required to air
2800-530: Is the only Citytv O&O, as well as one of only three stations affiliated with the network, to carry nightly locally produced evening newscasts). To maximize simultaneous substitution opportunities, in the Eastern and Pacific Time Zones , prime time programming airs from 8:00 to 11:00 p.m., while in the Central Time Zone it generally airs from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m., in both cases mirroring
2900-416: The Government of Saskatchewan (led at the time by Premier Grant Devine ) was granted a broadcast licence for a non-commercial educational service by the CRTC. The channel, Saskatchewan Communications Network (SCN), was launched on May 6 of that year. (Ontario's TVOntario was launched on September 27, 1970; British Columbia's Knowledge Network was launched on January 12, 1981; and Alberta's Access, which
3000-518: The Windsor region near Detroit . Television viewership outside Ontario was limited to British Columbia's Lower Mainland with access to American programming from Seattle and some sets in Montreal . Television sales were promoted not only by the arrival of CBC Television , but by revised credit practices at that time, which allowed purchases without requiring an initial cash deposit. Following
3100-732: The 10:00 p.m. hour, Atlantic and Mountain Time Zone stations will typically delay their 11:00 p.m. news programming to 12:00 a.m. and air the entire program in unison with the time zone directly west (thus, a program scheduled to air from 9:00 to 11:00 p.m. in Eastern and Pacific Time Zones is typically aired from 10:00 p.m. to 12:00 a.m. in the Atlantic and Mountain Time Zones (10:30 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. Newfoundland Time), with syndicated programming airing in
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3200-518: The 1970s and 1980s, nearly every major Canadian market saw the launch of independent third stations, most of which were either launched by or eventually acquired by Izzy Asper 's Canwest , and which served as a de facto third network although they were not yet branded or formally structured as such; these stations, by and large, were eventually unified as the Global Television Network. The 1980s and 1990s saw exponential growth in
3300-492: The 8:00 p.m. hour). CBC Television airs all programming corresponding to the local time zone, except for a 30-minute delay in the Newfoundland Time Zone. Overnight programming varies from broadcaster to broadcaster, and may consist of purchased programming or infomercials , or repeat airings of daytime programming. As of 2003 three quarters of English-Canadian television shows on prime time were from
3400-644: The CTV affiliate-owner in British Columbia to include many of the stations of Allarcom and Maclean Hunter , in order to satisfy its long-held desire to enter Alberta , but also giving it a second network. CHUM secured two regional services in Ontario before expanding to British Columbia and merging with Craig, its equivalent in the Canadian Prairies . The early 2000s, aside from the completion of
3500-624: The Canada–US border were available for several years prior, and gained a sizeable audience in cities like Toronto, within range of U.S. signals, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) was the first entity to broadcast television programming within Canada, launching in September 1952 in both Montreal and Toronto. Private CBC affiliates began operating late in 1953 to supplement the Corporation's own stations;
3600-592: The Canadian Radio-Television Commission (now the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission ). The government still referred to the Canadian broadcasting system as the "single system". Among other concerns, this implied that both private and public networks were working toward the same goals, notably the national objective of unity and Canadian content and ownership. Government intervention helped
3700-845: The Canadian broadcasting industry economically but failed to create a distinct culture that was in sharp contrast to American popular culture. However, it did allow Quebec to run its own broadcasting service and economically, it helped out the Canadian broadcasters, particularly the Canadian Association of Broadcasters (CAB). Due to their protests, Bill C-58 was passed. Among many changes, Bill C-58 removed tax deductibility benefits for Canadian Corporations advertising on American stations. The 1968 Act had also given priority carriage for Canadian broadcast services. Policies such as these produced important economic benefits for Canadian broadcasters. Economic prosperity for Canadian broadcasters took priority over Canadian identity in that prosperity
3800-707: The Canadian network overriding the signal interrupts the program for a news bulletin, unless the cable company switches the signal back to the American station's feed. Many Canadian broadcasters broadcast on a 24-hour schedule. Daily programming begins at about 6:00 a.m., usually with a local or national morning show . Daytime programming, including talk shows and soap operas , follows, although some Canadian stations may air "brokered-time" religious or charitable programming as well, which unlike traditional infomercials can count towards Canadian content requirements. Most Canadian television stations are required to carry some news programming as per their licence. As opposed to
3900-654: The Citytv stations instead, the Rogers deal was rendered void. As such, CTVglobemedia retained Access along with the A-Channel stations, CKX-TV and all of CHUM's specialty channels, and sold the Citytv stations to Rogers. The takeover transaction was finalized on June 22, 2007. The A-Channel stations were rebranded as "A" on August 11, 2008; on the same date, Access debuted a new A-styled logo and began airing programming from "A" during certain prime time hours. On June 8, 2011, it
4000-409: The Eastern and Pacific Time Zones is typically seen from 9:00 to 11:00 p.m. in the Atlantic and Mountain Time Zones (9:30 to 11:30 p.m. Newfoundland Time)), and 10:00 p.m. programming aired earlier in the evening at 8:00 p.m. (8:30 p.m. Newfoundland Time). Also, in the rare event a program scheduled to start before 10:00 p.m. in the Eastern and/or Pacific Time Zones runs into
4100-607: The Government of Alberta announced in 1993 that it would cease to directly fund Access past 1994. As a result, in 1995, Access was privatized and sold to Learning and Skills Television of Alberta Limited (LSTA), which was 60% owned by CHUM Limited . In February 2005, CHUM Limited acquired the remaining 40% interest in LSTA (and renamed it Access Media Group ), giving the company 100% of its shares, including its ownership in Access. On July 12, 2006, CTVglobemedia announced that it would make
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4200-483: The Ontario/Manitoba border have adopted this scheduling format for their local news programming. In contrast, some stations carry a locally produced morning news programs even if they do not carry evening newscasts at all (such as City's owned-and-operated stations, all of which produce a weekday morning news/talk program using the title Breakfast Television ; the television system's Toronto flagship CITY-DT
4300-415: The U.S. model, most stations, even in major markets like Toronto , carry a single newscast during the late-afternoon/early-evening period, specifically from 6:00 to 7:00 p.m. However, as in the U.S., "strip" programming fills the following hour, at least in the Eastern and Pacific time zones, and is followed by prime time programming. One or more newscasts follow, usually beginning at 11:00 p.m.;
4400-919: The U.S. networks. However, viewers in the Mountain Time Zone – i.e. Alberta – have historically received U.S. network feeds from the Pacific Time Zone, not from the Mountain Time Zone. Similarly, those in Atlantic Canada receive U.S. feeds from the Eastern Time Zone. Local stations in those regions also use 8:00 to 11:00 p.m. (8:30 to 11:30 p.m. in Newfoundland and Southeast Labrador ) as prime time, but with most programming advanced by an hour (thus programming seen from 8:00 to 10:00 p.m. in
4500-460: The United States. American television programs are much more profitable for English Canadian networks than domestic ones. A Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage report found that networks lost $ 125,000 per hour of English-language Canadian drama, but made a profit of $ 275,000 per hour of American drama. Scripted television programming in Canada tends toward the shorter runs more typical of British television rather than
4600-414: The United States. While under Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission regulations at least 60% of program has to be Canadian-produced, and 50% during prime time, English-language private broadcasters such as CTV and Global have always had difficulty airing more than a bare minimum of Canadian-produced programming in primetime; in actual practice, network and local news accounts for
4700-738: The case of the Maritimes ) through a network of rebroadcasters rather than through multiple licensed stations. Some privately owned network affiliates do still exist, although these are now relatively rare and exist only in smaller television markets. Bell Globemedia (soon after renamed CTVglobemedia and then Bell Media ) announced plans to acquire CHUM Limited, in a deal that would place Canada's four largest private English-language broadcast services under just two owners (in CTVgm's case, CTV and Citytv ). The enlarged CTVgm would also own interests in nearly 40 specialty channels and pay services. As part of
4800-486: The channel under Rogers ownership; as such, Citytv Saskatchewan is the first Citytv owned-and-operated station to carry no localized news programming (All other Citytv stations air nightly CityNews broadcasts at 6 p.m. and 11 p.m., as well as a national broadcast of Breakfast Television . Citytv stations in Toronto, Calgary, and Vancouver also air their own local versions of BT .) In addition to airing Citytv's schedule of entertainment programming, Rogers committed when
4900-481: The channel was purchased to maintaining the channel's requirement to air commercial-free educational programming from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily. Children's programming airs from 6 a.m. to 1 p.m. in a block branded as CityKids , with educational programming for adults and older youth aired from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. daily. Television in Canada Television in Canada officially began with the sign-on of
5000-427: The channel's licence as an educational station). The post-3 p.m. programming, branded as "Citytv on SCN", consisted of entertainment programming sourced from Rogers' Citytv stations, including the network's prime time lineup. With the Citytv affiliation, SCN became the second Canadian educational television service to carry entertainment programming from one of the major commercial networks or television systems. The other
5100-826: The channel, in a hybrid format similar to Alberta's Access . When Bluepoint took over control of the station, few changes were made to SCN's programming, other than introducing films seven nights a week starting at 9 p.m. during the summer of 2011. The first major changes to the channel occurred on September 12, 2011, premiering a new prime time lineup of current American network series such as Supernatural and The Insider , and classic series such as Danger Bay , Family Ties , and Frasier . On December 20, 2011, SCN announced that it had entered into an affiliation agreement with Rogers Communications to air Citytv programs from 3 p.m. to 6 a.m. starting on January 2, 2012, with educational, children's and locally produced programming continuing to air on SCN outside those hours (to fulfill
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#17327648261985200-616: The colloquial sense, below, although in the regulatory sense they may or may not be licensed networks. However, they are often treated very differently from U.S. networks. For instance, most networks provide a full slate of programming, often, but not always, buying the national rights to "syndicated" programs that air across affiliates of multiple American networks. In Canada, hence Dr. Phil and The Ellen DeGeneres Show only air on CTV stations, and Entertainment Tonight only on Global stations. However, for historical reasons, The Oprah Winfrey Show (until it ended its run in 2011) aired on
5300-508: The consolidation described above, brought an apparent convergence craze among the major media conglomerates. CanWest bought the Southam newspaper chain, including the leading broadsheet papers in several major cities, raising new concerns on media concentration . Telecom giant BCE , believing it needed control over content to fuel its new media strategy, formed Bell Globemedia , essentially CTV and its specialty services put together with
5400-565: The creation of private television networks. Private stations did emerge but could not exist independently, and were obliged to become affiliated with the French national network or the English national network. The Act of 1958 as well as its revised version in 1968 allowed for the existence of privatized networks. The private stations were then recognized as direct competitors to the CBC, which maintained its role as national broadcaster but lost its regulatory power. The 1968 Broadcasting Act created
5500-450: The development of the respective E! and A (now CTV Two) systems. Nonetheless, the local news coverage these stations provide do not prevent them from airing programs with mass appeal during the rest of their schedules, frequently promoted on their sister stations. CTV Two Alberta The channel was licensed by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) as an educational programming service for Alberta, and
5600-454: The difficulties that might arise in protecting the French language , inexpensive imported U.S. programs, which filled the schedules of many English language Canadian TV channels, were not attractive to French-speaking audiences. In this situation, society affected the division in the Canadian broadcasting industry as much as the division affected society. The intensity of fears of "continentalism"
5700-521: The first private CBC affiliate in Canada was CKSO-TV in Sudbury , Ontario in October of that year, with CFPL-TV in London , Ontario following a few weeks later. All television stations that signed on in Canada were required to be CBC affiliates, as the CBC was the only television network operating in Canada at the time. In 1948, there were 325 television sets in Canada, but thousands more were sold in
5800-592: The first station not affiliated with either network, not counting the initial launch period of most of the soon-to-be CTV stations. Over the next 25 years or so, many more new stations were launched, primarily CBC stations in major markets replacing private affiliates (which subsequently joined with CTV or became independent) and new independent stations in the largest centres, such as CITY-TV in Toronto, CITV-TV in Edmonton , and CKND-TV in Winnipeg . During this time cable television also began to take hold, securing
5900-531: The fortunes of individuals such as Ted Rogers , who secured the licences for much of Toronto. In 1966, CHCH in Hamilton formed the nucleus of the first serious attempt to form Canada's third terrestrial television network. The original plan was withdrawn for regulatory and financial reasons by 1969, but a scaled-down version resulted in the 1974 launch of CKGN-TV in Toronto, whose branding as Global Television Network would eventually extend nationwide. Through
6000-426: The help of elevated outdoor antennas and amplifiers. U.S. television programs and the networks that originated them thus became popular in those Canadian cities within range of their signals, and those cities represented a sizeable proportion of the total Canadian population. This helped spur development of a specifically Canadian television programming and transmission system during the late 1940s and early 1950s, but at
6100-416: The historic development of mass communication and television in the country. Three factors have made the historical development of television in Canada a unique one: The threat of American influence, the language divide, and the government's response to both of these. American influence and the fear of that influence greatly affected television's development in Canada. The first decades of the 20th century saw
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#17327648261986200-407: The longer seasons that predominate in the United States. A typical Canadian drama or comedy series will produce between six and thirteen episodes in its first season, although an exceptionally popular series such as Corner Gas may produce up to 20 episodes in later seasons. A slight deviation from this model is with the long-running teen drama Degrassi: The Next Generation (the fourth iteration of
6300-550: The main exception is The National , which airs at 10:00 p.m. on CBC. However, there is a growing trend of some television stations adopting a newscast schedule similar to the American television model, with locally produced newscasts in the mornings (usually lasting about 3 to 3½ hours and airing only on weekdays, though a few stations do carry weekend morning newscasts) and during the lunch hour, in addition to early and late-evening newscasts; most owned-and-operated stations of Global nationwide and most CTV O&Os located west of
6400-693: The majority of services operate in English, there are a growing number of similar services in the French language, serving primarily Quebec . Ici Radio-Canada Télé , the French-language equivalent of CBC Television, broadcasts terrestrially across Canada, while TVA , one of Quebec's two commercial French-language networks, is available across Canada on satellite and cable. RDI , the French equivalent of CBC News Network , also has cross-Canada cable carriage rights, as does TV5 Québec Canada . Most other French-language networks are available only in Quebec, although some have optional cable carriage status in
6500-464: The merger (most of the properties were sold to Corus Entertainment – which already owned Teletoon and its related children's specialty channels – although Remstar acquired MusiMax and MusiquePlus and DHX Media acquired Family Channel and its sister channels ). As outlined below, Canadian regulations ensure that the majority of programming aired by Canadian stations are of domestic origin. However, thanks to domestic newscasts and daytime programming,
6600-477: The money – the poorer the country, the more American productions." English Canadian broadcasting illustrated how this was problematic for some Anglophone Canadians as well as the Canadian government . A major question was how any sense of "Canadianism" could come out of such an attractive (and rich) American world. There was a fear of communicating ideas and opinions that were not Canadian, to Canadians - especially
6700-457: The multichannel universe, beginning with pay television services and later continuing with various waves of specialty services, usually launched in one fell swoop. The launch of direct-to-home satellite television services in the mid-1990s accelerated this growth. The early- to mid-1990s in particular also saw further growth and consolidation of broadcast television. Baton Broadcasting , owner of Toronto CTV affiliate CFTO-TV and already seen as
6800-478: The nation's first television stations in Montreal and Toronto in 1952. As with most media in Canada , the television industry, and the television programming available in that country, are strongly influenced by media in the United States , perhaps to an extent not seen in any other major industrialized nation. As a result, the government institutes quotas for " Canadian content ". Nonetheless, new content
6900-661: The near future. Other major specialty operators include Corus Entertainment (owned by the Shaw family) and Channel Zero . Consolidation has also continued between cable companies, and between specialty channel operators. There are now few of the small family-owned television groups that dominated the formative era of Canadian television, the most notable perhaps being the Stirling family, which owns NTV in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador . The twinstick model of broadcasting, in which
7000-630: The network carried a variety of educational and informative programs along with entertainment programs all of which include children's programs, documentaries, feature films, talk shows, dramas, comedies and other programs. Starting March 9, 2009, Access began cabling a province-wide news and current affairs magazine program called Alberta Primetime , from the CTV/Access studios in Edmonton. Resources from CTV's owned-and-operated stations in Edmonton ( CFRN-DT ) and Calgary ( CFCN-DT ) are used to produce
7100-530: The network to Bluestone Investment Group. Under Bluestone, SCN was converted to a format similar to Alberta's Access network , airing commercial-supported entertainment programming during the late-afternoon and prime time hours, and commercial-free educational and cultural programming from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily. In late-December 2011, SCN announced that it would affiliate with Rogers' Citytv network for its entertainment programming beginning on January 2, 2012. In June 2012, Rogers would acquire SCN entirely, maintaining
7200-451: The network's dominant player, bought or replaced most of the network's other affiliates and ultimately acquired the network itself. In 1997, Asper's regional networks became united under the Global Television Network brand previously used only by his Ontario station. Additional groups also sprouted up in the form of Western International Communications , CHUM Limited and Craig Media . In 2000, CanWest bought WIC, which had itself grown from
7300-558: The newsmagazine Alberta Primetime . CTV 2 Alberta is also designated as a "satellite-to-cable undertaking" serving the entirety of Alberta, and is therefore carried throughout the province on cable and licensed IPTV services on each service's basic tier. It is also available on both national satellite services. The channel was launched on June 30, 1973 as Access . It was owned by the Alberta Educational Communications Corporation (AECC),
7400-419: The novelty. Television performer and producer Lorne Michaels said, about the advent of television, "it was all we talked about at school. We literally raced home to watch TV". It became important to Canada that Canadian values would be projected onto this large audience and then onto the entire nation. Although many watched the available American television programs, some feared that Canada would end up stuck in
7500-449: The popular Degrassi franchise), which due to a switch to a more serialized format in 2011, began producing up to 40 episodes per season. Less expensive forms of programming, such as news and sketch comedy programs, will usually produce many more episodes each year, coming closer to the American model. The French-language commercial networks air significantly more Canadian content than their English counterparts, and domestic programming
7600-545: The previous statement but must provide a variety of programs reflecting different points of view. CRTC regulations have so far prevented a large number of the infomercial - or religious-based stations now frequently found in major centres in the U.S. from operating in Canada; infomercials, even those made in Canada, are not considered Canadian content. Nearly all broadcast stations have now been aligned, in one form or another, into national groups based on ownership and/or content. Many of these groups are designated as "networks", in
7700-643: The proposal, CTVgm would sell several of CHUM's less valuable properties, such as the smaller A-Channel system, to Rogers Communications , Canada's largest cable provider and already a major media company in its own right. On June 8, 2007, however, the CRTC approved the CHUM merger, conditional on CTV divesting itself of Citytv rather than A-Channel. This sparked another round of media consolidation. In early 2007, Canwest, in partnership with Goldman Sachs , announced an agreement to buy Alliance Atlantis , another major specialty channel operator, and more deals are expected in
7800-824: The rest of Canada. V , for instance, is carried on cable in New Brunswick and parts of Ontario and is available nationally by satellite. The Ontario government's French public television network TFO is the only French-language broadcaster in Canada whose operations are located entirely outside of Quebec. Other ethnic and multicultural services, serving one or more cultural groups outside of these two official languages, are also growing in strength. Six terrestrial TV stations, CFMT and CJMT in Toronto, CFHG in Montreal , CJEO in Edmonton , CJCO in Calgary and CHNM in Vancouver , air multicultural programming in
7900-614: The sale of SCN to Bluepoint and the licence amendments on December 23, 2010. The transaction was completed shortly thereafter, and at that point, SCN lost its original revenue streams of government funding and viewer donations. Under Bluepoint's approved amendments to its licence, SCN was still required to air commercial-free educational programming from 6 a.m. to 3 p.m.; after 3 p.m., the channel would be allowed to air entertainment-based programming with up to 14 minutes of advertising per hour – Bluepoint planned to use this new ability to air programming that could attract new advertising revenue to
8000-587: The same programming model implemented by Bluepoint. Because it is licensed as an educational broadcaster, Citytv Saskatchewan is required to be distributed as part of the basic cable service in Saskatchewan, and is also available on Bell Satellite TV and Shaw Direct . The channel is defined as a satellite-to-cable television programming undertaking, meaning that it has full simultaneous substitution rights for its programming in Saskatchewan, but does not operate any over-the-air transmitters. In February 1991,
8100-626: The same time caused it to develop within American technical standards that had been previously mandated by the Federal Communications Commission between 1941 and 1946. Since the first Canadian stations ( CBFT in Montreal and CBLT in Toronto) signed on in September 1952, television developed differently in Canada than in the United States because it was introduced and developed in a different context. The distinct social, political, and economic situation of Canada shaped
8200-460: The survival of Canadian television depended on public funding for Canadian programs, which would be produced, broadcast and controlled by a public corporation. The Broadcasting Act of 1932 began of government involvement. Its main aim was the "Canadianization of mass media". In other words, it wanted to create a Canadian broadcasting system to replace the American system that had infiltrated itself into Canada, as well as to unite Canadians in creating
8300-494: The television industry in Canada now more closely resembles the British or Australian models, in which the vast majority of stations are directly owned by their networks and offer only slight variance in local scheduling apart from local or regional newscasts, rather than the American network affiliate model that formerly predominated. In some cases, in fact, a single station serves an entire province (or even multiple provinces, in
8400-463: The ten most popular programs on French-language television were made in Quebec, including La Famille Plouffe . Gradually, French Canadians showed a strong preference for Quebec-produced television programs, which was significant considering the fierce American competition that English Canada dealt with (and still deals with to this day). French-language television was distinct from English-language television in that "one of its most distinctive aspects
8500-498: The two countries being tied very closely on an economic standpoint, almost anything produced in the U.S. could be considered to be of general interest to Canadians. Changes to this were attempted in the late 1980s. Government intervention throughout the development of television in Canada affected the way it was developed domestically as it developed through laws and policies rather than a free market. While American television stations, including affiliates of ABC , NBC and CBS , near
8600-737: The years from 1948 to 1952, most of them tuned to stations from either the Buffalo, Seattle, Cleveland or Detroit television markets . When Canadian television began, the Radio-Television Manufacturers Association of Canada estimated that 85,000 sets were expected to be sold in 1952. 95% of these were concentrated in Ontario, with 57.4% in the Golden Horseshoe region (40.2% in Toronto and Hamilton, 17.2% in Niagara Peninsula ) and 34.6% in
8700-406: The youth. With the exception of radio, television presented an opportunity, for the first time, to reach a very wide audience at the same time. By 1954, a million television sets had been sold in Canada. Even though those sets were very expensive at the time, the large majority (9 of 10) of Canadian households owned a television set by the end of the 1950s. People became excited and obsessed with
8800-641: Was Alberta's Access, which adopted the CTV Two name and lineup upon its relaunch in August 2011. It also gave the Citytv system affiliations in all provinces west of Quebec and south of the federal territories of Northern Canada . (Rogers later expanded Citytv into Quebec when it affiliated with CJNT Montreal in June 2012, which the company also purchased.) The next year, Rogers Media announced its intent to acquire SCN from Bluepoint Investment Corporation. The sale
8900-500: Was allowed on the basis that, in another owner's hands, stations like CHCH in Hamilton, Ontario and CHEK in Victoria, British Columbia (both Canwest stations that were sold off in 2009, CHCH to Channel Zero and CHEK to a consortium of the station's employees) would inevitably turn their focus to the larger Toronto and Vancouver markets respectively, leaving their cities of licence with little or no local news coverage. This led to
9000-479: Was already trying to keep foreign ownership and programming at a minimum to avoid the American imperialism that would be caused by such dependency on the United States, which in fact was already incipient. The issue of economy of scale played a large role. "Americans [were] pushing smaller cultural communication aside with their dominating programming, not because they [were] based on a policy but because they ha[d]
9100-399: Was approved by the CRTC on June 21, 2012, and closed later that month, making the channel an owned-and-operated station of the Citytv system. Rogers relaunched the channel as Citytv Saskatchewan on July 1. Rogers planned to invest into improving the channel's infrastructure, and to launch a high definition feed for the channel in the coming year. No regional news programming is planned for
9200-408: Was as strong as its opposing force of attractiveness of American television programs to Canadian viewers. Most Anglophone viewers could relate easily to the American programs as much as they did to their Canadian programs, since people spoke the same language as they did. For example, in 1957, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation presented American programs such as The Ed Sullivan Show . However,
9300-403: Was available on cable in most of the province. On January 9, 1984, AECC was granted a licence from the CRTC for a terrestrial television station in Calgary , CIAN-TV , to rebroadcast the Access cable feed. on December 1, 1986, AECC was granted another licence for a television station in Edmonton, CJAL-TV , to serve as a satellite of CIAN. After re-evaluating all provincial funding recipients,
9400-449: Was formerly a public broadcaster owned by the Alberta provincial government. Following its privatization in 1995, its licence continued to require at least 60 hours of non-commercial educational programming per week along with entertainment programming more favourable to advertisers and adult viewers. In 2017, the channel officially relinquished its status as an educational broadcaster and dropped all its previous educational programming except
9500-439: Was licensed as a satellite-to-cable undertaking, it was not required to offer over-the-air transmitters. Due to this, the costs of converting the two Access transmitters in Calgary and Edmonton to digital, and because the network already must be carried by cable and IPTV providers in the area as the province's designated educational broadcaster, CTV 2 shut down its over-the-air television transmitters on August 31, 2011. As Access,
9600-418: Was not compromised for identity. This can be inferred through the vagueness and ineffective policies passed in the aim of protecting Canadian culture. For example, Canadian content regulations were introduced in 1959 and revised again in 1978. "Canadian content" is broadly defined as programs of "general interest to Canadians". Since Canadians easily identify with Americans and their popular culture as well as
9700-879: Was rejected by the CRTC as this would have resulted in Bell increasing its share of the Canadian broadcasting market to 42%. Bell filed a new application for the proposed takeover with the CRTC on March 6, 2013, two days after the Competition Bureau approved the acquisition; the Commission approved the merger on June 27, 2013, with Bell volunteering to sell certain cable television properties including Family Channel , Disney XD , MusiMax , MusiquePlus and Historia as well as Astral's interest in Teletoon , in an attempt to relieve concerns surrounding Bell's total market share in English-language television following
9800-433: Was revealed that Access would be relaunched as CTV Two Alberta on August 29, 2011, as part of a rebranding of the "A" system. On January 11, 2016, during CTV 2 Alberta's licence renewal, Bell Media (a successor to CTVglobemedia) requested that the channel no longer be classified as an educational broadcaster. The company stated that the province would be better served with both a dedicated educational broadcaster alongside
9900-497: Was the bringing together of international and local influences, American and European television styles and programming ideas and merging them with the cultural idioms of rapidly modernizing and assertive Quebec." The merging of local and foreign ideas and techniques was a novelty in North American television. Since English and French language television in Canada had developed separately, French-language broadcasting developed
10000-473: Was to have shut down at the end of April, but it was later decided to keep the channel in operation while offers to buy SCN were evaluated. On June 21, 2010, the Government of Saskatchewan announced the channel would be sold to Bluepoint Investment Corporation. During the CRTC approval process, Bluepoint requested several amendments to SCN's licence, which would allow the channel to air limited amounts of non-educational programming with commercials. The CRTC approved
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