The Tea Makers

Next Sensation: Jailhouse Rock

2009-07-08T16:27:00.002-05:00

July 7, 2009, Courtroom 4 - 9, Toronto

Only ten minutes into the second day of sentencing hearings for Garth Drabinsky and his partner Myron Gottleib on their convictions for
1 - fraud over $1000
2 - fraud over $1000
3 - utter forged document
and we hear that Mr. Drabinsky appears on a CBC television show.

Eddie Greenspan may well be the best lawyer in the history of our country.
Everyone is in awe of him. Karlhienz Schrieber loves him.
He seems the most grounded person in the room, regardless of his ample girth.
He's wearing sandals in court today. The epitome of calm. (and as we already know, that's not good television.)
He's very smart and very thoughtful. (which does however make for good radio.)
At the moment, Eddie is explaining to an Ontario Court judge that in the course of production for a show called Triple Sensation (which comes off like a very trivial pursuit indeed in these circumstances), Mr. Drabinsky became aware that there were at least 34 schools for artistic talent that might benefit from a tour by him, lecturing and inspiring and telling the students "what happened to him".
It would be one way of compensating for the harm he has done, instead of sending him to prison.
You've got to love Eddie, and his careful choice of words.
Seven years after he was busted, and now conclusively convicted, Garth has yet to admit to his crimes.
At trial, the defense suggested that the books had been cooked entirely by the head accountant, a man with very little to gain from all that effort of false record keeping and money transfers that kept the lie going for a significant number of years.

Greenspan is one smooth ...
He has the Crown agreeing that the crimes were not motivated by greed, but rather with a view to keeping the company going.
Why, Your Honour, he was practically doing a public service.

It's several more minutes before Eddie clarifies that indeed when Garth tells the students what happened to him, he'll be sure (here it comes) to tell it "straight".
It's a subtle message to the judge, while Garth sits expressionless, refusing still to admit that he lied.
The defense has already thrown in Drabinsky's polio, (his extremely crippled walk which the judge probably never gets to see), as a reason not to sentence him to a chain gang.
Instead, consider letting him tour the country at his own expense.
The idea is so silly that even Eddie distances himself from it by saying it is not a "suggestion" coming from the defense, just one alternative.
They produced laudatory letters from dotty Martha Henry ("He's the real American hero: larger than life"), amply rewarded with royalties E.L. Doctorow ("I came to admire the man for his inexhaustible energy"), and that handsome fop Christopher Plummer ("I have known him to be steadfastly loyal and exceptionally generous"), each an eloquent and understated way of saying "the cheque cleared".

But the judge here is smart and alert.
She acknowledges and responds to everything in a clear and confident voice.
The question before her is simple, is it ok to lie, to falsify documents and cheat people out of hundreds of millions of dollars?

What do you think?

An entirely rhetorical question, like one you might hear in a play.
Still, Myron and Garth won't get the unavoidable answer until August 5th.

Tonight we welcome a new judge to our panel ...

The Tea Makers has moved

2009-07-07T20:24:00.000-05:00

To http://www.theteamakers.com/.

MAX(imum) HEAD ROOM

2009-07-02T19:02:00.002-05:00

He's funny, cheerful, confident.
He can read a teleprompter better than the average bear.

And it takes only four people to write every word that comes out of his mouth.

war is a force that gives The Current meaning

2009-06-30T17:05:00.001-05:00

It's 8:30 AM.
Time to get depressed.

After a pleasant local morning show that makes my immediate environment seem vibrant, creative and manageable, makes me feel like I'm a citizen and a participant in the affairs and running of my own community, it's time for ... WORLD AFFAIRS.
Gee, thanks CBC Radio One.
North Korea wants to blow me to smithereens and the "i" in CSIS stands for idiots.
Why was I even born?

And how many more minutes until Regis and Kelly?

Qmeshi

2009-06-30T11:32:00.003-05:00

Yes, it pains to admit it, but "Q" is ... yes, you want to grimace, you feel like you've lost a bet, you absolutely do not want to encourage them, but ... "Q" is, apart from the "classics" like Happens and Ideas and Enright and Ms. Rogers ... you pull your finger out of your throat and find you didn't actually throw up ... "Q" is the best show on radio or TV that the CBC is currently producing.
It's actually interesting. And topical.

And yes, it's not perfect.
The flaw is of course the host.
He's not a fake like Strombo, and he's not really a bad person.
But he is someone who likes to say his own name several times each program.
Several times too many. And it's indicative of the most annoying aspect of an otherwise very good radio show.
The host's questions seem longer than the answers. There's just too much of him.
Which is especially irritating because, as a culture celebrity he is so insignificant. (again, unlike Strombo)
He hints at being a complex and deeply insecure individual, traits that would otherwise catapult many other "artists" to stardom. But we sense he is hiding this real person under a giant mask of verbal dexterity. He wants desperately to impress us with his mind, as if being the de facto host of a national radio show (!) with the most fascinating guests and topics, is somehow ... just ... not ... good ... enough.
It's like he turned up for work as a hotel concierge dressed like a Musketeer.

Relax, man, you already have the job.
And it happens to be hosting the best show produced by the CBC today.

Evan Solomon Forever?

2009-06-28T18:53:00.007-05:00

Only in Canada, it seems, does a fundamental principle of broadcasting not apply.
Only in this country of a largely unmotivated population could a broadcaster get away with continually putting someone on the air that does not attract an audience. In fact, someone who actually repels an audience.

No show has ever succeeded with Evan Solomon on it.
But the CBC will not let go of him.
And Evan appears to think himself entitled to on-going employment, as if he had signed a lifetime contract.
Even a meaningless filler of a show on a Sunday TV time slot that has virtually no audience will still fail with Evan as the host.
And in another example of skewed judgement, the same broadcaster that will hold auditions and choose Barbara Budd to voice the great As It Happens, will take a guy who always sounds like his collar is too tight and so can barely get out a sentence, and deem him acceptable as the sole announcer/interviewer for the national radio show The Current.
And, come fall, this person will suddenly transform into a charming, genial game show host.
The next Fred Davis.
Someone, apparently, no, obviously, thinks that there's such a thing as finding the right show for Evan. That he's indispensable. That he will one day, as if by magic, suddenly attract an audience. That there is no one else in a country of 40 million people who is better suited to the task of being a presenter for a national broadcaster. Not at McGill, U of T, SFU, UBC or Carleton. Not anywhere.
But then someone also thinks that if the National Post just keeps doing what it does day after day that one year it will suddenly begin to make a profit.

The same magical thinking that has the CBC believing that anyone wants any more of Evan Solomon.
Ever again.

Can you sink the honour of the CBC any lower, Mr. Stursberg?

2009-06-22T18:54:00.002-05:00

Drabinsky's "success" was complete and utter fakery, yet the the print scribes won't denounce him. They easily forgive his swindling, of pocketbooks and minds, and call him talented. He even writes a book about himself, which despite his lame attempt at humility nevertheless reveals that anything he did that was worthwhile (rarely) was quite simply, a fluke. He just wanted to grow up and become important in some way, and the glamour and excitement of show business is a very good cover for ineptitude and a weak mind (Kiefer Sutherland, e.g.).
He had nothing to offer but bluff, yet over the course of the years that he was pretending to know what he was doing he gave out enough "favours" to the media leeches that they still feel beholding to this charlatan.
He's a convicted criminal, but the management of the CBC has no qualms about giving him a platform of legitimacy and respectability.
As if it were still yet to be conclusively proven that he is a bald-faced liar and a crook.

‘Variety Lives on CBC Radio’

2009-06-18T14:50:00.001-05:00

Another gem from the Canadian Design Resource.

(Typeface, incidentally, is Dynamo.)

KanKonKwiz™

2009-06-15T08:23:00.008-05:00

NOW WITH SOLUTION

For a fun diversion as we head into a long, hot summer of pogey, “blockbuster” Hollywood movies, and high-UV-index Saturdays pretending to give a shit about Toronto FC, take the Tea Makers’ fun new KanKonKwiz™!
(First in a series!)

Can you spot the distinctive, legal-mandate-conformant CBC Television series hidden in plain sight in this omnibus list of brand-new “Canadian” programming, compiled from press releases from CBC and Canada’s valued private broadcasters?

Ford Models Supermodel of the World Canada
Great Canadian Bio-Series
Ice Pilots NWT
Canada’s Super Speller
Pow-wow’s Playhouse
Innovators of Music
Leaders of Lieder
Bloodsport: Opera
Photo Xplorers
Star Portraits
Anna & Kristina’s Style Bag
The Cupcake Girls
Of Kiwis and Men
L’Oréal Paris Presents Spitting L’Image Canada
Re-Vamped
The Jane Show
How to Marry a Millionaire
Battle of the Blades
Over the Bolts
Junk Raiders
Johnny Knoxville’s Jackass: The Series Canada
Peak Season
Crash & Burn
The Half-Hour News Parody Hour
Angel on Campus
Baxter
The Republic of Doyle
Meet Phil Fitz
The Bougons
The Ron James Show
Eat Your Heart Out, Adrienne Clarkson
Stella and Sam
Justin Time
Sanctuary
Traders: The Musical
Bloodletting
All Families Are Psychotic
Homeroom Vampire
Love Among the Tar Sands
Fakers
Harlequin Presents The Kilting Bee: The Colin & Justin Story
Phantom
18 to Life
The Pillars of the Earth
The Foundation
Living in Your Car
My Other Car Is a Prius
Straighten Out Your Life with Mark Tewksbury
My Rona Home
The Basement Design Department
Holmes Inspection
Conviction Kitchen
Realtor vs. Realtor

Answers!

Well, I see nobody gave a shit.

The new CBC shows are Ron James, Battle of the Blades, Canada’s Super Speller, 18 to Life, and The Republic of Doyle (AKA “Not Charlie Jade”).

The list included a number of ringers I made up. You should have spotted at least one or two, but nobody would have gotten all of them. This theory will remain untested.

My Other Car Is a Prius
(as surely any Riverdale-semi-owning CBC manager’s wife’s must be)
L’Oréal Paris Presents Spitting L’Image Canada
(après Project Runway Canada avec Iman, le déluge?)
Leaders of Lieder
(ahhhts programming)
Bloodsport: Opera
(Repo: The Genetic Opera half-assedly cloned 1996–CITY-TV/Canadian style)
Straighten Out Your Life with Mark Tewkesbury
(who’s already doing Newsworld segments)
The Bougons
(from Les Bougon, one of those actually funny Radio-Canada series that tightassed, PC Fort Dork pretends doesn’t exist and isn’t worth remaking in English)
The Basement Design Department
(which got dismantled)
Love Among the Tar Sands
(AKA Son of Wild Roses)
How to Marry a Millionaire
(please: a gimme)
Eat Your Heart Out, Adrienne Clarkson
(hommage to Her Excellency the Sashimïst General)
Homeroom Vampire
(YTV-style tween comedy)
Traders: The Musical
(could it work?)
Of Kiwis and Men
(calque of Des kiwis et des hommes)
All Families Are Psychotic
(après jPod, le déluge?)
Harlequin Presents The Kilting Bee: The Colin & Justin Story
(they really are on book covers; plus they’re reputedly hung like horses)
Pow-wow’s Playhouse
(Cowboy Curtis’s aboriginal reconciliation)

Private-broadcaster secrets now easier to read than ever

2009-06-08T11:44:00.001-05:00

Canada’s new government held sessions with the Privates to talk funding and policy and basically dish! dish! dish! Your government then published transcripts with nearly every point of interest blacked out (“redacted”).

But now you can enjoy this government censorship of government documents on behalf of private for-profit broadcasters in superconvenient Web format.

CBC-related content?

Michel Arpin: If the CBC was to go out of advertising, including getting out of sports... [w]here will that money flow? Will it flow back to organizations like CTV and Canwest or will it go in the specialty sector or in print? [...]
Brian McCluskey: [...] You have really got two CBCs. One is the sports CBC, which is a high-profile player that commands a premium, and one is the other CBC, which is a discount station. So if CBC were to shut down their discount station, the first beneficiary would be the remaining discount conventional stations in the market. And right now there is a sufficient number of them they could easily absorb what the CBC turned away. From the sports standpoint, you would get some migration to sports on the specialties, depending on where those sports went. If they went to CTV, well, the money would migrate with it.

In adversity we shine

2009-06-01T13:16:00.001-05:00

-----------------------------
from: richard.stursberg@cbc.ca
May 28, 2009

It is often the case that in adversity we shine. And over the past several days, this has been the case.

This week, colleagues across the country have received the news that no one ever wants to hear--that their job will no longer be part of the organization. This is not a reflection on those who have come to work day in, day out, contributing to the country's largest cultural institution. It is a sign of the turbulent, unanticipated times in which we live.

But despite all of this, staff have reacted to the news of redundancies with professionalism and grace. And for those who have not been directly affected by this process, you have responded to your colleagues with sensitivity and compassion. These are highly prized values, values that are core to the CBC.

Unfortunately, the changes don't end this week. We'll continue to be unsettled for several months. But we're all in this together.

Take care.

Richard

-----------------------------
from: jennifer.mcguire@cbc.ca

Yesterday was a tough day for everyone at the CBC. Even though we minimized the number of people affected, many of our co-workers were told that their positions would no longer exist. They will be going through a joint management and union process where every effort will be made to place them in other positions. That may not be possible in every case but I know both sides at the table are committed to a process that respects the rights of the individuals affected.

I want to give everyone a sense of where we are at with the CBC News Renewal process. In our department, we undertook to reorganize our structure and reassign many employees so we could position ourselves better for the future. It is a massive change and coupled with yesterday's news, it is understandable that there is a high level of anxiety in many newsrooms.

On Monday afternoon, we will be revealing the new organizational structures for CBC News. At our last meeting we discussed how the new assignment HUB would work and how we would organize the programs in the future. Now we are ready to announce the key leadership and on air positions.

Following that announcement, starting on Tuesday, we will be meeting with every news employee one on one through the week to discuss new assignments. The reassignments are the next step in forming new teams to launch our renewed programming in the fall.

It is a stressful period but it is also an exciting time to be working at CBC News. Great new ideas are being traded. Wonderful opportunities are opening up and, in the end, we will be serving Canadians in new and better ways. And that's what it is all about.

Details about the Monday meetings will follow soon.

Jennifer

Cinema conundrum?

2009-05-28T12:52:00.001-05:00

If you work at Fort Dork, your tastes in private commercial broadcasting probably run more along the lines of CITY-TV. The old CITY, before it got ass-raped by cableco kleptocrats.

How is Rogers borking now? By ignoring its licence requirement to run a Canadian movie every week.

It’s not much of a ploy. Even with today’s compliant CRTC, so unfamiliar to those who cut their gums on yesterday’s compliant CRTC, I don’t see how Rogers is gonna squirm out of this one. They’ll be stuck with the requirement and will get slapped on the wrist for having ignored it.

The CITY CanCon ghetto was a good deal. I saw a lot of decent pictures. Contrary to what Rex Reed thinks, Canadian movies don’t all suck. Ginger Snaps, Waydowntown, Hard Core Logo, Goin’ Down the Road, Last Wedding. These are not bad movies. Seriously. (Now, Pontypool I didn’t like. But it was a great night out at the Fox.)

So why aren’t these movies also on CBC?

The whole late-movie slot is badly programmed. I remember a job posting for a movie programmer a couple of months ago; was it ever filled? Doesn’t look like it.

A lot of the time, the Friday-overnight (i.e., the before-you-go-to-bed-Thursday) movie slot is Canadian. Do you even watch those movies? I always check the program guide to see what’s coming up. (It doesn’t work in any reasonable way: You have to peer at each day’s program grid; there isn’t a permalink for each movie.)

Anyway, tonight’s movie is 20h17 rue Darling; last week’s was Ginger Snaps: The Beginning; next week’s is Once in a Blue Moon. Not fantastic.

This can’t cost a fortune. Why can’t CBC run way more Canadian movies, maybe twice a week? It’s already happening. Why not more, and better? Isn’t this an easy win?

The tweeting wounded

2009-05-28T12:38:00.012-05:00

What was there to be unsure about, luvmuffin? Yesterday was a rotten day.

What makes it worse is that when someone is classified as 'redundant,' it's not over yet. If they're in the union, they get a chance to bump someone out who's not in the union, or who has less seniority. Just as long as they can prove they're qualified for the job.

Know how to operate a telephone? There's a bright future for you in Audience Relations. That sort of thing.

It's that .5 of a job that is the kicker. Who wants the butt end of that job?

Thanks for the vote of support, MickiMaynard. By the way, we have you surrounded. You got any jobs in there?

Crap!

Oof!

Sacre bleu!

Ouch!

Ummmm...

Oh Pumpkins

2009-05-27T14:17:00.001-05:00

As I read the latest posts on “Inside CBC” --- I feel like an Aberdeen Angus that slipped out the back door of the slaughterhouse when no one was looking. I am free, ambling through green pastures, my mind is beginning to clear and I realize how close I came to being turned into hamburger. In the distance I hear shots being fired, one after the other. Bang, bang sounds are coming from the slaughterhouse. I am sad for the herd, but relieved I am free at last.

You know Pumpkins, what’s happening is really not your fault. It is the CBC management, that has proved to be about as flexible as a concrete block. There is a way out of this, but I am not sure they have what it takes—and subsequently none of you have what it takes to turn this thing around for CBC TV.

Here’s an escape for route you all.

Get out of local television. We are experiencing the great media shift. It means many things for the way all of us do our work, but for the CBC is means getting out of local TV. To survive in local TV the news programming (and that’s why it exists) must be intensely local in every aspect. It has to be daily and closely involved with the community and CBC local is not. It parachutes anchors and reporters and weather people in from anywhere but there. That means that the people doing the programming don’t have a deep connection to place where they work. They are just there temporarily. Successful stations put up home grown talent that the community is proud of and often have deep roots in local organizations, sports teams etc. CBC is just not in that game on a local level. They don’t even do weekend newsgathering in most cases.

Secondly, most markets are already served by CTV and Global and in some cases a third station – there is no need for a CBC local station.

Thirdly, CBC is competing with other stations for advertising dollars. No need for that either.

So, what’s to be done. Sell all the CBC local real estate (lets start with Regina) – and set up small newsgathering bureaus EVERYWHERE across the country – that feed into Newsworld ALL THE TIME. Use those resources to actually cover the country instead of leaving large swathes of territory that never SEE a CBC crew.

Make Newsworld a Powerhouse
And lets kill the National. It is over baby. It is boring, turgid, overproduced and out of date. Maybe Pete will take a package eh? Or you can give him a few hours on Newsworld. Bring the talent to Newsworld. That’s where the future is.

Now, what about all of you and your jobs. Well there is lots going on out there. You’re journalists remember – and skilled trades people. There is lots to do. You may not get $75K a year, but most people don’t. Or take a job in Brandon or London Ontario or Yarmouth. At least you’ll be writing stories about Canada instead of kevetching yourselves sick in Toronto and Vancouver.

Wedgie then and now

2009-05-26T12:21:00.003-05:00

The ever-changing moods of the imperious critic we just can’t get rid of, Robert Fulford.

Then: Intelligence anti-American

Low-life bad guys may shoot each other on the mean streets, but the really bad guys are sitting behind desks [and]we know precisely who those bad guys are: Americans. [...] It sounds like the darkest fantasy of a Canadian nationalist. Mary may be devious and greedy for power, but she’s still a patriot. She throws all her resources into the struggle against the American empire. [...]
[W]hen it comes to Washington’s power, [Chris Haddock is]addicted to the conventional wisdom of hysterical nationalism. On the question of water rights, for instance, he assumes we all agree that fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly and Americans gotta steal our water. It’s their nature.
In the old days, paranoid anti-Americanism at the CBC appeared mostly in news shows and documentaries. That was enough to infuriate some of us. But in recent seasons it’s seeped into drama as well. There’s no question that the CSIS heroes on Intelligence consider the Americans our most dangerous enemies. [...]
Conspiracy theorists will say that all this indicates a plot devised by latte-lapping leftists among the filmmakers in Toronto and Vancouver. Unlikely. Their motive is probably pure calculation. Their shows appeal to the anti-American mood that Liberal and NDP politicians, as well as a few editorialists and TV critics, have done their best to foment. They also, I imagine, attract nods of approval from grant-giving Ottawa bureaucrats who consider their product “relevant.” Our TV drama producers have learned at least one rule from American TV: Success begins with an appeal to prejudice.

Now: Intelligence almost “the most convincing drama ever produced in Canada”

Haddock's next series, Intelligence, about a B.C. marijuana magnate and his Byzantine connections with the forces of law, didn't go the distance from primitive to decadent. While at times it seemed the most convincing drama ever produced in Canada, it died quickly when viewers realized they needed almost scholarly concentration to follow the plot.

Vent

2009-05-25T07:32:00.001-05:00

According to the signals emanated, no doubt with a Cheneyesque lack of contrition, from the desk of Dick Stursberg, this is the week 180 CBC English employees will lose their jobs.

Not many of the Tea Makers writers work at the Corpse (use of second-person pronouns notwithstanding). The number isn’t zero, but we aren’t led by Alphonse Ouimet anymore.

I’m not going to pretend to understand the tribulations each and every one of those 180 people will face. This is one of those times when the floor needs to be opened even wider than it ever was. I want everyone to view this thread as a platform they can use to talk about the layoffs – any aspect, up to and including how the process went for you and what you want to do now. Or anything else.

You can stay anonymous or pseudonymous or use your real name, as you wish. Or you can write a full-fledged guest post, again under any authorship you choose. You can do whatever you want. The floor is yours.

Open Doors, Open Hearts

2009-05-24T06:19:00.003-05:00

Everyone was so nice.
A Love-In.
Much needed.
(click on images to enlarge)

A Little ... Weird

2009-05-22T19:20:00.003-05:00

The Floor Director for The Hour is pointing out the many fire exits to the studio audience, as he must before each taping.
But there's an extra addition to his comedic spiel (and The Hour's audience will laugh at almost anything).
There are two tables off to the side that hold a couple of LCD monitors, and chairs around the tables.
He explains that these will be occupied by the producer of the show, and the writers of the show. And that we may see George occasionally going over to confer with them during the course of the show.
Really?!?
This is new.

Don't recall ever seeing such an arrangement for a television show.
The producer has a desk IN the studio?
And the writers too?
That seems so odd.
Are we supposed to think that the show is being altered as it goes along? That is, other than the usual cuts and stretching that goes on when the clock is ticking.

But sure enough, there they are.
Two women as producers, and four guys as writers take their seats as the show starts. Their backs are to the audience. They stay focused on the screens in front of them. You would think they are actually working.

But you have to wonder, what purpose does this serve?
Isn't the show already written, and isn't what's going to happen here largely, even completely, predictable?
Are the writers being punished? Forced to "feel" the reaction of the audience to their jokes?
There's something odd about this.
Is this copied from other shows? Is this a new trend in live studio production?
Who came up with this idea?
Don't writers usually go home when the script is finished?
Are they there to help George if he gets in over his head (and isn't that every night)?

There's a girl at the end of table with her feet up on a chair, as well.
Nothing unusual. But one of the guys sitting with the writers starts to give her a two handed neck massage. And it goes on and on. All very friendly and apparently innocent, and the other guys just stare at the screens.
But this is a work environment and it seems odd that no one wants to tell them "hey, we may be casual here, but that's a little too casual".

In both instances you get the sense that even though it's all kind of weird, nobody is going to voice any objection or question what's happening.

It's the CBC.
You do whatever management says, keep your head down and mouth shut, and you'll do fine.
And if things begin to seem a bit strange, just pretend you didn't notice.

Did we get him wrong all along?

2009-05-17T12:25:00.002-05:00

According to a gushing Toronto Star staff writer, Jee-ahn Go-meshee is:

boyish
eclectic, cultural, skilled
heartfelt, cerebral
an ironic hipster
a single gadabout
prone to career reversals with Denise Donlon: “she’s his boss now”
“ambitious and passionate” (self-declared), but possibly over the hill (self-declared)

Two ways to televise a radio show

2009-05-13T12:09:00.002-05:00

Failed TV pilot for popular nerd podcast the Sound of Young America (q.v.; at iTunes):
(A pilot for whom? CurrentTV.)
Q (“TV”) with Jee-ahn Go-meshee:

Champion of this updated contest of filming a stageplay and calling it television? None: It’s a tie.

UPDATE (2009.05.21): Now teh Gays are doing it (the Proud FM to be simulcast on the OutTV).

How to turn a profit on Canadian programming

2009-05-12T12:53:00.003-05:00

Run 40 repeats on another channel.

The Usual Suspects of the CanCon lobby paid Nordicity to research and write a study (PDF) on the economics of TV programming. The study gives the appearance of marshalling a huge range of plausible assumptions to arrive at the preordained conclusion that Canadian programming can be profitable for broadcasters.

The study considers one-hour dramas, including Da Vinci’s Inquest, and half-hour comedies, including Red Green. (Seemingly all other cited shows come from the Privates.)

Assumptions

By far the most interesting assumptions are:

The Canadian Discount:
Canadian television programming is subject to an implied discount. Canadian broadcasters typically sell television advertising in packages that include a combination of different types of American and Canadian television programs.... [I]t is understood throughout the Canadian advertising industry that Canadian programming is subject to an implied discount of 15% to 25%.
The Schedule Adjustment Factor
addresses the fact that Canadian broadcasters have historically – although to a lesser extent in recent years – typically aired most Canadian prime‐time television programming on Friday or Saturday evening, or during the peak‐fringe period [of 5:00 to 8:00]....
On Saturday, audience levels were 60% to 73% lower than the Sunday‐to‐Thursday average. On an aggregate basis, therefore, we found that audience levels on Friday and Saturday were approximately 51% lower than the Sunday‐to‐Thursday average.... Friday or Saturday time slot reduced a program’s audience by 25%, on average.

40 airings for five grand (or 26 for one)

Our analysis shows that Canadian drama with an average audience of 700,000 between Sunday and Thursday is likely not profitable for a Canadian broadcasting group following the completion of the conventional broadcast window. After seven conventional airings, the Canadian drama generates a per‐episode deficit of $138,264 for the broadcasting group.

Assuming no dead-zone broadcast times, you need 16 specialty-channel airings to “generate a surplus of $5,416.” Include the dead zones and you need 40 airings on a specialty channel.
If we assume an generous average ten-episode run for a season and a gap of 100% between airings, to hit 40 reruns of all ten episodes on Showcase or whatever you need 800 weeks’ elapsed time. Do you really want to be watching reruns of Blue Murder in 2021? Do you think Asper fils is still gonna want to run that show then?
Is that too long a time? You could air reruns on more than one channel to cut down the timespan. I suppose it is possible to pull an April Fool’s Intelligence scenario and run a show on second through eighth windows. But anyway, today are we still watching episodes of Traders? Hot Shots? Straight Up? Urban Angel? Earth: Final Conflict?
You need 26 airings of a half-hour comedy to achieve a surplus of a measly $1,886. That’s five years of off-and-on repeats. Is Little Mosque gonna get any funnier in 2014?

The examples are kind of moot for the CBC anyway, as it lacks a harem of specialty channels onto which to dump reruns. (Does Bold really count?)

Canadian shows do not pay

That seems to be the honest conclusion. The only way to make them pay assumes an ecosystem of B-list rerun channels endlessly rehashing the same shows. Even then the return on investment barely pays for a single plane ticket in the business-class cabins that are the preferred domain of the broadcasting executive whose business was built on rebroadcasting American shows.

Hey you! Tech nuts!

2009-05-08T09:39:00.027-05:00

Who you calling tech nuts, Dianne Buckner?

Look, I don't have any time for the Facebook Phenomenon right now. I'm right in the middle of the Tweethole Meltdown. And I've a whole bag of tweets to get through before the Amazon buys twitter and teamakers and puts it all on the Big Kindle and behind the paywall.

There's not a second to spare, so let's get started.
Don't touch that dial! If you liked the Swine Flu, you're going to love The Border.

Who doesn't love them? And I think you'll find that they're normal people, just like you and me.

Well, maybe more like you than me.

Is it possible that Tod Maffin has missed an opportunity for cross-promotion somewhere? Download my podcastable eBook to find out!

I'm not sure I'm grasping the gist of your inference, homie.

See? Only part of that is in all caps.

If this is what a discussion on twitter about the future of journalism looks like, you can let me off right here plz.

Remind me to steer clear of the bathrooms near the Documentary Department today. Waaaaaaay clear.

Let me guess: because it sucks ass?

I couldn't agree more. Were pitchforks involved?

Me, I like to watch people weeping out of futility in my spare time. And you really want to warm the cockles, we'll call you down for the next lockout! Good times.

Just come home already, JD. You know you want to. I mean, really - CNN? Get real.

Actually, they call me all the time. I think they're just lonely, especially Ian Morrison. And he never shuts up! Always on and on with the American cultural takeover and the Harper agenda yadda yadda yadda... look, I'll subscribe to your video podcast of Ian Morrison speeches overlaid with photos of Ian Morrison and your Ian Morrison Facebook page and Ian Morrison newsletter if you'll just leave me in peace for 30 min to watch Wheel? Sheesh!

A fine gentleman like Jonathan Goldstein has no patience for the fripperies of twitter and the hackneyed phrasings of blogs, I assure you. If you wish to contact him he can be found every second Tuesday holding court around the fire, sipping sherry.

However, it might also be fruitful to consult the Google on these matters before broadcasting your query like an arse.

Who doesn't love pirates? Well, except from the people they rob, rape and kill? Otherwise, bring them on with this timely promotion!

No offence but I'm going to see how this works out before I submit my request for a transfer to CBC North. Call it a hunch.

Calm down lorynsmommy, and stop shouting. Teamakers has got you covered. Just go ahead and show what you have to, I'll answer the phone. And if Ian Morrison calls I'll pretend I'm not home.

‘I’m not here this afternoon to blackmail you’

2009-05-07T12:26:00.002-05:00

When not rewriting Tea Makers posts a couple of days after the fact, near-useless official CBC blog Inside the CBC can occasionally deign to cover real events, like Hubie’s appearance before the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage on April 27. That blog gave us 343 words.

Meanwhile, I printed out and read all 56 pages of “evidence” (transcripts), published only yesterday, and can offer a highlight of what was said. You pretty much know already about anything not cited here. (All remarks from Hubie unless otherwise stated.)

Miscellaneous bons mots

Hubie: Selling assets to balance your budget, selling assets in fact to pay for your downsizing costs and your severance obligations, is not the best of management decisions, but we have no other choice.

Saving a few lost jobs

Ruby Dhalla: The minister had also stated in the House that even if the government had provided CBC with bridge financing there still would have been a substantial amount of job losses, to the effect of 800. If the government had provided CBC with bridge financing, would you be in the dire situation that you’ve described today and that we’ve heard about from CBC employees across the country? Would jobs have been lost or would bridge financing have helped to save the CBC?
Hubie: [T]his would have allowed us to gain time so that we could have made our voluntary retirement incentive plan perhaps a little more generous, and we could have used attrition, but unless permanent funding had been given to CBC/Radio-Canada, we would not have saved the 800 jobs. Bridge financing was about reducing the number of jobs impacted by this downturn.

Budget decrease in ‘constant dollars’

Hubie: The decrease is about $64 million, but that’s simply on the numbers that are presented. I’m not saying that we have seen our budget decrease by $64.8 million. The $60 million that we hope we will be receiving when we are in front of Treasury Board in a couple of days will make that number bigger by $60 million. We have a decrease of $2 million due to the non-renewable funding for the Canadian content online program – that’s a program that was not renewed – and we have a $2.8 million decrease to the budget 2007 expenditure review.
So what you’re looking at in fact is that if you include the renewal of the $60 million, in constant dollars we have about $400 million less than the corporation received in 1990. But in terms of basic appropriation, it has been stable since 1996-97.
— But the money is less.
— In terms of constant dollars.

Ad-free CBC

Hubie: Well, Mr. Angus, if the question is, “Lacroix, what kind of model would you present if you took advertising revenues out of the CBC? How many dollars would you need?,” the answer is pretty simple in terms of what amount of commercial revenues we need to balance our budget. The number is anywhere between $300 million and $325 million in 2009–10 in our budget.

Removing the Yukon transmitter

Larry Bagnell: The AM tower is about to be removed for radio in the Yukon. People depend on CBC there, unlike in other areas in the south. Because of the remoteness and the –50°, weather reports – for survival, for daily jobs – are really critical things in life. Staying in the regions would not be maintained if this tower were not replaced. The local manager is doing a great job, but he says he does not have the resources to replace that.
I hope you will take this under advisement. I know you probably can’t answer now, but hopefully we’ll have an ally in you to get this service extended. Those people outside the boundaries of FM really depend on it. They’re the most vulnerable.
Hubie: If your question is what will I do about this, I will take the question under advisement. I’m not aware of the details surrounding this tower.

Disproportionate effects of layoffs in the north

Charlie Angus: I want to follow up with what you said about regional losses. As you know, it’s a very serious issue in our region, and this is not being parochial. Our communities are absolutely dependent on CBC. If they don’t have CBC North service, they don’t have a voice, period. I hear the number 28%, and I’m doing the calculations across northern Canada, where we took a 50% hit in Sudbury, a 50% hit in Thunder Bay, 100% in northern Manitoba, 100% in Saskatchewan.
We don’t really get a feeling that those losses were balanced out, because when you take two jobs out of a market like that, you’re eliminating the afternoon show. When you eliminate the afternoon show, you’re eliminating the entire ability of a vast region the size of western Europe to have arts programming, to introduce northern writers, to bring voices to the region.

Let’s not give away any secrets here

Tim Uppal: [O]n April 17, a news release was sent out saying that local news will become a major priority for the CBC with the reorganization of the news department. In a variety of newspapers across the country, it was noted that the reorganization and focus towards local news has been under way for some time – for about two years – and is now being revved up because of the economic downturn.
I understand that the details were sketchy and that you have plans to elaborate more in the summer, but can you please give this committee some of the details you do have? It has been in the process for about two years, so can you give us the details you have?
Hubie: Sir, I’m sure you understand that I’m not going to describe here what we are going to do with respect to our programming and let our friends at CTV or at Canwest understand and prepare for the changes we’re going to make.

Why are there still job postings online?

Shelly Glover: I can’t help but note that on your Web site, sir, there are job postings, and yet we’re talking about layoffs. I’m wondering why these people were being laid off.... My question is, please tell us why we are looking for new jobs and new people when we’ve considered laying off people who have expertise and experience with your corporation.
Hubie: Well, I’m not aware of the postings you’re talking about. We have rules with respect to postings and how they get to be posted. There’s one thing that has to continue.

Average salaries: The new whipping boy

This one is just ridiculous. Averages are susceptible to outliers, and there’s always somebody who earns more than you, even if that somebody is a salt-of-the-earth blue-collar Tory (maybe a plumber). Nonetheless, committee members tried to squeeze blood from this stone.

Dean Del Mastro: Can you give me some idea what the average salary is at CBC? Do you know that number?
Hubie: No, I don’t offhand.
— Would it surprise you if access to information indicated it was around $76,000?
— No. Do you mean for an overall employee? I think $76,000, but on the television side it may be a bit higher – $84,000 to $85,000. Those are the numbers we work with, yes.
— Okay, that’s fine.
Obviously, as I’ve indicated, these are challenging times. Everybody laments job losses – everybody does. But the people in my riding, where the average household income is about $60,000, would probably look at that and ask, how much more in taxes can I pay? How much more do you want me to pay, when you’re already paying people more than my entire household makes?
Shelly Glover: I spent almost 19 years as a police officer. I’m quite shocked to hear today, for the first time, that the average wage or salary of a CBC employee surpasses by quite a bit the average amount that a police officer makes, a police officer who puts his or her life on the line every single day. To hear you say that it may be higher than $76,000, or maybe even more than $84,000 on average, when our men and women who are living the news make far less than that and the people simply reporting it are making far more on the taxpayers’ dollar, was quite a shock to me.
The other comment I wish to make, sir, is about the $4 million that you speak about when you talk about the bonuses. I assure you that police officers aren’t getting any bonuses for doing a good job, and I would hope that all Canadians expect, when we assist corporations, that all employees are expected to do a good job regardless of any kind of bonus.

Would you shut up about American game shows already?

Seriously, get over it. Now you want to sub in the co-host from What’s for Dinner?

Glover: I would suggest, sir, that we do have some very talented people, very talented Canadians, in fact. If I look at the Martha Stewart show, I would argue that Ken Kostick from my home province would do as good a job, and that Canadians would be engaged. They expect Canadian identity in much of this programming.

Does CBC have to broadcast in Punjabi now?

Apart from play-by-play on the occasional hockey game, at least?

Dhalla: The demographic across the country is obviously changing very rapidly. I look at my own riding in Brampton, and it’s one of the most multicultural and multilingual ridings in the country. What impact have the job losses and closures of some of the regional and local programming had on ethnic programming and ethnic communities in the country?
Hubie: Madam, your question is very precise in nature. I would have to follow it up with a better answer than the one I could give you today.

Running the same news on three competing channels

According to one member, that really happens.

Carole Lavallée: I would like to talk to you about the Abitibi region, which is a huge area with 150,000 inhabitants. It truly is a remote region.
CBC/Radio-Canada does not have deep roots there; actually, it’s not there at all. In Rouyn-Noranda, there is a funny, screwed-up arrangement – I can’t explain it in any other terms – according to which several journalists working at Radio Nord read the same news report at the end of the day, and it is written and read in the same order. At 5:00, we hear from TQS; 5:30, they change the set and it’s TVA; and at 6:00, it’s Radio-Canada. I’m sure you understand that the people of the Abitibi–Témiscamingue region find that this news report is not at all of the same calibre as the Radio-Canada news.

‘Search Engine’ unshackled

2009-05-06T15:57:00.002-05:00

In an interview with the Torontoist, Search Engine host Jesse Brown admits the show was inspired by copyleftists Cory Doctorow and Michael Geist.

At its new home on TVO.org, the podcast can now spread its wings free of CBC’s meddlesome rules on journalistic fairness and balance – the rules still tying the hands of Spark’s producers. Search Engine can now become what it always wanted to be, a platform for unfettered advocacy of exactly one vision of copyright reform. The Doctorow/Geist/Lessig axis has a new champion, and no way is a cabinet minister gonna hang up on them this time!

(Insult added to injury: The interview has yet another horrifically unflattering photograph of the tall, strapping host.)

JS&P to be updated at a future date to accommodate all this Googling

2009-05-06T15:23:00.003-05:00

Now you too can attend a pointless, long-ass strategy meeting, just like a real CBCer!

Esther Enkin throws open the doors to a public discussion on rewriting the Journalistic Standards and Practices to bring it up to date.

First on the agenda: comments. When should they be deleted?

If you ever wanted an example of "old media" struggling with programming the clock on the VCR while everyone else is timeshifting American Idol, this is it.

(Anyone want to bet how long it will be until someone in the comments mentions Hitler?)

Looking ahead to May

2009-05-04T10:27:00.004-05:00

May 1, 2009 - It’s been a pretty interesting week (understatement!), so I thought I’d drop you a quick line.

CBC/Radio-Canada had two important appearances this week: mine before the Heritage Committee on Monday and another by Steven Guiton, Richard Stursberg, Sylvain Lafrance, Louis Lalande, François Conway and Bev Kirshenblatt before the CRTC on Wednesday. Both gave us the chance to press for urgent solutions to the problem that plague the conventional broadcasting industry.

There’s a fundamental systemic imbalance that needs to be fixed. That, we all know. And it affects us all, public or private, since Canada has a public-private system. I suspect you’ve all caught wind of the rumours about help for the private broadcasters. I don’t know any more than you do about them but, at least this week, we had the chance to make the case that we shouldn’t be excluded from any solution that’s brought to bear to remedy the imbalance, whether that solution is fee-for-carriage, the Local Programming Improvement Fund, the Canada Media Fund, or anything else.

I think our message got through in both appearances. Certainly, I was pleased to hear the CRTC chair reaffirm yesterday that CBC/Radio-Canada will be a full participant in the Local Programming Improvement Fund. This will no doubt bolster our ability to remain deeply rooted in the regions. And it was also good to hear Minister Moore reaffirm yesterday in his own appearance before the Heritage Committee recognize CBC/Radio-Canada as a “great Public Broadcaster” and also reaffirms that we will again get this year the $60 million in special programming funding that it has gotten every year since 2001 (though it still requires Governor-in-Council sign-off).

On a regulatory note, you should also know that the CRTC has administratively renewed all of our licences with the same existing terms and conditions for one year, until August 31, 2010.

It had been the CRTC's intention to require CBC/Radio-Canada to file renewal applications for these services in May 2009 and to proceed with a public hearing to consider renewal applications in September 2009. A one-year administrative renewal is consistent with the Commission's revised regulatory timetable that is intended to permit a review of major policy issues affecting the conventional television business. The outcome of these proceedings will have a material impact on CBC/Radio-Canada's licence renewal plans for its services.

Following this summer's policy review process, it is possible that the CRTC could put our licence renewal hearings on a faster track if it decides to move forward with important financial remedies for the industry such as a fee-for-carriage.

Also, huge congratulations to CBC News at Six for their increased share performance, according to data from the Spring 2009 BBM Canada television diary survey, released yesterday. It’s evidence that good things come from having deep roots in the regions.

Finally, today is the last day for people to apply for the Voluntary Retirement Incentive Program. The applications will be reviewed over the next couple of weeks. We remain hopeful that through this program we will be able to reduce the number of people affected by layoffs. Expect to hear more about all of this from me in late-May.

We have a Board of Directors meeting coming up on May 12 and 13. I’ll be touching base with you again after that.

Hang tough.

‘In Lausanne this year, the Rose d’Or Awards are devoting an entire day to celebrating the CBC’

2009-05-03T12:20:00.003-05:00

That’s quite the accolade! The Tea Makers thanks Richard Stursberg for bringing us this news. Stursberg also claims “CBC TV’s never been better”:

Ah, say our critics, we’re not “distinctive” because CBC shows are made within the same narrative and format conventions as many U.S. television shows. They argue that the Canadian privates could make these shows.
Maybe. But they don’t. CBC spends more on Canadian drama and comedy than all the privates combined. [...]
But, say the critics, it’s not “high quality” and a public broadcaster needs to focus on quality, not popularity.... They want it to be a university lecture, a ballet, or a treatise on world hunger. [...]
In English Canada, it’s sometimes argued that we’ve fallen away from CBC’s Golden Age in the 1970s and 1980s.

A lot of us here would be happy to return to the Golden Age of Da Vinci’s fucking Inquest and Intelligence. (And Opening Night. And The Fifth Estate with enough of a budget to rub two Schreibers together.)

Happily, the CBC is full of imaginative, intelligent and creative people. Sadly, we’re in the process of letting many of them go.

The CBC is one of those places where not only do the rats actually helm the sinking ship, they get to write op-ed pieces extolling the unheralded good works of rats and their rodentlike taste.

Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster. And when you gaze long into the tweethole, the tweethole also gazes into you

2009-05-01T10:51:00.023-05:00

Social Media Professionals and Nietzsche will tell you that you only get out of social media what you put into it. So it goes without saying that when you make fun of the twitter people, sooner or later you become that which you made fun of.

"That site," my friends, is this site. And noizangel is Nicole Winchester, producer for Steven and Chris. Calling tea Makers "ridiculous." Has she ever watched Steven and Chris?

Exactly.
Now, Inside the CBC is starting to bug me. They're not only taking stuff from Tea Makers proper, but now they're twittering about it through some kind of Perpetual Twittering Machine.

They also did a big piece on the dangers of fake twitter accounts which some people are falling for. They're robbing the tweethole!

The site sucks so hard that even Google ignores it. A Google search for "insidethecbc.com" doesn't even return insidethecbc.com.

Besides, who's going to be fooled by these fake twitter accounts? Certainly not the media-savvy elites of Canadian broadcasting?

Best buds forever, apparently.

cbctom is on the case, however. Next week he's doing a special report that reveals that some lawyers representing Nigerian princes may not be all they seem.

This is one of Tod Maffin's Perpetual Twittering Machines, and it pumps out CBC-related tweets all hours of the day and night. Lest you think the CBC is now developing Buzz Strategies (?), this is not the CBC you're looking for.

Now this guy also had the wrong CBC, but amazingly, he's got it right. In fact, writing this post about the CBC, I'm thinking of a ham sandwich.

To be perfectly frank I have no idea which CBC this guy is talking about, but I hope it's the one I work at.

Let me translate this tweet for you. The free Perpetual Twittering Machine that Canadian media relies on to update their free twitter services broke. So for 5 hours there was no free news on twitter for any of the freeloaders.

There's an old saying where I come from: "You get what you pay for."

Me, I like my tweets like I like my cigars: handrolled. By hot chicks.

Now that's a tweet! By a News Reporter, with a goddamn checkmark baked right into the handle!

Of course the big news this week in CBC twitter land was the announcement of the cbcnews.ca boss, @rachelnixon, formerly of the BBC and Nowpublic.com.

She may be the highest-ranking CBCer to maintain a twitter account. I combed her account looking for something interesting to read and fell asleep. The experience was not unlike reading the nowpublic website.

I thought everyone on the west coast loved the mary jane?

The most surprising thing to come out of the whole episode was the re-emergence of Jon Dube. You might remember him as the cybernetic manager of cbcnews.ca sent from a dystopian future ruled by rogue Blackberries to exterminate mankind and trigger Armageddon.

It turns out he's working at ABCnews.com. Who knew they even had a website?

You and me both, sister. Fuck a big-ass duck, can I get a pip pip Cheerio, or wot?

Location is everything

2009-04-28T21:06:00.002-05:00

Destined to become the greatest broadcast center in Canada.
In that location, with that view, behind the stage at Dundas Square, it cannot but capture the mind and the eye, for all who need to feel anchored to their surroundings for even just a moment, see the weather downtown, join the summer festivities always at Yonge & Dundas, see the blizzard sweeping across the GTA, be near thousands of bright young minds only a block away, looking down on the one intersection that everyone in the country eventually crosses ... and it could have been the CBC's.

Is The CBC Leftist?

2009-04-28T07:53:00.004-05:00

Lynne Russell may well be the Emma Peel of integrity and discipline when it comes to electronic news gathering.
But that doesn't mean we will always agree with her.

The example Lynne gives here is not a clear indication that the CBC is "Leftist".
The decision that was made which she complains about, could easily be attributed to a different motive than simply because the CBC is "leftist".
Is NPR leftist?
Is PBS?
TV Ontario?
What specifically qualifies a broadcasting enterprise to be a "leftist" organization?

It seems more likely that someone was simply covering their patriotic ass, far more than this being a symptom of left-leaning politics.
Management probably envisioned a backlash in Parliament, and it's easy to picture.
After all, if it's a silly, pointless argument that no one cares about, it's probably the #1 issue in Canadian politics.
"How dare the CBC use an American to talk about Canadian war deaths? We might as well be pretending we're CNN! We need a Canadian perspective. It's why we have the CBC in the first place." etc etc etc.
And there would be some merit to the upset.
It's an understandable sensitivity, coming from a country that has good reason to be proud of itself, yet will always be a little insecure by virtue of living next door to the undisputed winner, the champion of the world, ladies and gentleman ... The United States of America!
So it's easy to imagine that someone within CBC news management made the call to use Lynne for other new items, and instead have a Canadian report this, a tragic and important story.

Sorry, Lynne.
But we'd love to hear more of why you think the CBC is a leftist organization.
Because if Lynne Russell believes there's evidence of that, then it may well be the case.
Some members of the Conservative Party certainly believe it to be true.

This video is part of a longer piece that can be seen here.
The discussion is focused on the issue of objectivity in reporting the news.

How PMSD Is Ruining the CBC

2009-04-27T09:39:00.001-05:00

Program Management/Staff Development, PMSD. It's an innocuous-sounding and much-despised program that is meant to align the efforts of employees with the goals of the CBC. Unfortunately, the goals the Senior Executive Team has set are entirely self-serving and not aimed at improving service to the public. Rather, the broad goals that start this top-to-bottom exercise are to maximize the number of ears and eyeballs that come to CBC. The much-discussed bonuses we've all heard about for SET members depend on everybody in the organization working toward the goal of making those bonuses become a reality.

So, it comes as no surprise that the cuts that have just been announced have been made with an eye to reducing services in smaller communities. Local radio in the large centers has been largely left untouched. Bigger audiences mean bigger bonuses. It is simply not in the economic interest of the SET to make cuts that jeopardize audience sizes in large cities. But if cuts have to be made, cutting in those places that have larger audience shares but smaller absolute numbers, makes perfect economic sense.

Similarly, the SET is making cuts to network radio programs with smaller audience shares. The SET is using the economic crisis as cover for these cuts. Instead of making across-the-board cuts that would have drawn a line in the sand and united all of CBC's viewers/listeners in protest, managers are re-shaping the CBC in their best interests. The Broadcasting Act's call for all Canadians to be served in an equitable manner is subsidiary to the call of bigger bonuses.

The bias of SET is also evident in its treatment of programs that provide a great public service but don't meet audience targets. These programs, such as Market Place, are targeted for cuts. Instead, the investments are made on bets to produce shows that maximize eyeballs.

The maddening thing about PMSD is that we're all complicit in helping senior managers secure those bonuses even when we may have views of the role of the public broadcaster that are at odds with their goals.

What The CBC Will Never Air

2009-04-25T22:55:00.002-05:00

The one sure thing you won't see on the CBC:

an open discussion about the CBC

It's so entertaining, and could have gone for hours.

But then, you don't have to tell us!

Tubby-HNIC

2009-04-25T15:27:00.001-05:00

Front page of the Tubby today: A full-on diary of putting on an episode of Hockey Night in Canada, complete with infographic.

Great coverage for something that isn’t an Asper property. (Canwest Global Brings You Cialis® Hockey Night in Canada?)

Ivan Fecan, let's make a deal!

2009-04-25T08:50:00.003-05:00

However, Fecan said CTV has offered to sell several of its money-losing stations for a nominal fee of $1. It's had no takers.
"That speaks volumes," he said.

Dear Ivan Fecan

It has always been a dream of mine to be a broadcast mogul, and it seems I am finally in a position to realize that dream.

I recently discovered several loonies that I had been using to prop up and balance a wobbly bedside table, but it was only holding books and an alarm clock radio which doubles as a charger for my iPhone, and will gladly forgo one of them in return for the chance to build an empire and show the CBC how broadcasting can be done in the 21st century.

Mr. Fecan, would you please contact my representative at alphonse.ouimet@gmail.com so that we may begin the process of transferring ownership of the stations you have made reference to in your kind offer above.

Sincerely
Allan

PS I assume there are no strings attached to your offer as you strike me as a serious and responsible individual who would never say anything that he didn't mean and is not playing tricks to fool anyone.

Cowardice, thy name is NYTPicker?

2009-04-24T14:50:00.001-05:00

The de facto Tea Makers of the New York Times, the NYTPicker, explains why he, she, it, or they remain anonymous (really, pseudonymous):

Our goal was – and is – to offer information you can’t get anywhere else.
We’ve broken news stories..., reported on patterns... and spotlighted the career paths of little-known NYT personnel.... We also try to catch the NYT publishing inferior journalism – which it often does.... We showcase bad ledes. We like stuff, too....
[T]hen why do we remain anonymous? Shouldn’t we be proud enough of our Web site to put our names on it? A reasonable question.
The answer is that if you knew who we were, it would compromise our ability to function. Everything we say would become filtered through the reader’s perception of our qualifications, our conflicts, and our personalities. This way, for better or worse, you focus on what we say, not who we are. We like that.
We don’t like the “coward” label very much... because it doesn’t really apply to us.... The NYTPicker sticks to the NYT itself, and to the people inside it. Everything we write about is public. Sometimes we go for a laugh, but hey, that’s show biz.
Oh, and by the way: We love the NYT. Isn’t that obvious?

While there are noticeable differences between the NYTPicker and the Tea Makers that commenters will instantly seize upon, the Picker’s post neatly summarizes the issues involved. Fundamentally, though, both organs operate in a climate of fear. Surely it says something that only the outside-the-Corpse writers of the Tea Makers make their identities known. Then again, the NYTPicker’s evaluation is correct in that the Tea Makers writers with known identities are the ones ritually attacked for who they are. (I would settle for a way to keep the various Anonymoose distinct.)

Meanwhile, who is John Galt?

And there’s gonna be laundry?

2009-04-24T11:52:00.001-05:00

Tweethole stimulus package

2009-04-24T10:00:00.017-05:00

Welcome back, web 2.0 social media fans!

Unfortunately, there are no twitter blockings to report this week. But we roll in stealth mode these days, ie: not logged in, so we might've missed one. If you're blocking us, or spot a prime tweethole in the wild, be sure to DM @teamakers so we can get it squared away.

All right then, let's get into it.

No.

Joe Clark, is that you?

CBC/Radio-Canada Vice President of Real Estate Michel Saint-Cyr, is that you?

Not that it's any of your business. However I have it on good authority that a ton of people on CBC radio are Negroes. And HR? All Chinamen.

Don't take it personally, Jian.
And in other news: who the fuck is Andrew Bird? Send me a tweet when you get Big Bird.

I love me some social media, but there is something unsavoury about seeing a CBC Radio Producer whine like a bitch in the comments of YouTube.
It just doesn't seem all that Canadian National Broadcastery to me.

Let's move on.

I said let's move on? Can we talk about something else besides bodily fluids and Jian Ghomeshi? I'm reading this on my lunch hour, for Christ's sake.

Ben better than Strombo? Hard to believe, but I'll be the judge of that.

Heheh. That's pretty good stuff.

Hahah. Is this for real? This guy is on fire, whoever he is.

Dude is tweeting Chinese fucking links.

Forget about better than Strombo, he's the Goddamn Twitter Grand Master.

Respect.

Things to do (while you wait for CBC to lay you off)

2009-04-24T09:58:00.000-05:00

stockpile pens and note pads
book all the massage therapy your benefits will cover
take your lunch hour
drink on your lunch hour
drag out story meetings with inane anecdotes about your kids and/or pets
have the office affair you thought shouldn't (or wouldn't)
have your best suit dry-cleaned

More With Less

2009-04-23T12:53:00.003-05:00

I still remember that visit by Harold Reddekopp in 1995. The real reason I remember the day so vividly is that I accidentally bit into some sort of fishy croissant sandwich that seemed tasty on the tray. Not wanting to seem uncouth in the presence of quasi-CBC-royalty I managed to swallow the foul-tasting bite but felt quite icky for a long time afterward.

I should tell you that I'm not much of a writer. This explains my use of the work 'icky'. I say this because I honestly didn't start out trying to tie together my fishy sandwich bite with the equally fishy mantra of Reddekopp.

Well...sometimes you're good and sometimes you're just lucky; and I was definitely lucky there. I hope it stays with me through this post because the odds always seem to favor failure.

Can I introduce myself?...I'm a man of panache and wealth. And I want to save 13 regional CBC radio stations that are sound in mind, body, soul and health.

To those actually working in regional CBC Radio, reading this while on duty: you'd best get back to work because your manager is very, very nervous. And working hard 'behind the scenes' to save your station and 'manage through the cuts'. Watching your every move is a key part of this effort, so you wouldn't want to attract any attention right now. Just having this on your screen is likely setting off some sort of alarm in your boss' office (there's a REASON why you can't change the desktop background on your Dalet PC). Just be confident that behind the scenes, your manager is working hard to save your station; and by station I mean their own ass. Right now, as we speak, your manager is getting a continuously updated worksheet of pre-spun phrases, rolled out in unison across all locations. And because they're pre-spun, they go down smooooth. Don't kid yourself, these phrases are designed to keep you calm in the non-postal sort of way and hopefully will convince you to not attend rallies or write letters to the editor. See?...doesn't it seem like you're NOT in the cell block having just dropped your soap.

And speaking of asses, there is lot of kissing of them going on and a lot of tensing of them. All staff are making sure their manager knows how key their role is; and how their co-worker's isn't as. Front-line managers are making sure their managers are impressed with their ability to quash the dissent while lending a sympathetic ear and taking notes. Most front-line managers are so tense right now you couldn't pull a needle out of their anus with a pair of pliers. That's some tense. And mildly arousing. But the manager's office door will remain open even though it's closed pretty much all of the time. No, it's not the mushrooms you took; it really is confusing.

So suck up while you can; there's only a few weeks of this left and you still may be able to save your own job. Make sure you point out what should be cut in open meetings. Maybe you should have thought about upgrading your skills at night instead of wasting your time on booze, bad TV shows and the opposite (or same) sex. What the CBC really needs right now in its' smaller stations is for everyone to be formally trained Journalists. Also helpful if they can field-strip and service a DaletPlus PC, operate a switchboard and host. It's a hybrid job; Reporter/Editor/Producer/Media Librarian/Host/Tech/Receptionist/News Reader; and bilingual. Band 2. (Thanks, JE!) Posting to come.

That's some funny shit; I know.

But the message today isn't for regional radio; it's for the big-city-folks; those who will remain post-apocalypse to man the BCBC; the Big City Broadcasting Corporation. This is for those of you who have kept your heads down and kept silent about the gutting of small regional stations. We know why you're ignoring the gutting of the small stations. We get it; you don't want to ruffle any feathers. You're playing dead hoping the bad man won't unzip. Better take the next elevator.

And where's our union in all of this? We're not hearing from them how the cuts are not equal and will decimate smaller regional stations while leaving the 'big' regional stations in Toronto and Ottawa basically untouched. It might be politically dangerous for them to take that position because if the 13 gutted stations are saved, it would mean layoffs in the big cities where all the votes are and where the memories are as long as the commutes. The $7 solution is great, but that campaign should have been started last year when the Heritage Report came out. To the small stations who are drowning and need a life preserver; the union has thrown them an air conditioner.

And what about the 'new relationship' with management? Apparently it means STFU and take it. Don't make waves lest it mess up the group-grope-Mazzola-orgy that defines the new relationship.

So people in Toronto; staff, management and union... Your silence is notably unhelpful; and shameful.

If the CBC were reporting on this same story at a different company, they'd get eaten alive.

Instead we have...nothing...silence.

I remember crackling embers
Coloured windows shining through the rain
Like the coloured slicks on The English River
Death in the marrow and death in the liver
And some government gambler with his mouth full of steak
Saying, "If you can't eat the fish, fish in some other lake.
To watch a people die -- it is no new thing."
And the stack of wood grows higher and higher
And a helpless rage seems to set my brain on fire.

And everywhere the free space fills
Like a punctured diving suit and I'm
Paralyzed in the face of it all
Cursed with the curse of these modern times

CBC management's latest reality show piloted in Sudbury

2009-04-23T10:23:00.001-05:00

Hits to the hinterlands mean half the jobs and half the staff at the ceebs in the Nickel City.

Tune in as CBC management issues the ultimate northern challenge: the CBC Sudbury station still doesn't know where its cuts will fall, but it must submit a plan for what future programming will look like. Watch and vote as this group of castaways slugs it out on the slag pile.

Who will come out on top? Which reporter will be the first to dig up the dirt on the latest multi-national mining company to test Industry Canada's metal? Which host can summarize weather for a region three times the size of New Brunswick the fastest? Who will successfully pitch a trip to Ontario's far north in time for the next evacuation from a Cree reserve during spring break-up?

Don't miss the next immunity challenge episode... staff hit highway 144 to Timmins in the ancient station vehicles, out of cell phone range, in search of roadkill. Up for grabs? Two weeks of stress leave.

Grab yourself a pickled egg and pint of OV, it's a Sudbury Saturday night and you've got front row seats.

Enter the Infomatrix!

2009-04-22T21:02:00.008-05:00

Aloha #nerds, @nerdettes and 1eetSpeekrz alike! Patrice Nortel here, freshly drafted by Ouimet to hit the Teamakers technology beat! OK, here goes ...

More @Penne Noodles in #Styrofoam Please!

Looks like every Toronto CBCer's favourite place to meet and eat is moving into that big cyber-atrium we call the web. OOH LA LA is now on Twitter!

The site is still in beta right now. Looks like it's being built offshore. You can get a sneak peek here:

http://twitter.com/oohlala

Once they finally unroll this thing, I'll be checking every 10 minutes to see what kind of toppings the producers of Tapestry get on their bagels!

CBC Museum Relocating to CD-ROM

Nowadays, saving a few dollars on real estate costs is a helpful step in keeping us all around, enthused, and quietly plotting to bump 25-year old casuals back to the soup lines.

Explore nearly 75 years of innovative, challenging and mostly English-accented on-air poo-pooing the quick and easy way. These richly documented folders of JPEG images have been carefully indexed and resized by archivists at the Corp for viewing on just about any PC.

Travel back in the CBC time machine to a golden era when radio careers started - not ended - with razor blades and hallucinations!

IO WTF?

A CBCer writes:

Patrice, I really want to watch the io! portal video streams for all these important meetings of late. Every time I click on the link, I just get a blank, busted page. Any quick tips to get this working?
- Static in Saskatoon

Hey Static - don't get in a tizzy - just remember that we're not simply making a web page link to a video. More, we are striving to deliver a rich media user experience across a world-wide, in-house broadband network-enabled and supported microcomputer system.

As my grandmother used to say "you can't pick your nose and expect to pull out a raisin!"

With io!, you can pull out raisins every day! This handy link should make it all a LOT simpler for the next announcement ... jot it down on a post-it so you don't forget.

https://portals/portal/intranet/new_Document/io/Microsoft Shared Data Objects/rich-content/media/logiciels/doc!Root/../_~Shared Microsoft Media/Context/io/Media/---Carnovale_cellPhone/#/Server/TORNWS/pub/scope/My Documents and Settings/Solitaire/---webclips/assets/programs/network/io/io/io/stream 99203049-- --2920494920HXSKDIIWJ@H#.aspx

Well, that's about it for now. Keep sending in those tough tech questions and scorching bits of gossip from inside the CBC firewall to patrice.nortel@gmail.com. Full anonymity/pseudonimity is guaranteed!

Billy . . . Bob . . . Thornton!

2009-04-22T07:04:00.001-05:00

Robbed

2009-04-22T03:59:00.009-05:00

Peter MacNeill is one of the most accomplished actors in Canada.
He is respected by every other actor in the country.
You saw him on the 11th Hour. Never used at his full potential.
He's had bit roles in many Hollywood-type movies, ones mostly shot in Canada.
You may have seen him in Kevin Costner's Open Range, or as a regular on Queer As Folk.

Peter has that hardened look of having lived a deeper life.
His presence on stage and on screen is the epitome of Willie Lohman in "Death of a Salesman", he comes across as wise and tough, but caring if need be.

Every actor in Canada would stand up and say Peter MacNiell is as good as it gets, on this side of the border at the very least.
Every actor would gladly share a scene with him.
He's competent, credible, and charismatic.
In other words, his ability to act is never in question.
And that's why he has been, for some time, a successful professional actor.

When you take an actor like that, and put him in the role of a detective, a man with personal problems and foibles, you have a role that's made for that man, and a man who's made for that role.
And every actor in Canada will concede that holds truest of all in this case.

The perfect actor for that role, and the perfect role for that actor.

It is only as an aside that it may be mentioned that he is Canadian, that he is from New Brunswick.

To have one of, if not the, primary roles in a good TV series can be the turning point in anyone's career.
The "Da Vince" moment, that makes an actor or actress an identifiable national fixture. Or call it the "Erica" moment.

Yes, rejections are routine, and plentiful since the acting profession is basically a succession of part-time jobs forever.
That's show biz.
But having a chance like this being taken away after you've been cast once in a dream role, has got to be a bit hard to take.

And for what reason was it taken away?

What reason is the CBC giving for depriving an accomplished Canadian actor of a role he can so naturally and competently fulfill?
And fulfill it likely better than any other actor in Canada.
This particular role.

The answer has absolutely nothing to do with his ability.

Another Bad Omen For "The Republic of Doyle"

2009-04-21T22:45:00.004-05:00

First one big mistake, and now another.
When you read Denis McGrath's gleeful news that he'll be working on upcoming scripts for the show, it becomes even more apparent that Republic of Doyle is in deep trouble.
First they rip the heart out of it by removing part of the cast. Then they inject the soulless bag of wind that is Denis.
Either the producers are worried that they can't pull the show off using the abilities that got them this far, or else the CBC is pulling strings all over the place.
Making demands, changes, or else no series.

But the CBC is not run by creatives. It is run by accountants, and commissioners of surveys.
They have no clue what makes for a good show. They look at numbers to tell them what to do.
And to look at DMc for answers and actual worthwhile content, is a measure of desperation.

At the rate it's going, a documentary titled Anatomy of a Show about the process of how this show was brought into being (including original footage already in the can) would easily be far more dramatic and illuminating and entertaining and captivating than even the series itself could ever be.
Some might even find it all a bit funny, if there weren't such a dark cloud hanging over it.

Sadly, it's too late to bring in Chris Haddock to kick some CBC ass off the set.

And Evan Solomon gets a children's show

2009-04-21T22:25:00.003-05:00

Finally, people who can match wits with him at his level.

Take that, Chomsky!

John Doyle Is Stupid

2009-04-21T18:26:00.009-05:00

John has been watching way too much television.
Generally, when we say that about someone, we're trying to convey that they're gullible. They believe everything they see.
In John Doyle's case it's the opposite. He believes nothing.
No one is going to fool the intellectual television writer for The Globe.
He can see past the charade, expose the fakery for what it is.

He looks down his nose at anyone who was thrilled and taken in by Susan Boyle and her incredible performance on Britain's Got Talent.
We're all hypocrites in his eyes, and stupid to fall for another one of Simon Cowell's tricks.
Everything in the universe is superficial and phony.
Except of course John Doyle's opinion and insight.

- it's possible we have been expertly manipulated
- There is something far too slick and staged about the clip
- The idea that Cowell was completely taken aback by Boyle's voice is simply too far-fetched.
- it is entirely plausible that Cowell and his cohorts deliberately set out ...
- it's perfectly possible that she is a phenomenon foisted upon us.
- We've probably been hoodwinked into this.

Over and over again, he can't quite come out and say it in so many words.
He's suspicious, but has nothing to go on.
It just seems too good to be true.

But it is indeed true.
Susan Boyle is the real thing, and what took place that night was a genuine surprise, and it was thrilling.
For once, television captured an authentic moment not related to news or home videos. The intensity of the emotion in the hall explodes on the screen, and everyone watching is blown away.

I've watched or heard the clip nearly a hundred times. It loops in the background as I write a post for Tea Makers.
And I'm not ashamed to confess that tears are streaming every damn time. I feel like Pavlov's dog, it's simply so automatic and uncontrollable.
And I too was curious about how television was able to capture that moment so well.

There are some things you need to know.
The people who audition for Britain's Got Talent are nothing like the gell-haired moppets that dominate the Idol shows. There are dancers and jugglers and magic acts and pet tricks, and in his homeland Simon Cowell is respected and loved, as you saw from Susan herself.
The show is in its third season, and is a tight package of hilarious idiocy that reminds one of the old Gong Show. But you are always tipped off that something unique is about to happen with one of the contestants. The two stage handlers who double as M.C.'s will focus in on someone, provide some biographical background, sometimes a still shot from a family album, and then it's out on to the stage.

The show is edited, and not broadcast live.
That's what I found especially amazing about the few minutes spent with Susan Boyle.
The visuals were fast, and they seemed to capture everything that was going on so perfectly.
How could anyone in the Control Room be so good at knowing exactly where and when to take a picture, of the audience, of Susan, of the judges? Bang, bang, bang. The director seems to be everywhere at once and almost seems to anticipate where the next great moment would be. I've never seen a better series of cuts.
Even the interruptions by the two genial hosts are timed perfectly with the music.
How can it be so good?
Because it's taped and edited of course.
As an example, not that you need it, I'll direct your attention to the arc of Susan's left arm as the scene shifts from front to backstage.
Watch closely as her arm swings down.

Another favorite moment, and there are many, is that fleeting instant, ten seconds into this clip, where you see the girl in the white sweatshirt captured in that rare moment of having her heart in her throat as she exhales. A split-second you almost never see.

So many things were right about that moment, and the entire story as it unfolded.
The chosen song itself could not be more powerful or more appropriate.
Susan delivers it as if she'd been on Broadway for twenty years. Masterful, and nearly perfect.

Doyle wants to cheapen the moment, holding it up as an example of our unfounded faith in humanity. To the extent that you were stunned by her talent is the extent to which you are a hypocrite.
But it is those who are without faith who are truly irrational and illogical.
To look at the world and fail to see the beauty and hope that infuses all of reality is to be just plain dumb.
John fancies himself to be the little boy yelling the Emperor has no clothes!, when in fact he's actually the same as a couple of characters from a different children's story. Much more like both the Scarecrow, without a brain, and the Tin Woodman, without a heart.

The Corrie Effect

2009-04-21T13:05:00.000-05:00

jDoyle:

[T]he suppertime news program would move forward to 5:00 p.m., and suddenly grow to 90 minutes....[L]ocal news is being parked at an earlier hour so that Coronation Street can air at 6:30 p.m., and then, in the 7:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. hour, Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune will run....
It’s not about the news. It’s about scheduling. Those game shows get lots of viewers. If most stick around to watch CBC dramas and comedies at 8:00 p.m., then the ratings go up, up, up. CBC is not doing you a favour by offering 90 minutes of local news starting at 5:00 p.m. – it’s doing itself a favour by getting the boring news stuff out of the way earlier.

How do you “get something out of the way” by making it bigger? If what matters is the 7:00-to-8:00 slot, who really cares what aired before then? Really, would his argument change if the two game shows were moved but The Simpsons stayed put and the news stuck to an hour?

Those game shows have something for everybody who hates or loves the CBC. (United for the first time!) The shows are expensive (allegedly – I’ve read no published figures). They pull in ad revenue (allegedly – I see a lot of promos). They’re American, a cardinal sin. They’re the wrong kind of vulgar.

Whereas The Simpsons, soon to be cancelled, is the right kind of vulgar, so we can overlook the fact it’s also American. And Coronation Street? The national governing broadcaster obviously makes more sense as the permanent home of this ITV staple than, say, BBC Canada does. Corrie has the good sense to avoid being American – or vulgar in a way Canadians actually notice. (How is this show really worse than The Tudors?)

An all-Canadian CBC Television is unattainable, is it not? Hasn’t CBC Television run American and British shows for decades? Should it really matter where the foreign programming comes from? Or do we just want to rid CBC of American influence, all the way down to its newscasters?

Is CBC TV Helping Or Hurting Canada?

2009-04-20T14:29:00.001-05:00

Guessing that when the government of Canada gives you a billion dollars a year to produce Canadian shows, that would be considered helping Canada.
But when the CBC insults Canadian actors and deprives them of an opportunity at employment and success, that might be considered hurting Canada.

Last Saturday morning, The Globe partially let the cat out of the bag by announcing that Republic of Doyle had been given funding approval for what looks like a sure-fire hit.
But the article used words like "quietly", "secretive" and "awkwardness", and for good reason.
Those are the methods often used when you betray your country.

When the pilot for Republic was viewed by CBC brass it garnered raves, as the saying goes. Not surprising when you consider the cast.
That the show is filmed on location in the haunting beauty of Newfoundland doesn't hurt either, but scenery is not what attracts viewers.

The announcement of funding for a new series that could go for years and make Canadians proud is usually a time for celebration.
Instead, the "public broadcaster would not confirm the news", and CBC spokesman Jeff Keay said last Friday that a formal announcement would be made later in the week.
But the decision for the go-ahead had already trickled down to the producers, writers and the crew weeks ago. And the good news was mixed with shock and disbelief, particularly by those who had been on set during production.
As you read this, CBC brass are scrambling to contain the demoralizing damage their clever decisions have caused. Once again.
They want to stall as long as possible revealing what they've done.

CBC declares 'Republic of Doyle' too good to waste it using Canadians

2009-04-18T14:27:00.002-05:00

Always thinking of how to make a bigger profit, the CBC knows a good show when they see it.
And they know how to improve it.
Get rid of the Canadians.
After viewing the pilot episode of Republic of Doyle, CBC programmers were so enthusiastic with the show that they decided to give the go-ahead for more.
But with a twist.
Replace an excellent cast with foreign actors, in order to maximize potential profitability and overseas sales.
No reflection on the cast, just a reflection of CBC management's priorities.

For the CBC, it's a matter of supporting the arts in Canada and making a profit.
Or rather, the other way around.
Have we had enough yet of the CBC treating the country as second class?

Wait for their announcement, and explanation, later this week.

'My Date With Ouimet' would be better than this borefest

2009-04-18T14:07:00.007-05:00

Dragons' Den would be wiser to stick with mass producing widgets than funding movies.
The upcoming My Date With Hugh has all the earmarks of going straight to DVD, and just as quickly tossed into the trash bin.

Waste a minute of your life if you want to check out the trailer. Then ask yourself why would intelligent people think such a project would be of interest to anyone.
Was the CBC also party to this folly? Did they commit to airing it because surely sex sells?
In this case the only real boobs involved were the Dragons themselves.
Why didn't someone tell them that smart, decent, ethical, fair-minded, honourable people should not be in the movie biz.
They're so unsuited for it.

Broadcaster bailout and teh Gays

2009-04-17T12:31:00.000-05:00

Because there has to be a “queer” angle, doesn’t there?

April Outlooks (giant PDF), p. 11 (excerpted):

With so many media and news outlets in danger during this recession, do you think the government should have a role in helping them out?
Conservative Senator Nancy Ruth (Ontario – Cluny): Yes and no – it depends on how it is done. What the government has chosen to do is to keep those who make content still in business. They’re not going to bail out the Asper family for their debt load; but the CBC is crown-owned, so they’re already funded. They will help with jobs, and that’s what the Canada Media Fund is – over $134 million this year supporting programming.
Part of the outlay for the broadcast industry is that people get more choice – people get what they want, when they want it, and I think that’s also true for the queer community, and that some of that programming money will go into that as well. We won’t help the corporations; but we’ll help the corporations stay relevant, and they’ll hire actors and set designers and program scriptwriters, and all the people that go into making shows and increasing the content.

Then there’s a response from actual gay Scott Brison, more about copyright than anything else.

A Fear Of Death

2009-04-17T02:20:00.004-05:00

Leonard Cohen doesn't give bad interviews.
The full forty minutes can be seen here.
It is quite dull and boring, because the questions are often silly and dumb, but there's the occasional good one thrown in.

The only moment that had any impact came after the interview was over, and it was a very good one.
As is so often the case, that's where the interview should have started.

Jian The Journalist

2009-04-15T23:43:00.011-05:00

Why is Russell Smith trying to ingratiate himself with the CBC?
He writes a piece in The Globe touting the tougher standards of journalism here in Canada and at the CBC than most celebrities may be used to during promotional appearances.

Is this a joke?

Journalism, as an art and as a public service, is generally thought to be characterized by two key elements: probing questions that elicit new information.
Smith goes on record, in reference to the Billy Bob Non-Blow-Up appearance, to say ...

that interview should strengthen the reputation of Jian Ghomeshi as a serious interlocutor on questions of art

That's over-the-top to the level of being absurd.
Did he listen to the same interview as the rest of us?
Are these the questions that Russel Smith would have asked? Apparently so, if he were as skilled as Jian:

( already knows and states the answer )
~ you guys formed only in the last couple of years , right?
~ and you've made three records in that time?
~ and you're currently on tour with Willie Nelson?

and continues
~ Have you done shows with Willie Nelson before?
~ What do you learn from Willie Nelson?
~ Did Willie choose you guys to come on tour with him?
~ Tell me about the decision to include an entire record of covers.
~ (did the fusion of the two genres) always seem natural to you?
~ do different audiences react to you in different ways?

Easy with the probing there, Jian.
Russell considers these to be serious questions, coming from a "tougher journalistic culture".
Nonsense.
The questions, one could almost term them a script, are obvious and predictable.
The same ones the group would be asked anywhere by anyone.
No new information.
Not even, "tell me about your backgrounds", or the standard "why did you choose that name for the group, The Animals?"

Whoa.
Did I just come up with some obvious questions?
How about that. I'm qualified to be a tough CBC "journalist"!

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Twitter

2009-04-14T13:22:00.013-05:00

It's true that former President Robert Rabinovitch wasn't exactly a "people person." Also, he knew nothing about broadcasting. And as a bureaucrat, he got us sweet dick-all from Ottawa. This website busted his balls repeatedly but they were clearly balls that needed busting.

The current president, Mr. H. Lacroix, is a different story altogether. I think he likes us. He sure likes telling us what's going on. And this website might bust his balls every now and then but it's more of a playful tickling of said balls rather than a full-on death grip.

Despite all his emails, one can never have enough news about the CBC, right? What could be more important than Canada's public broadcaster? Nay, this nation's very culture!

So once again, we turn to twitter for this.

Sounds good to me! Now I'll have something to talk about at work. Where do I sign up?

You know, I mentioned this to the fellows at work and they had no idea what I was talking You must be authenticated to access shorten

Yep. Something def wrong here.

Let's check in on AboutCBC headquarters and see what the problem is:

Um, I'll come back later.

A day? Or 2? This is twitter feed, not the Sistine Chapel ceiling!

Maybe there's someone else with some CBC news? How about this guy, CBCdweeb? Surely he has something?

Jesus christ, what an eyesore. Isn't there anyone a little more sane?

Thanks, AboutCBC, I'll go check them out!

Who the hell is this know-it-all? He's neither About nor Dweeb, twittering under what is an embarrassingly un-CBC-branded handle.

Oh wait. Apparently he's "JB" of CBCNewsDesk and has a horse in this race. He also twitters about the CBC.

Just imagine! If every one of those followers clicked on a link, even by accident, why, that would be somewhere around 10,000 clicks! Or thereabouts!

So it's desk vs dweeb action now, eh? That's the way you like it, eh JB? Well, let's see what CBCdweeb has to say about that:

FUCK. F U C K !!!!!!!!!!!! :-(

Has anyone seen the paper?

Keep Dreaming, CBC

2009-04-14T10:58:00.003-05:00

Hopefully the CBC will eventually put the horrid "Q TV Blow Up" video behind it and replace it with a more uplifting and encouraging broadcast moment.
It can happen, if you just keep trying.
In this clip from Britain's Got Talent we see some of the most amazingly timed switching, cutting from one scene to another, so good you'd think it was all a scripted movie.
A favorite moment was the inclusion of the pushing of the button.

Susan Boyle - 47-letnia śpiewaczka z brytyjskiej wersji “Mam

Uploaded by luloczek

UPDATE: April 16

Watch CBS Videos Online

Reality Therapy

2009-04-14T05:39:00.003-05:00

The odds are always in favour of failure, as Dr. William Glasser will tell you, if not life itself as it does every day. Success can only be drummed up up to a point.
But predicting is a mugs game. There's no way anyone knows the future for sure, let alone that it really really was true that the entire economy and government was a sham. Who knew?
Everyone. And kept their mouths shut.

Doyle takes the provocative (hey, this is after all about selling newspapers), yet mild risk of predicting the end of CBC Television.
And no surprise, he contradicts even that view by concluding that his prophecy for the CBC TV is that it will be ... wait for it ... "Same as it ever was".

But CBC TV will not fail, even if it deserves to.
Nor will it be the "same as it ever was' because it was once really great, though that seems a long time ago now.
It was great because in part it was the only game in town. It didn't have to compete with anything else. It could concentrate on just putting on good shows, the best they could figure out to do, while still trying to figure out how to use the medium itself.
But that changed, especially with the growth of two other aggressive networks who didn't have to worry about offending the government. The success of private businesses is always in the best interests of the government, a nosey Fifth Estate is not.

The rise of the internet put further pressure on the CBC, or maybe a better analogy is that it let the air out of its tire. With a vastly growing field of choices people were less and less interested in or impressed by the CBC. And nor did they need the CBC as much any more, except for news. And that's good enough coming from the radio.

Everyone knows that CBC TV is in trouble (and yes, it's all George's fault), and that was true long before the recession.

So change is inevitable.
But another change overtook the CBC that was not inevitable.
And it is what has hurt the CBC more deeply and profoundly than anything else.
The campaign to become popular.
Not good, just popular.
And we saw the result, as John describes in his article.
The CBC lost credibility. It became a disappointing joke. The country experienced a slow souring about the way they were seeing themselves being portrayed on the air.
As wannabe rock stars, whether pushing aside The National in favour of The One or the relentless hyping of a cheap show and declaring George and all that he is as being the embodiment of the soul and spirit of the CBC.
A bubblegum journalist gets all the attention.
The CBC throws their fortunes and brand into one basket. A basket lined with Strombo 8 X 10 glossies.
No wonder the real reporters are so lifeless and disinterested. They don't matter any more.
In its drive to become popular, the CBC ignored its soul, ignored the real reason it even exists.
To make us proud.
Not to make us think it's all just a game of people prefer one color branding over another and want lots and lots of jokes and sexy melodramas.
The CBC is not that good at that stuff.
Please don't tell me The Border was good. The most obvious thing about it was that it was never good enough. It was no Da Vince and it was certainly no American contender.
All the CBC has become good for is hockey and news, the two things it can be the very best at doing.

I predict that CBC TV will never be the "same as it ever was".
It can't survive that way.
And it will survive because we will insist that it does. And will do it ourselves if we have to.
But it will also have to get real. And that goes for George too.
As soon as he figures out what the term means.

A Silly Boy

2009-04-14T02:02:00.002-05:00

The moment he came in to view on Play, how could we know we would be stuck with him forever.
Supercilious, smarmy, smart.
And a great vocabulary to boot.
And he looks good in a suit, but has this smile that says you think I'm cute right?
And he's quick and alert and doesn't do drugs.
A reliable go to for a quick plug from a fly by celebrity.
But everything is superficial about him. You lose interest, he gets in the way.
You wish he'd shut up and let Leonard talk. We came to hear Joni Mitchell not the bouncy jovial high pitch of the sound of his voice.
Didn't we get rid of him once already?
Wasn't that TV show cancelled, due to total and utter boredom lack of interest no matter who he had on?
And then there he was on radio giving out lists and any flimsy excuse for Canada Votes For Something and we spread the gig out over a month, and this guy just won't go away.
Now Q and website and cameras and Bold and he continues to leech off celebrities "acting" like an interested party when it's all about him, how insightful and musically and artistically informed he is when the guy played in just another failed dream band that went nowhere because it was just a lark anyway.
Actually saw on the net that he was being referred to as a Canadian rock star.
In what country would that be?
He's a very skilled wordsmith, you can't take that away from him. And now he writes for The soon to be dead National Post where teenagers have taken over, pretending, hey this is easy. And meaningless.
He's thought to be so successful. Based entirely on leeching off the celebrity of others. Revered in some quarters that others now want to leech off his celebrity on their way up to celebrity pay-off dominance.
But he offers nothing of value. He adds nothing.
He just stands near real talent, talks to real talent. And makes it somehow partly about him, as if he mattered one iota.
Me and L.C.
Only this guy would insert himself into the headline. And then put himself at the front of that line.

But this isn't new. Strombo and he are very similar in their approach. And let's face it there's only a couple of ways of playing that game. You're either serious or you're sociable. These guys are sociable. Game show hosts for conversation, but game show hosts like Bob Eubanks and Wink Martindale, the ones without talent, instead of Drew Carey or even the guy who started out Family Feud and made it a mandatory practice that he was allowed to kiss the contestants. Of course in George's case it would be a mandatory practice that he be kissed. On the cheek.
Was that the sound of moisture from the Stromboloopela group, just now?

He's a harmless, unavoidable, self-centered twit who has no serious grasp of life and what it's for. Or art and talent and why he possesses neither.
But we need guys and girls like him.

To service the stars.

Wake up, Strombo!

2009-04-13T17:12:00.000-05:00

Here's your chance, George, to step out from the shadow of Jian and re-gain the spotlight that's been fading on you and your career.
With a YouTube video that has eclipsed anything you've ever done, the universe has lost its balance, and your "boyfriend" status is eroding.
Though time is running out, there still exists a golden opportunity to be the first to get the next substantial interview with the fascinating Billy Bob Thornton.
We need clarification, George. We need your special brand of diplomacy to bring peace.
You know the issues involved here, and your way around a plate of mashed potatoes.
You could become BBT's BFF.
Seize the moment, George, before someone else takes over this Gravy Train.

Trouble with DaletPlus? Exterminate!

2009-04-13T07:20:00.002-05:00

Was that dead air on World Report at 7am on Radio 1 in Toronto? How was your DaletPlus weekend? How is your DaletPlus Monday doing? Have any stories to share? This is the place...

... what gave it away? ...

2009-04-13T02:08:00.005-05:00

~ being in the same band for over 30 years?
~ 19 Grammy nominations?
~ induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame?
~ Billboard Century Award for lifetime achievements?

"... you seem very passionate about music ..."

~ Jian Ghomeshi to Tom Petty

You got a lot of nerve

2009-04-12T15:37:00.005-05:00

you got a lot of nerve to say you are my friend

~ POSITIVELY 4TH STREET LYRICS

then less than a minute into the show, you announce to the world, in front of all of us that the only reason we're on the show is because of who i am, that you're not interested in the music or anyone else in the room, but you're perfectly willing to go through the charade of doing an interview about hillbilly music, faking your way through it, feigning interest when you have none.

you agree to have us on to talk about the music.
you agree not to bring up my acting career. you look me in the eye and promise.
you tell me you're interested in my music and the band, and then tell the country that you need to put our appearance "in context", meaning the only reason we're here is because of who i am

you say that you don't compromise, that no one controls your questions, yet when i ask you on the air, just as i did before the show started, to only discuss the music, you say you're fine with that, you say you're cool with that.
isn't that what I asked for before we started? isn't that what you already agreed to before we had to negotiate the arrangement all over again on the air?
you lied to me, and then smile and act like you're my friend, and expect me to just go along with you and act like I trust you, like you, respect you, when you've just shown that you have no respect for me or my music, that, again, we're only here because of my acting achievements, never mind the other accomplished musicians sitting here with me today

they answer your questions politely, but you've already made it clear you don't care.
you keep addressing me, trying to draw me into the conversation, get my voice on the air, because that's really the point isn't it, get Billy Bob, use his presence to draw listeners, pretend to be interested while telling the world you're not at all interested

are you a man of your word? are you someone who can be trusted, trusted to act in a manner other than in your own self-interest?
you acknowledge on the air that there was a discussion prior to the show between us and your producer. you were fully informed about it. if you had no intention of abiding by it, then why didn't you tell me before we started taping? why put me in that position, of finding out on live TV that within a minute you've broken our agreement. now what am I supposed to do.
do you think this is all a joke to me?
you think this is my latest passion? I played in a band before I became an actor.

you're very slick at what you do here, I can see that. you have all the questions ready - when did you first get together, what were your musical influences - all the standard questions, as if you care or that any of it mattered to you, when you already told everyone you have no real interest in any of it. then why are you doing this? as a public service, in the interest of the audience? or in the interest of yourself?

Still slow to refresh

2009-04-12T10:53:00.003-05:00

They're always a little bit behind, but any day now there should be an update to the Business Travel and Hospitality Expenses of the CBC's top executives.
The pattern has been to post them three months after they've been submitted, and to only display the past twelve months.
That means the receipts submitted for Richard Stursberg during the last three months of 2007 are about to disappear from public view.
Seems a shame to let that happen.

Stursberg's expenses are of course necessary and vital to keep the Corporation running smoothly. And we look forward to a fresh list of bills for travel, meals and hotel accommodation. Particularly for the remaining months of 2008, when executives were first alerted to financial crises the CBC was facing. Word had it that it was in early October when top brass was notified that the shortfall was already at $30 million.

Is music your first love?

2009-04-11T18:00:00.003-05:00

Would you ask Billy Bob Thornton that?

Tweets of ill repute

2009-04-10T09:19:00.020-05:00

Good morning, social media fans, and welcome back to opensource happyland.

WTF! Blocked! By local television scribe and online diarist Denis McGrath! It's a heywriterblock! It's an outrage! What did I ever do to him?

Come to think of it, he's been distant ever since we made fun of his weight. And baldness. And criticized his writing for relying on quantity and cheap sentiment rather than quality and genuine emotions. But that was all in jest. Surely he didn't take us seriously?

And it's true that Tea Makers operatives infiltrated the comments on his website. But their only crime was in disagreeing with Denis. His usual solution to quieting dissent is to have the last word and then close comments. Or delete them outright. Chairman Mao style.

No matter. It's his blog. He can do what he wants. To be frank we have more pressing matters to deal with here.

Twitter is great for mainlining populist rage. But for nuanced reportage, society relies on the impartiality of the professionally trained mainstream media. It would be anarchy without it.

At least Global has the class to replace "EPIC DOUCHE" with "@#$%." That's professionalism right there, kids.

Enzo does some kind of radio journalism for 102.1 The Edge and from the look of his photo he should be able to recognize a tool when he sees one.

The CBC likes to remind us that the interview has generated thousands of comments on the Q blog. Just think! If each of those comments were one dollar we would have thousands of dollars!

But regular readers of blog comments know that not all comments are worth a dollar. And most of the comments on the Q blog can be summed up by: "LOL BILLY BOB THORNTON, EPIC DOUCHE."
Frankly, it's a little embarassing. Let's move on.

God bless Tiffany Burns at CBC Edmonton. She knows she should be on Twitter. She's not sure why, or what she should be doing there. Tiffany honey, don't feel bad. No one knows.

But most of the Twitter people are using computers. They can go to YouTube and watch the replay whenever they want. They don't have to wait until 6pm anymore.

It's fucked up, I know.

While it's true that no one really knows what they are doing, some know less than others. The Blogging Tories decided to put a hot tweet front and center of their web page at all times.

At least, I think that's what this is. The tweet is so arcane, archeologists in the future will write volumes trying to figure out what they are trying to convey here. In many ways, this screen grab sums up what's wrong with the whole party. Which would be laughable, if only they weren't running the country.

Here's another use of twitter. drewmack is from out of town. He went to some kind of nerd conference. There was a party afterwards at a bar. They gave him some booze tickets at the door.

I don't want to live in a world in which no one can operate free booze tickets without consulting their iphone. And god forbid you ask someone next to you. And what if it's a girl? drewmack should be blowing all the money he made doing SEO in Moncton on Brazilian girls in the Zanzibar instead of spending it on people who talk about Facebook all day.

But I digress.

Did you hear that, everyone? Matt Hartley from The Globe and Motherfucking Mail has told us to get over it and move on. Preferably by reading his Technology column in the newspaper where he'll show you how to use booze tickets with your iphone!

Not a chance, Matt Hartley. We're just getting started.

Christina, this is the big hope, isn't it? International media attention. The most viral video of the week. This is the watercooler stuff that the CBC has been dreaming of for the last 3 years. Far from being Jian's "hardest interview" he was no doubt cheering politely and internally as soon as the first barb was thrown.

Because the person who's gaining the most from all this is Jian Ghomeshi.

Pure poetry, Aaron.

Because in the end, that's all that matters. And no one can violate the sanctity of the artist. Not me, not Jian Ghomeshi, not Leslie Roberts from Global TV, not the Conservative party. Not Denis McGrath. Not Matt Hartley.

Not nobody, you asshole.

Apologies to today's other, and much funnier, Anonymous tweet reporter

Crucified by the CBC

2009-04-10T07:54:00.005-05:00

He's often accused of being strange, but he's never been called a liar.
Yesterday, press around the world condemned Billy Bob Thornton for his uncooperative behaviour during an interview with the CBC. He was labeled with every insult in the dicktionary, while interviewer Ghomeshi was nominated for a medal for bravery and politeness.
But at the heart of the dispute was whether or not there had been a prior agreement between the CBC and Thornton that his acting career would not be discussed.
The world press ignored this part of the story, gleeful to have found another YouTube moment unfairly described as "a meltdown".

When Thornton stopped his performance at Massey Hall to clarify the reason for his earlier uptight attitude, some members of the audience booed rather than hear him out.
Thanks to coverage by The Toronto Star, we have a chance to hear from both sides in the dispute.

Billy Bob Thornton

"Boo all you want, but I want to say something.... We're really happy to be here, but I need to say something. I talked to this a--hole yesterday."

"I sat down and talked with this guy. He and his producers say, `We promise you we won't say that' (meaning references to Thornton's acting career). The very first thing they said was that."

"I don't really like sensationalism," he added. "If you look someone in the eyes and promise them something, and you don't do it, you don't get the interview. That's the way it goes."

Jian Ghomeshi

"Our policy is that we don't allow anybody to tell us what we can and cannot say," said Ghomeshi. "Beyond that, it was this notion and the language that he used during the interview that I thought was unfortunate, that we were `instructed' to say this and that. And I think that does raise interesting questions about ideas around how much journalism is to be controlled, especially when it comes to arts and entertainment and culture, and I think that that's a concern."

Who is telling the truth?
Seems it doesn't matter to most people. Facts are irrelevant, as long as there's the slightest excuse to ridicule another celebrity.

Meanwhile, the CBC and Ghomeshi prefer to leave Thornton to fend for himself as seeming payback for exposing their hypocrisy.

It's a very old story.

Billy Bob Twits 1.0

2009-04-10T00:27:00.016-05:00

Down into the cess-laden twit-pit we go! Hopefully Twitter can provide some much needed context on the whole Billy Bob / Jian flap that has taken the world by storm ...

As Don, Peter and Shelagh always used to say, "happy Thursday!"

Wow. Brave twittering, Franca. I heard Jian beat the shit out of the last person who mentioned his music career.
Holy crap. Somebody give this obviously beleaguered CBC employee an EAP fridge magnet, quick!
Dude, I just tuned in to 99.1 right now, but I'm not hearing the interview. Do you have an audience relations dept. that I can send a bitchy e-mail to?

Uhhuh, the most painful truncation of the archaic english word 'interview' u'll vr reed awn-l1ne! Buddy, didn't you study 1984 in grade 10 English?

RRRGHG!!!! I'll tell you what I'm scratching my head about - the name of the fucking network that this interview aired on! Especially after your reporters did that axe-job on our 'luxurious' indoor smoking rooms. Don't make me hit CAPS LOCK, Astral Media.

p.s. - We know how many 'GPs' and Hammy Hamsters got killed flying around in that miniature airplane under those hot studio lights. But that's another story ...

... and then an astute Twitterian uttered the word PWNED and all was right in the world again. Remember, ill luck may befall if you don't retweet this seven times!

Apologies to the admittedly much funnier Anonymous auter of past 'twit-tiques'

Howard Stern on Billy Bob

2009-04-09T22:46:00.006-05:00

Image links to Howard Stern Radio Show clip
April 9, 2009
using a few words you won't hear on
CBC Radio 1, 2 or 3

"autograph my gravy?"

2009-04-09T20:50:00.006-05:00

Caption:

http://houndstv.ca
TORONTO (HoundsTV) Apr 9, 2009 - Billy Bob enters Massey Hall in Toronto the day after his weird CBC interview as fans and media await. Billy says it's NOT Canadian audiences that are like "mashed potatoes without gravy." - IT'S THE INTERVIEWER JIAN

Parody

Caption:

Bite TV host Jason Agnew and special guest star singer/songwriter Justin Rutledge parody Billy Bob Thornton's infamous blow up on Q TV! Check out more awesome clips at www.bite.ca/thesurf

Jeremy Fisher

Caption:

eremyfishermusic
I step in as translator for Billy Bob Thornton on the CBC radio program "Q" with Jian Ghomeshi and it all goes terribly wrong. Watch the original interview here - http://tinyurl.com/cjajzb

CBC Radio 3

Caption:

cbcradio3
Popular indie musician, Shane Nelken, drops by for another interview at our CBC studios in Vancouver. But this time, he's changed his tune.

Single-sided, journalistically reprehensible transcription of nothing but Billy Bob Thornton’s utterances on ‘Q’

2009-04-09T20:02:00.000-05:00

[Mumbled greeting]

— That’s the ones that have been released. We’ve recorded about five.

— I don’t know what you’re talking about.

— Uh, I don’t know what you mean by that. [Clears throat]

— I’m not sure what that means.

— Hmpf.

— Uh. Never met him.

— I don’t really know him.

— Well, I said hello to him once. He’s a nice guy.

— No.

— Um. I don’t—

— No.

— Shit, I don’t know.

— I just liked baseball when I was a kid.

— Uh, I don’t know. Maybe.

— Uhh. I – I subscribed to a magazine called, um, Famous Monsters of Filmland, which was – the publisher was a guy named Forrest J. Ackerman, who passed away recently.

— They had a contest where you could build your own model, and it could be like a King Kong or it could be, it could be anything from something that you created yourself to like one of the monsters that was actually in – well, you know, in some of the magazines. It could be Frankenstein all the way to Phantom of the Opera. They made these plastic models in those days that you could buy and put together. But this was like a thing – if you create your own world of it, you know, build telephone poles, make the railroad tracks and everything. And I actually did enter it once. I didn’t win anything. But I gave it a shot. And, uh – but it was a big deal for us kids in those days.

— Ehh? Music? No, it was a monster magazine.

— Would you say that to Tom Petty?

— Yeah.

— Really?

— Would you explain why it’s not a hobby?

— Yeah, I am, I am, since you were instructed not to talk about shit like that, yeah, I am reacting to that, yeah.

— Well, the producer was instructed, so somewhere along the way—

— First of all, that wasn’t supposed to be mentioned either. You know. But, uh—

— Uh, not really.

— No.

— Yeah. That’s correct. That’s correct.

— Yeah.

— Well, I think it’s odd that you have to smoke inside of a white stripe outside. [Chuckle]

— Yeah.

— Well, there’s plenty of “context” without all that. Yeah. So.

— [Clears throat] We’re not really new.

— Well, I made eight albums.

— I don’t know.

— Well, what I’m explaining is we said do not talk about shit like that, and we also said that we didn’t want to hear anything about how this was my “first love.” You wouldn’t say that to Tom Petty, would you? “I understand music is your first love.” Well, my first love was a chick named Lisa Cohn, you know what I mean?

— Uhm, that’d be great.

— Yeah, it’s a mixture of the British Invasion with hillbilly music – something that I know more about than, say, a band who’s 20 years old that you wouldn’t say that to, yeah. I grew up as pretty much a music historian, so. Yeah, cosmic cowboy music.

— Not lately. Not in the last 30 years, no.

— Well, the good news is that Willie’s audience is pretty eclectic. He has everything from bikers to, you know, old people to young people, and so somewhere in there you find an audience. Or at least we do in Europe and the United States. Canadian audiences seem to be very reserved.

— Yeah.

— Uh, you know, we tend to play places where people throw things at each other, and, uh, here they just sort of sit there, you know? And it doesn’t matter what you say to ’em.

— Some are theatres. Some are like stadiums or whatever you want to call it. But, um, uh, it’s very, yeah, very, um – well, it’s mashed potatoes and no gravy, you know what I’m saying?

— Yeah. Yeah, you do, actually, on a lot of things.

— Yeah, absolutely. I’ve seen that in several of the shops.

— Um, the guys are gonna do an instrumental version of a song called “Turn It Over,” which is on this record that we have now.

— Um, I’m a drummer.

— No. We don’t cart those around at 6:00 in the morning.

[Clears throat twice]

— Absolutely.

— We’ll give it a shot.

Priorities

2009-04-09T17:44:00.001-05:00

Arts coverage, as defined by the CBC:

Ghomeshi admits that he'd sooner put an unaccomplished American band on his show than a Canadian band.
Because, you see, the American band has ...

"Quite frankly it took Arcade Fire three or four years to get a lot of attention. They are not going to be in the national papers or on a show like mine without the hook that Billy Bob's career trajectory is what it is. To kind of deny that is misplaced ..."

~ Jian Ghomeshi, host of national publicly funded radio show

Conceit & Control

2009-04-08T23:59:00.007-05:00

His introductions are unfailingly flattering, and filled with facts.
Yet it must be demeaning to have one's life and accomplishments encapsulated the way he does with each guest. Wrapped up neatly like a subjective Wikipedia entry, written by Jian Ghomeshi.
He tries hard to immediately put everyone on notice that he's smart. As if that were somehow really necessary for us to know.
And Jian is someone important, apparently to the CBC, and understandably in his own mind. Even though you won't see billboards of his face all over downtown Toronto.
After only a few minutes in the presence of such an arrogant manner, a voice in the back of your head is asking him "who do you think you are?"

In the above clip. Jian backpeddles to save face in front of his audience.
No one tells him what to do. He's the star. The one person the show can't live without.

I wasn't instructed to ... I'm ... I'm instruct ... I'm not really instructed ...

But Thornton is right, Jian was instructed. So Jian pretends to be more truthful, and trips.

The producers told me that you didn't want to ... eh ... that they didn't want to focus on questions around your acting career, etc. And I'm cool with that.

Yeah, we bet you're cool with that, Jian, if you want to keep your glamorous job.
Even more bullshit, and covering up. Jian was clearly ordered not to talk about the acting career or movies. And he really did try. But he couldn't help himself, because in his mind, he's the most important guy in the room.Too important to be told what to do, either by a guest or a lowly producer.
Put yourself in Billy Bob's position, sitting there while some punk who has never met you says things about you like ...

he's always intended to make music, he just got sidetracked ... these days music is a major priority in his life ...

Really, Jian? You've got a total stranger, an Academy Award winner even, and their life all figured out, eh?
More than ever, you want to ask him, who the fuck do you think you are?

Recession Distracts CBC From Wake-Up Call

2009-04-07T21:11:00.003-05:00

insidethecbc doesn't explain where it got these shocking charts, which vividly display the real "death spiral" of CBC Radio One.

According to the graphs, at the rate at which the CBC was rapidly losing audience share before the recession hit .....

..... by this summer no one would be listening to it any more.

When Can We Buy Us Some CBC?

2009-04-07T19:06:00.002-05:00

Of the $171 million in cuts announced by Hubert Lacroix, 73% of that amount is to be realized by the selling of some CBC "assets".
And while many production cuts have been specifically named, no one as yet knows what real estate or equipment is going to be put up for sale.
CBC management has apparently found unneeded properties valued at $125 million, but has yet to inform potential buyers who to contact, let alone how they arrived at that number.

Could Hubert be stalling, or bluffing?

Borders

2009-04-06T17:54:00.005-05:00

George & George, The Hour

Further down the tweethole

2009-04-02T09:36:00.022-05:00

The twitter people have criticized these posts for doing it wrong. Tweets are sacrosanct and must be taken in context, they say. Tweets should not be fodder for cheap laffs. They tell me I'm too old and I don't "get it."

But nothing could be further from the truth. I get it. It's all about rapid communication. And for people in the public eye, it gives them a rare chance to interact with the public directly.

WTF BLOCKED! By John Doyle! It's an outrage! What did I ever do to him?

Come to think of it, he's been distant ever since he was caught plagiarizing from this site. No matter. If only they could block me from seeing his stinky TV cranny in the newspaper, the circle would be complete.

Besides, we all know that in the future, TV criticism will be delivered to us via twitter in real time.

Indeed, Honkerburger. I concur with that sentiment.

ctorbin, I have some good news and some bad news for you. The good news is that the CBC has nothing to do with Canadian Idol, so our shortfall won't effect that show. And the bad news?

Word up, dawg!
For some reason, which remains a mystery to me, the whole Hardcore CanCon genre of rap never took off.

Another great use of twitter is for CBCers to keep in touch with each other across the country like one big happy famiARRRG WTF? I just got stabbed in the fucking back! Serves me right for standing in front of CBCAaron.
I'm moving over here....

FWAAAGfor the love of God! Someone just shoved something up my ass over here!

It's a long story but the upshot is: anything you put on here I can read. And I have a million eyes and see pretty much everything. In fact, I see you reading this right now. Get back to work.
That goes for your boss as well.

Now, this is what I'm talking about. This is the kind of minutiae that people read twitter for, a brief peek into the lives of the people we see on TV, who travel in circles that we can only dream of, but at their core are just like us.

Let's move on.

Our mightiest Canadian dead tree columnists, using twitter to beg for interviews with glorified American nerds. Using default avatars. Twitter is indeed a savage land, and I can bear no more. Please, spirit, move on.

It's clear that twitter is best left to professional media people like us, who understand that it's best used like a rivet gun with which you hammer your message into the crania of the twitter people.

... wait for it ... wait for it, now...

... and done!

Hell, maybe the critics are right and I don't get it after all. Is there anyone here who does?

Succinct. Pithy. Concise. Without pretense, deceit, or cheap sentimentality.
I couldn't have written it better myself.

Inside the CBC blogs about spoof of Inside the CBC

2009-04-01T13:33:00.005-05:00

And now if you look at this home page long enough you will find yourself getting sucked into an infinity vortex of meta.

Answers to a few of your questions

2009-04-01T12:52:00.000-05:00

Last week was a long and difficult week for all of us.

I know that you got, and are still getting, more details on how the changes will affect our operations from your respective management teams. We still have a lot to work through and talk through. We’ll keep doing that.

On financial flexibility

People have been asking if we still would have had to cut jobs if we’d received a $125 million bridge loan from government. Our shortfall was too important ($171 million) to only handle it through this bridge loan. The only way for us to not have seen job cuts would have been to receive new, additional and permanent funding to make up for the loss of our advertising revenue and the other budgetary pressures I talked about. We knew that additional funding wasn’t in the cards and wasn’t realistic, particularly in this Canada-wide financial context, so we did not ask for it. We built a plan to show that we could reimburse our requested loan over a five to seven-year horizon based on conservative and thus achievable revenue projections. That’s how we determined our $125 million request: we were, and still are, very confident that we could borrow $125 million and repay it over that time period and not risk endangering our corporation even more.

Our bridge loan would have helped us reduce the effect of the shortfall on our people and our programs. If received when requested, we could have implemented our reorganization plan sooner and accelerated its savings; a simple calculation shows that the cost per week of this reorganization not being started is about $3 million per week (remember that there is $158 million of budgetary pressures in the $171 million; take this $158 million and divide it by 52 to get the cost per week of not acting on the plan).

The alternative of selling our assets is also less attractive because it means that money we would be receiving over the next few years will disappear. We will be taking it now to provide our own bridge.

How many less jobs? How many programs saved? Frankly, I can’t answer that question exactly. Best way though is to start from 800 and work backwards. Cuts would have been important but it would have been easier to manage the downsizing and reduce its effects.

Strategic investment and re-investment

A second issue I wanted to touch on is whether, if our financial situation improves and can be sustained, we will reinvest it in the places we’ve cut. The answer is yes and no. Not a really good answer but let me explain.

All funds would (and should!) be directed toward things that push our strategic direction forward: in things that enable us to become a content company, to become the most important creator and distributor of Canadian content across all platforms, and to be deeply rooted in the regions.

These are the principles that will guide future investment and re-investment. So, would we invest and re-invest, for example, in our regional roots, presence and visibility? Absolutely. Would we necessarily reinstate a particular program or position in a particular place? Not so much.

Would it mean that we would reinstate the same number of positions in each station, exactly as we were staffed before the announcements? Not exactly. Some stations, some centers would perhaps get their resources back sooner than others, depending on markets, other media alternatives, strength of ad revenue potential, fairness between the communities served by CBC/Radio-Canada, costs relative to re-staffing, etc.

Would it mean that we would necessarily reinstate a particular program? Same yes or no answer as above, for the same reasons.

But I would again state: impossible for us to be a national public broadcaster without being deeply rooted in the regions. I know that some you are looking at the choices we made last week and saying: “Lacroix, we don’t believe you anymore! How can you say this when you cut 17 positions in Nova Scotia, or 13 in Windsor, or 8 in Sudbury, or the only person in La Ronge?” You won’t like my answer: because we had to make difficult cuts and attempted, as best we could, to keep our presence in the regions. And we thought that we would do this by protecting our footprint.

The $60 million envelope

In case you haven’t heard about it, our Minister has now confirmed that CBC/Radio-Canada would in 2009-2010 be receiving the $60 million in non-recurring funding for programming initiatives that it has received each year since 2001. This amount was already included in our 2009-2010 budget. This confirmation doesn’t improve our current situation but not having received it would have been catastrophic. We are grateful for this announcement.

Voluntary Retirement Incentive Program

Some of you have also been asking about the Voluntary Retirement Incentive Program, which the Minister approved last Friday. About 780 of you are eligible for it, so I won’t get into the details here, but you can find out more here. And, if you’re eligible, you can also expect to receive a personalized information package in the mail.

More questions?

That’s all for now.

Obviously, there are other questions out there. We’re doing our best to compile them and provide answers on iO! for you, as we go. It’s something that will be updated regularly, so I’d encourage you to check it out from time to time. I’d also encourage you to talk to your managers regularly about all this.

Hang tough. We will get through this.

Hubert

‘Intelligence’ goes to Global

2009-04-01T08:14:00.002-05:00

Like, finally: Corpse-shitcanned critics’ darling Intelligence is heading to the amber airwaves of grain. Chris Haddock spat out a press release today (PDF only; go look it up yourselves) announcing that Global, the network that brought us Train 48 (also ET Canada), upped for a 13-ep run with second through ninth windows on Showcase, Showcase Action, BBC Canada, IFC, TVtropolis, Mystery, MenTV, and Scream. They’re gonna stream episodes at GlobalTV.com (embedded ads, Windows Media only), plus the Other Solitude gets a dubbed version on Séries+ and Historia. And – surely the pièce de résistance – the show will get the full CSI treatment on History Television, with all-day Intelligence marathons the weekend of September 19–20.

Of course I’m surprised. Even John Wells couldn’t sell the show down in Hollywood. But I looked Haddock up on MSN and he told me “its real... any port in a storm i always say.” I asked the U.S. embassy and Jeff Keay, but they wouldn’t comment.

So this is good news, right? Yeah, except: Conservative blog Small Dead Animals reports that Global execs insisted that series lead Klea Scott be swapped out for blonde funnygirl Carla Collins, star of the new Carlawood on Canwest property TVtropolis. (SDA commenter: “I know a guy from headquarters and he was saying the feeling was ‘bit too schwartzer for a series lead.’ ”) I don’t know what the hell they’re talking about – Intel plus Da Kink in My Hair would make a perfect CanCon double-header, would it not?

Reardon lives, bitches.

Still open for business

2009-03-30T20:55:00.003-05:00

Theo Moudakis, Toronto Star

It's a bit strange to read headlines and phrases that talk about "losing" or "saving" the CBC.
We are nowhere near losing the CBC.
All that seems to have happened is that the talk of a 5% cutback of services has given a bit more fuel to the many who are calling for reform.
The usual exercise in futility.

Where would The Barenaked Ladies be without the CBC?

2009-03-29T23:34:00.010-05:00

It's a common conceit amongst media bigwigs that they can make or break artists. That their valuable publicity machine and coveted approval must be sought at all costs "if you hope to make it in this biz".
That without CBC's Radio 2 on the air promoting tomorrow's emerging musical artists we wouldn't get the next Anne Murray or k.d. lang.
So millions have to be spent to create radio shows that play Canadian records, in order that Canadian musicians may thrive, and eventually get that big break in the States, and move out of Cabbagetown.
Away from Canada.
(no, we don't blame you, Niel, Joni, Avril ...)

But public taste can only be manipulated up to a point.
When the audience gathers, that musical act had better be able to deliver the Matthew Goods.
The bottom line is, either you've got it or you don't, and a radio interview with Jian or Mainstay Molly isn't going to give it to you.

Rock and rap don't rely on Radio 2 for exposure. They rely on a video and Much and MTV to make themselves stand out.

And yet it's easy to make a case that all the money spent on Radio 2 is useful because it means more exposure for Canadian musical performers, even if hundreds of other radio stations across the country are already required to do the same.(!)

And easy to declare that Canada is made culturally better and stronger with the funding and presence of Radio 2.

What's harder to do is to make the case that all of our artists couldn't possibly succeed without it.

The Canadian Multi-Platform Media Content Provider Corporation

2009-03-28T23:01:00.004-05:00

The CBC no longer sees itself as just a broadcaster.
Even The Broadcast Act of 1991 is so ... 1991.
It states that the mandate of the CBC is to be "the national public broadcaster .. (to) provide radio and television services ... in English and French". It doesn't say anything about the internet.
For all intents and purposes, the CBC has no business being on the internet.
It's a broadcaster, just as the name states.

But reading further in The Act we see that the CBC is to be "made available throughout Canada by the most appropriate and efficient means and as resources become available for the purpose".
Ah, now it's in the internet business.

And spending millions to be there; partying like it's 1995.
So it has become more than just a broadcaster, it has also become a publisher.
A publisher of all the gripes the population has about the CBC.
And of news, weather and sports information, almost in direct competition with newspapers.
The CBC hasn't just beamed its programming via the internet. It has now created a new printed version of itself as well, and so is no longer only a broadcasting enterprise.

But it'll probably keep the name for a while longer, as a quaint reminder of its historic roots.

What's it all about, Alphonse?

2009-03-27T15:02:00.011-05:00

That's kind of the thing isn't it, Bill?
What is the CBC for?
A repeater station of American shows?
What is the point of the CBC?
To make a profit?

Bill Brioux writes the best TV column in Canada. Feel free to offer up the name of anyone better or equal.
It's always a great read, partly for the hard facts that he provides and partly because he writes like a lifelong fan of television shows and their stars.
When a program is a hit, and everyone is fascinated by it, where is the TV columnist that goes to Chicago and sits in the audience of the craziest show in North America, The Jerry Springer Show, and tells fans what it's like? Bill is the writer that would do it, while his peers stay home looking at preview tapes of some upcoming series, writing reviews as if they thought they were theatre critics.
The very best service that Bill provides is reporting the ratings. If you want the numbers on The Hour or Being Erica, Bill has them and lets the public read them.
That's my kind of reporter, though I might prefer a TV column written from the mind of Philip K. Dick.
And when television is interesting, Bill is interesting, and when isn't television interesting. So he's got a reasonably good gig, though it's probably a hustle to make it pay sufficiently.
He recently got a round trip to New York courtesy of Rescue Me, a show desperate for an audience, as are a lot of shows.

So I read that the CBC is canceling the Simpsons, and thought - I love The Simpsons, never tire of seeing it a dozen times. Went so far as to buy the episode guides at one point, several Bart dolls, and likely to buy a King Burger if it comes with a Simpson toy.
But The Simpsons is an American show, so understandably it can go from the CBC schedule. And isn't that show on somewhere on cable practically every few hours, and aren't they all re-runs that we already have on VHS, and don't we already have 19 seasons as avi files?
So not in any way a big deal to lose the afternoon CBC episode.

Not so to Bill Brioux

His TV FEEDS MY FAMILY BLOG - http://tvfeedsmyfamily.blogspot.com/
Direct link to the SIMPSONS POST -http://tvfeedsmyfamily.blogspot.com/2009/03/doh-cbc-sacrifices-simpsons.html

Look at what he's saying here ...

Ay, carumba! Ditching The Simpsons, part of CBC's slash and burn plan (as reported here in Variety), is a bad idea, man.

Scrapping an import like The Simpsons may sound like a good P.R. move and the right thing to do in this economic tailspin but in the long run it won't help the network attract the revenue it needs to dig itself out of this hole.

The CBC should keep the Simpsons because it makes money.
Never mind that it's American, we all love it so much. (well, yes, there's a good argument there IF none of the other channels had it, or refused to run it, or IF CANADA WASN'T THE MOST CABLED COUNTRY IN NORTH AMERICA!)

But there it is, the first problem with the CBC.
What's it all about, Bill?
Your argument becomes worse when you suggest that Jeopardy is OK too because there are two Canadian writers working on the show.

Like Jeopardy! (the only other CBC show my 16-year-old son watches) it is an evergreen that never gets old and always pulls in ad revenue. Plus it employs a few Canadian writers, including Tim Long of Exeter, Ont., and Joel Cohen of Calgary, who sneak in their share of Canadian jabs.

Selling out much, Bill?
Where does it end?

Here's my proposal, Bill.
Using the vast resources of the Federal government, and I'm talking cash, the CBC sets about outbidding every broadcaster in Canada for the rights to the absolutely big, sure-fire money makers. Up first "24". How much more Canadian can you get than that, eh?
But even that becomes irrelevant. Is there a Canadian intern working on the set of Desperate Housewives? No, then send one down.

You see, Bill, I don't think the purpose of the CBC was ever to make a profit.
Somewhere along the line the CBC got confused, perhaps we all did.
But any "profit" it makes is supposed to be based on Canadian creations, involving preferably a 100% Canadian production crew. A 100% Canadian writer telling a 100% Canadian story. That's the ideal, no matter how "unrealistic" or "unprofitable".

The reason the CBC is facing growing grumbling from the population is because over the years the proud Canadian soldier seems to have merged far too much with G.I. Joe.
And yes, I realize that generation of patriots is quickly dying off, as the CBC looks ahead to pleasing a new generation, one that is so hip it lives in a world "without borders", the global digital mind, man.

But it's pretty short-sighted when you start using tax money to tell and sell the American lifestyle.
I guess if George can compromise his country, it must be OK for all of us.

But not for me.
And not for the many who want to contribute to a vital Canadian broadcasting industry that exists.
Exists when a certain kid comes looking for a job at Much Music.

When it comes to the CBC, and not CTV or Global or the Rogers behemoth, we need more Canadian shows, NOT more profitable shows.

Where's the light in this tunnel?

2009-03-27T12:09:00.002-05:00

Is this a good time to be selling real estate?
Maybe the federal government would like to buy some CBC properties at "competitive" prices.
Or not.

But the curious thing is that while the CBC set itself a target of cutting costs by $171 million, the recession continues like an unstoppable glacier.
In October of last year, the figure that emerged was that of a $30 million shortfall, and management began to worry about their bonuses and staff morale (vis a vis their confidence in management).
By December it had swelled to more than $60 million, by February it was $120 million.
Doesn't this mean that all solutions are still "a work in progress"?

Printable versions of liveblogs

2009-03-27T11:42:00.001-05:00

If this blog had better CSS, this step would be unnecessary, but:

Plan B

2009-03-26T21:02:00.001-05:00

Liveblog of Richard Stursberg presentation on programming cuts

2009-03-26T15:39:00.002-05:00

Business Plan Update conference call starts 2009.03.26 14:02. (Printable version.)

STURSBERG: Well, thank you for coming. I know many among you and many of the people on the phone had a pretty horrible morning. There isn’tanything nice about any of this, and I know how difficult it is for so many people here in terms of the people and the shows and the things that we’ve been doing. There isn’t any happy way to do this. There is only a difficult way to do it.

What I would like to try to do today is talk about why we made the decisions we made, and then also show you in more detail – I think everybody has been spoken to in terms of what’s being affected, their shows and whatnot – I’m going to try to show you what’s affected in terms of English network as a whole. The logic of why it’s being done this way.

This is the beginning of the conversation, and we’re going to try to make sure that we create lots opportunities for people to talk and understand what’s going on and why it we’ve approached it the way we’ve approached it.

I know we’ve talked about this a lot in the past, but I do want to remind people, because it’s the core of how these downsizings are going to be managed. Things actually are working very well for us, and I know I’ve said this a number of times, but we need to keep in mind that radio is doing well. Radio’s share is at an all-time high. Television is doing very well. Last time an all-Canadian prime-time schedule has beaten an all-American? Never. Grown by 2 share? Never.

CBC.CA continues to be the number-one Web site in the country, and its growth seems to be accelerating – in unique users, page views, members. So it’s very important because it means all the work we’ve been doing has actually been working. So let’s try to keep our strategy to the extent that we can, given these difficulties.

How many people actually view one or other of our services every week? 20 million Canadians – almost 80% of the English Canadian population. That’s an extraordinary response to what it is we’ve been doing.

So I know we’ve been talking about this yesterday, but I’ll just maybe mention it again today. What we would like to try to do is, to the maximum extent possible, stay on strategy so that when the economy recovers we’re in a position to take advantage of it, and we have not destroyed those things, or have damaged those things, as little as possible.

(Keep Radio One and 2 share, and grow audiences on TV.)

News renewal, underway for two years now, is fundamental to CBC’s brand and has to continue. People in the regions, especially the Maritimes and some parts of Ontario who found the resources available to them have been reduced. We want to try to stay as much as we can anchored in the regions, but it is challenging. And we must, I believe, continue to invest in new platforms, even as we come through this difficult time (so we’re in a better position) so as not make the future hostage to the present difficulty.

Have to manage these resources in the context of our financial situation. How does this business actually work? How does CBC work? These numbers are 2007–2008, the last full year we have numbers for. The green bar is revenue, and the red bar is cost, and I’m going to walk you through this because there’s a lot of misunderstanding of things.

Procured programming means foreign shows – Simpsons, Coronation Street, American movies, etc. They make money, and they contribute to everything we do.

Professional sports makes money.

So one of the implications of this is if you cut these things you dig yourself a bigger financial hole. That’s all that happens. A lot of the conversation that’s take place in terms of Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune in the press is just silly. Either (A) give us more money so we can replace them with Canadian shows or (B) we do less Canadian shows. It isn’t more complicated than that.

TV news loses a lot of money. If that were CTV, it would make money, and there’s some reasons for it, but what it points to is the requirement to continue the news-renewal process. Recommitting to local television news because that’s what Canadians want and that’s where all the revenue is. (Last time we did that, it just dug a bigger hole.)

Drama and comedy: If this were any other place, they don’t make money. They can’t cover the costs. That’s why we have these subsidies. But there’s a problem. If you cut this, then the amount of money you can draw out of the CTF goes down. So you don’t draw the full envelope, so they take the money away and give it to somebody else (like last year with CTV). [Some joke I missed.]

Amateur sports: Bluntly, amateur sports has been carried by the margin in pro sports.

Documentaries: The same issue arises as with Kids. If you start cutting indie producers, you reduce your ability to draw from CTF. In this case, you’ll see that because our docs are half in-house, one of the good things that’s happened is changes in CTF rules mean we’ll able to access the CTF for in-house productions. So Mark’s red bar should come down, which will be good. But we have to continue to commit to it.

Kids and Radio: No revenues associated with either of them. In radio, 85% of costs are people, so that inevitably if you reduce the dollars available to radio, you reduce more people than you would if you were dealing with drama and comedy, because they are completely commissioned. We don’t do it with our own folks.

If we cut the procured programming or pro sports, we dig ourselves a bigger hole. The numbers you saw are before Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy and the new NHL contract. There are no revenue opportunities (on radio), though radio remains central to everything we do in our transformation to a content company but shares in the infrastructure of everything.

Our commitment to local television news is very important – total market value is $162M, of which we take almost nothing. But as others withdraw, like E, A, Global, CTV channels, there is an opportunity, I think. And we can take significantly more revenue going forward (there).

Lifestyle/living shows have been dropped in part because we just couldn’t figure out a way – they were beautiful and were brought in on an extraordinary price point considering how beautiful and polished they were, but we just couldn’t figure out a way of getting them to break even.

The difficulty with a lot of regional production is inevitably it costs more than network. If you make regional shows, you probably make 10 to 12 or 25 on radio (versus one national). That’s just the reality of the regions, which makes it difficult to deal with these cost questions.

Having said all that, we did not approach these reductions as pro rata. We thought that was wrong and would lead us nowhere. We did not want it to be about perceptions of internal equity. Filter the cuts through the maintenance of strategy and economic realities of English services. I don’t want you to think we did this proportionally. We didn’t.

The regions are cut less than they are proportional to the total dollars that are currently invested in them, and radio less than television, though marginally less, I would say.

$85M reduction. 400 people touched by this. Let me rephrase that, there are almost 400 jobs that are touched by it. 400 jobs taken out of English services – approximately 10%. We hope very much the ultimate number of people to be laid off is very substantially less than that.

Voluntary retirement incentive plan. Anybody who has 85 points or who is 65 or older. If 10 jobs were supposed to go, if people want to take 10 retirements, we’ll wind up those 10 jobs and we’re done. But if 20 people do, we’ll say no; you can only take 10 from that area and we’ll do it by seniority. If we took the 20, we’d be no further ahead.

Released April 6, open for about a month. Then we’ll know how many jobs have gone away and how many are left that we’ll have to deal with.

Say 200 people take the (package). That leaves 200 left. Can we now use the vacancies intelligently and abolish a whole bunch of those? Get another 100 that way? So instead of 400 layoffs, you get about 100. I should just say we have spent a lot of time with the union working on this. On Friday had a meeting with all the unions. Elizabeth and I met with CMG and everybody yesterday. Are trying to figure out the best way to minimize the number of layoffs. Relationship is very good. We’re trying really hard to make sure that we can do this together to minimize people actually laid off.

You will see that some of this is pretty devastating. Radio network shows in Toronto: Cancelled some shows. Inside Track, Out Front. Reduced music recordings by about 50%. Reduce drama, but will do some. Try to make some more synergies with Radios 2 and 3, since they’re both music offerings without getting rid of Radio 3 or cut back Radio 2.

Had already pulled back significantly on travel, discretionary. That will continue.

Many network shows into regions. The Point is gone this afternoon, or I mean The Point will be gone. Live music production capacity reduced. [Gregory Charles show, too? Missed that.] Try to be rational on satellite streams.

Means there will be holes in the schedule. Trying to think of smart way to (repeat our smart programming) so that the quality and density and richness of Radio One will remain.

We have not closed any stations. We have wound up two one-person bureaux – Thomson, Manitoba, and La Ronge, Saskatchewan. These other places have been reduced. The way we try to approach it in this case was a little bit about equity. Cost of providing local radio service per person served; we said we should reduce costs to those places that have the highest cost per person served. Because of the history of the CBC, where it grew more from the east to the west, we find the cost there is higher in the east than in central Canada and the west.

Noon show will continue – reduced from two hours to one. Resources to be reduced and standardized. $500,000 reduction for CBC North.

$5M from network level and 20 jobs, but that will not be 20 layoffs. $9M from network shows in regions. $5M in local regional shows in radio.

Television: Last week we already announced Steven and Chris were gone for next year. When we approached television, the thing we want most to do is to maintain the prime-time schedule, which is where revenue sits and CTF goes. So the first place to trim is non-prime-time. Kids in the morning has no revenue, but we have to be careful with it because it draws CTF dollars. Afternoons: Steven and Chris, Fashion File, the living shows have had to go.

Nice one-offs like Destination we can’t do for the time being. A lot of the big shows, we are going to have to reduce the costs for them. Fred has been busy saying to producers you’ll have less money in licence fees and episodes. The Border, 22 Minutes, Mosque have fewer episodes. $28M there, 110 jobs.

Some digital extension for TV shows: Some of that money has to come out. Not to be confused with something that will come up later. Not sure how to handle this, because when they change the rules for Canada Media Fund, must make shows for two platforms at a time. Careful here or we don’tdraw the fund fully, and that would be a mistake.

Sports: No more Blue Jays, plus a whole bunch of these amateur sports things are gone, though we might do some international figure skating if it’s in Canada. Which is a shame, because we’re big champions of amateur sport. That seems like few jobs compared to the amount of money – a lot of this money is tied up in rights costs, and there are not a lot of full-time jobs. You need a commentator for soccer, but not a full-time commentator.

This is perhaps the most complicated piece. News renewal started 2½ years ago. Let’s grow supper hours back to an hour when we got rid of Canada Now. Have almost doubled their share compared to nadir of Canada Now. Vancouver as testing ground for full integration. Took all of news assets about a year ago and put them all into the news department and took the next big step to reorganize it to provide full integration and meet the requirements of Canadians. We did a lot of research on that: Yes, people wanted context, but also wanted 24/7 news on whatever platform was convenient.

Jennifer and Todd and Seaton and Gino have been heavily involved in working through how this actually works. About 200 people in the news department have been involved in the consultations, with a development process on new shows. Boom, we got blown off course because of the downturn.

Now, unfortunately, news must contribute like everybody else: $7M, about 80 jobs. The difficulty here is executing the news-renewal task while layering in this $7M cut. We literally did not conclude with the Board on final details (on this question of fitting those two pieces together). Will come back April 16 to lay it out for the news department.

Small-market radio news is understood; is part of the cuts mentioned before. Fifth Estate and Marketplace budgets reduced. It’s the other $4M and 50+ people that we don’t understand fully yet.

Important to continue to invest in news platforms. The only areas not seeing reductions, where we’re putting in new money. .CA will have greater functionality, grow it out, because it supports everything – all of the extensions, whether local, sports, whatever. Growth in revenue is all here. Not to say there’s a huge amount of money here yet.

Why cut and also invest? Not to allow the current situation to cut us off, as it were, growth for the future.

Significant reductions in sales/support. Media sales and marketing 22 jobs, communications 12 jobs, a couple of jobs in content management and finance and admin. Production centres, libraries, archives: Still working our way through this, since some of it is caught up in news renewal.

Voluntary retirement: Aren’t we going to get ourselves in a jam with these cuts in terms of increase in the diversity of our workforce? But that’s skewed by age: Younger workers are more diverse. (Taking buyouts) would take pressure off our younger workers, who are more likely to be laid off because of the rules of our contracts.

(Small recap.) What now is left after all these cuts?

Radio and local in all major markets: Morning and afternoon drive shows are intact. Radio One and 2: Denise and Chris are figuring out how to retain the integrity of the schedule by using (unclear). No ads on Radio One or 2. Production efficiencies.

Television: The only reason we do it is to make Canadian shows. To hold to the Canadian content we do. 80% in prime time will remain Canadian. We’re going to increase the overall CanCon by about half an hour – get rid of Martha Stewart and Simpsons and replace with another American show, leaving a half-hour (to add). Will let us maximize revenue, CTF.

News renewal continues. If we execute it, will steal market share from all our competitors and end up with a news offering stronger than anybody else and much more valuable. Principal news sources for people are newspapers, conventional TV, CBC Radio. Those are the great news sources and they’re all under enormous stress. They want to walk away from news. So CBC becomes even more important in that environment.

Regions: No stations closed; two one-man bureaux closed.

.CA: Incremental dollars.

Current TV Canada: Money’s still there for that.

We used to have the online sales outsourced to AOL; brought it in-house.

Just to conclude, this is a really horrid situation. And the size of the cuts is very extensive: about 10% of the jobs, about 12% of total budget. This cut is bigger than the cuts Global took in people – 7.8% of workforce there. Cannot underestimate the severity of what is happening. This is going to be a very difficult process for the next number of months and maybe beyond that.

It’s also going to have knock-on effects to a lot of people (live music, independent producers, actors, musicians, directors). We are, as it turns out, the absolutely overwhelmingly most important commissioner of every kind of cultural product in the country – whether it’s songs, whether it’s shows, whatever it may be. So when we get hurt, it has a more devastating effect than when anybody else gets hurt.

We’ve tried to do this is in a way that is as intelligent as sensitive as we could. Nobody’s happy with the outcome because there is no happy outcome. The least bad way possible, if I can put it like that.

Q&A

Q. from Al at the National, at CBC for 15 years: Tensions that exist between you and us in news/current affairs/documentaries. Whether it’s good or bad, it exists. You mentioned share. Those numbers would be different if you looked at 2008–09. Issues other than share, like impact, why Canadians watch CBC. I want to focus in on the Fifth Estate. I don’t work there, but it’s a program that illustrates the tension for the last few years. It’s been beaten and bruised for a number of years. Budget come down, fewer shows, moved from Wednesday to Friday. If you are fan of it, you aren’t going to like what’s going on.
— So what’s the question?
— Let me just finish. We don’t get many opportunities. $1.7M for the Fifth Estate and Marketplace: The Fifth Estate is a program that contributes to the Canadian discourse in a way (out of proportion to its share). Lottery coverage, Schreiber/Mulroney. They get talked about by other media.
— I’m going to cut you off, because there’s a lot of people.
— I want to get to the retirement thing. You could have every host of the Fifth Estate retire because of the 85/55 formula, senior people retiring, and the program having a lot less money. It’s symptomatic of the whole thing. Problem in terms of the value that’s being put on things outside of ratings and share. (Applause.)
A. Let’s talk about that. Is anybody happy with this? No. I’m a little bit surprised, frankly, at the premise of the question, because over the course of the last number of years, the news department has been essentially been held harmless. And we’ve said to increase the amount of news that we’ve done. We’re prepared to put resources in to do better news. The size of the cuts associated with the news department is smaller compared to what’s going on in lots of other places, so I reject the premise heartily.
We want to maintain our investigative capacity. We’ll see on the 16th, where we go through the entire structure of the news. Central component is investigative stuff.
Q. from Steve, TV technical: VRIP. How exactly will the process work? Will the department recommend individuals that the VP will consider?
A. The department will have this number of jobs. Everybody who would like to take the retirement incentive can (to the maximum). Entirely voluntary.
Q. from woman: Are they losing any positions? [First part unheard.]
A. Management in the CBC is about 8.9% of total complement, senior management 0.5%. Cuts will fall pro rata on everybody, so you can expect 8.9% of cuts to fall there.
Q. from Alison Dempster, Sudbury: I feel I was duped yesterday when you said you were making regional stations a priority. 17–21 cuts, potentially 8 in Sudbury, none for Toronto, Ottawa programming. I feel you’ve just cut us loose. I have a hard time seeing any so-called internal equity, as you put it.
A. Nobody wanted to cut Sudbury, Sydney, anybody, but we had to cut something. Highest cost per Canadian served. [Remainder of answer missed.] Is it going to make anybody happy? I don’t think so.
Q. from man: Internet to be increased and digital. Does this mean we’re going to see ads on the CBC Web site?
A. You already do. Been there forever, really. Obviously you’re not going to the CBC Web site enough. Yeah, absolutely. We’ve been selling it aggressively. Two years ago the rules were more restrictive on Web than on TV, which we changed.
Q. from woman (Gillian Findlay?): I’d like to set the record straight, because you’ve said a couple of times there have been no cuts to current affairs. Our program has an operating cut every year of the last three years. Marketplace is now a half-hour program. My question, if you’ll just let me finish, is we get a subsidy (and the purpose is in part to) subsidize this programming that the privates do not do. You said we were going to grow investigative reporting. By your own won numbers you’re going to lose a number of people who do investigative reporting, so how are you going to grow it?
A. CTV does do current affairs; they do W5. We get a subsidy for that and for radio, drama, comedy, kids’ shows, for all sorts of different things. Nobody wants to do this, and I’m not sure exactly how to respond when people say “We’re of more value than anybody else.” More valuable than radio, than kids’ programming? I don’t know how to deal with that. Nobody wants to do this, but this is where we find ourselves. So the question is, I think how do we do it in a way that will be the least painful for the overall organization? This is the best we can do with the problem.
(Inaudible interjection.)
Are they of greater value than Little Mosque on the Prairie? I’d say no. I’d say they were of equal value. Let me put it to you this way, just for fun – (hooting). Hold my jacket now; we’re going to take this outside.
I think it is invidious and unfair to start this kind of conversation. I don’t think it helps collectively and doesn’t help each other. It isn’t right to say I’m more important than you are. It will pull us apart at exactly the time we need to be pulling together. (Applause.)
Q. from man: I’d like to clear up the confusion about Fifth Estate. But we did take a cut last year in the middle of the season, is that not the truth?
A. Yes, and you made more shows.
— So how is that holding news harmless?
— The premise of the question was untrue. Overall budget for news and current affairs has remained constant. I don’t know where this comes from and I think it’s unfair and I think it’s wrong. That’s what I’m saying.
— It is the case that every survey shows that what Canadians want is news and current affairs above all else. And yet, you’re asking in the case of the Fifth Estate, at the risk of being parochial, that we should take a 20% hit. So you’re taking a core element of your business –
— I don’t know how to respond to this. Radio is a core element. So is kids.
— How can you justify the Fifth Estate taking a 20% cut?
— We said we would not make pro rata cuts.
— I understand that, but I’m asking why you can justify this particular cut. (Agrees with no pro-rata cuts.) I’m asking you for the calculus.
— There was no mathematical formula behind this, if that’s what you want. In the context of things, this is not an unreasonable thing to do. That was the beginning and the end of it. Should it have been 1.1? 900,000? 1.3? There’s no science in this. This was the best we know how to do at this point in time.
(Interrupts the questioner.)
(Inaudible question.)
A. No. (Groaning in room.) No. Come on. How is that fair, you know? Essentially, you’re saying – I don’t want to get into it. The press is on the phone. Essentially you’re saying we matter more than anybody else. (Shouting in the room.) I’m sorry if you don’t like the answer, but it’s the best answer I’ve got.
Jennifer: At the end of the day, nobody wants to cut, but we’ll make sure that we uphold the quality of what we do. Look at new ways of doing what we’re doing. The assumption that we can’t do it, which is where we’re starting from here, is a false assumption.
Q. from Kathy in Thunder Bay on phone: I will take one minute, because it is rare we get to express our opinions. I’ve worked in about six to eight CBC locations, network, regional, and local, and if you believe that a per-capita cost is an equitable way to cut, then I’m not sure you really understand how important CBC is in small centres. All of those people become the parents of the grandparents of people who move to (big cities) and continue to watch and listen to CBC. When the economy recovers, will management promise/guarantee/undertake to restore jobs, particularly in small locations?
A. No.
— Thank you!
— In fairness to all Canadian citizens, we’d open another radio (station). Would we do that in favour of restoring (what we had)? Why do some people get better service than others? I don’t understand that.
Q. from woman from Marketplace: I look at quarterly reports of corporations outside the CBC, but I don’t think I’d be impressed with our ad revenue and how we were spending our money. I feel like the downturn is hiding problems with management and ad sales. Where were things before the downturn?
A. It’s not complicated. We have a very big problem in terms of television: Most other entities have very significant specialty holdings; we have one of any consequence, News world. We have a huge structural problem. Ad revenue of specialties has been going up despite the fact they also get cable fees; ad revenues of conventionals have been going down despite the fact they produce overwhelmingly the most Canadian programming. Then we had the economic collapse. If we were the only one collapsing, I would be very concerned as to whether our marketing and sales group was any good.
Sorry, can I just finish? The Summer Olympics? We did great there too; that was before the downturn.
The target actually was set, if I’m not mistaken, 10 years ago, so it was a little artificial. Global has essentially written off its conventional TV networks. Put ’em up for sale; there are no buyers. I read the prospectus; there’s nothing there to buy. They used to trade at $20; they’re trading at 5¢. CTV the same; $100M loss on their conventional business. It’s happening to everybody. How’s that?
(Inaudible retort.)
— The situation that they have, NBC, ABC, CBS, it’s the same for all the conventional broadcasters in North America; there is no difference.
Q. from John, Digital Archives: Out of crisis can come ingenuity, and I think we’re about to cross the Rubicon. I kind of felt for you and the management team in yesterday’s broadcast. I understand and appreciate the trouble you went through. But we need your help, and we’re in this together, and this is a time for solidarity as much as it is for divisiveness and anger. (Applause.) The question becomes: What are we all prepared to do? I’m going to give up one day a month of unpaid leave for a year if we can work it out. Many I’ve talked to are willing to do the same. Save jobs, save money, maintain the quality of show we’re accustomed to such as Marketplace and Fifth Estate. Take this information to the prime minister, the minister of finance, and the minister of heritage.
Q. from Michael Hughes, lawyer: As I understand it, this profoundly depressing situation stems in large part from the callous turndown of the Harper government and the heritage minister of our request for bridge financing. “I can’t play favourites for CBC when the privates are going it alone.” CTV and Global are now running to the CRTC and asking for help (in a handout from the CRTC to the extent it can give one). I read the notes for the president’s quite stellar speech today in Montreal, but I hope we are doing whatever we can to get back to the PMO and Cabinet and say the model you used to turn us down with has a fallacy now because privates are asking essentially for a bailout. Otherwise you’re going to be perceived as frankly stabbing the CBC with a major cut. Are we doing that?
A. The president told the Empire Club he wanted a meeting with the prime minister; has never been offered such a meeting. He made exactly that point (in today’s speech): “I do find it difficult there are rumours to the effect they are considering bailing out Global and CTV but won’t lift a finger to help us. We still don’t have the $60M or capital budget signed up five days before end of fiscal year. Not a problem of money, but one of governance and good management.” Have to get to a point, president says, where we are tread more respectfully. (Applause.)
Q. from Yellowknife: Asset sales. Won’t we be missing the $125M in fiscal 2010 because we won’t have those assts to sell again?
A. Essentially correct.

[Scribe ended at 2009.03.26 15:22.]

Brutal

2009-03-26T14:51:00.003-05:00

Whither the CMG?

2009-03-26T08:25:00.001-05:00

We are fast approaching what could be considered CMG's "Katrina Moment" - the point where leadership fails to recognize the magnitude of a crisis, and fails in almost every conceivable way.

We've all read the CMG emails that come every few weeks. It's usually the same thing written slightly differently each time.

There's the bit about writing some strongly worded letters to the government. And the stuff about holding talks with management to reduce layoffs. And also the comforting part where they talk about making sure that your ass is kicked out of the building with as much dignity as possible.

But what does all of this mean? What's the plan? Is there a plan? At what point will they let us in on it?

If you think I come across as someone taking their frustration out on the union because of stress, you would be correct. That is exactly what I'm doing. It's weird to me that an organization that represents people who communicate for a living is not engaging us directly when there are so many tools at its disposal. (To be fair, maybe this is as much our fault for not engaging with our union more than we do. And by we, I mean me, because to be honest, for a long time I mostly ignored the minutiae of CMG business.)

So I guess what I'm saying is that I'm sorry for ignoring you, CMG, and now that you have my mostly undivided attention, I'd just like to know more about what you are proposing to management. Does it reflect the magnitude of this crisis? Does it take a creative, damn-the-torpedo approach to foster some old-timey union solidarity and keep as many of us working as possible?

(FYI: YES, I will go to the next available EAP "How to Be Optimistic" seminar.)

Richard Stursberg's town hall - Thursday, March 26 at 2 p.m.

2009-03-26T07:54:00.003-05:00

Richard Stursberg, executive vice-president of CBC English Services, will be holding a town hall presentation with an overview of our financial situation, strategy and the changes to come on Thursday, March 26 from 2 to 3:30 p.m. ET in Toronto’s Glenn Gould Studio. He will talk about CBC president Hubert Lacroix’s Wednesday presentation and what it means for English Services staff.

Many of you are undoubtedly asking – why do we have to wait 24 hours to hear the details of the English Services Business Plan.

We explored a number of alternatives before deciding to proceed on Thursday.

The first principle was that we wanted our employees to know the details first. Delivering on that principle began to get complicated. We work in 5 ½ time zones – inevitably, a time that might have worked on Wednesday for part of the country wouldn’t have worked for other
parts.

There were logistical challenges – Richard is in Montreal for most of Wednesday to participate in the President’s Town Hall. The earliest he could have started the presentation in Toronto would have been 3:30p.m ET – this time would not have worked as we moved east. We explored a satellite feed from Montreal – that didn’t work either. We’re on air 24 hours a day – which means that there were some times of the day when large numbers of staff would not have been able to participate as they either were preparing broadcasts, or were broadcasting.

In a perfect world, we would have done everything on one day. We regret that we couldn’t. In the meantime, we’d like to ask for your patience. The approach we chose ensures that everyone receives the complete context and details at the same time. You can expect to receive the most comprehensive look at our Business Plan that is possible on Thursday.

There are several ways you can attend:

If you’re located in a centre, you’ll be able to dial in or tune in to your local in-house TV channel to watch the presentation. Your communications account manager will advise you of the details.
Toronto employees can attend in person at the Glenn Gould Studio (a monitor will be set up in the lobby to accommodate overflow or for those who do not have access to a television in their area), tune in to in-house TV channel 59, or log on to io! to take part in the event.
If you’re not near a television, you can dial in. Lines will open 15 minutes early to ensure that the update begins at 2 p.m. You’ll also have an opportunity to call in with questions.
Local to Toronto: 416-340-2217
Across Canada and North America: 1-866-696-5910
International: 00-800-8989-6336
(a reminder to international callers – you’ll have to enter your international access code before you begin to dial)
Participant pass code: 2538275#
The event will also be streamed live on iO!* Check the portal on Thursday, for the link.

For those who can't watch the update live, we'll post a video and summary of the event on io! shortly after. You'll also be able to hear an “instant replay” (available until March 31 at 12 midnight ET) if you dial 416-695-5800 or 1-800-408-3053 – pass code 2363730#.

*Just a little reminder, you must be logged onto the network, if you are watching the feed on iO! from home.

Name one thing that was announced today that isn't bullshit. Come on, I dare you.

2009-03-25T20:36:00.001-05:00

It would certainly help if the CBC provided a hard copy of what was said today.
So that we can all know all the facts, instead of just the few facts that a newspaper always prints, or the even fewer facts that we get from TV and radio (upon all three of which the internet still relies).
The CBC is a public service, like the Post Office, and it's apparent that that service is about to change.
Would you mind telling us exactly how, Hubert?
For the sake of the country, show us your efficiencies.

Town hall twits

2009-03-25T13:57:00.017-05:00

Today's town hall was the most tweeted CBC event in recent memory. These tweets have a special significance for those of us in Canadian media, as we are constantly told that we are dinosaurs and in the future all our news will be tweeted by real people with no agenda and you won't even need to think about it or pay for it, it will just be there and better than anything we could do with a billion dollars.

So how's that working out?

WTF who let this clown in here? You're not helping, Mr. Duong.

You know the world has gone mad when even the veracity of a Tod Maffin tweet is suspect. God help us all, and #FAIL.

No.

No.

No.
Look, are there any serious questions here?

Yes, it's clear that Canadian content must be destroyed.

I'm not going to click that link but I smell a Facebook Group behind it. Just a guess.

From this tweet forward, you shall be known by the nickname "MacFail."

Aw, bless your heart, li'l trevortye. Now, have you met justinsb?

So stupid it needed to be "retweeted." Ok Twitter, I give you one more chance. Give me a reason to read any of this junk.

Thank you.

Liveblog of CBC budget town hall

2009-03-25T12:15:00.001-05:00

Started 2009.03.25 11:45. (Printable version.)

HUBERT LACROIX: Our financial troubles and possible consequences have been the cause of much speculation. As unfortunate as the situation has been, I truly appreciate how well you have been able to maintain your collective concentration on our programs and services.

Our executive team and I have been working (on a solution), and it’s not been fun. We can’t really escape the realities that are affecting the economies of the world. We are here today to expand on what’s in store for our Corporation.

I know that some of you might be more anxious than others, that some of you may be angry or puzzled by it, actually upset. That’s understandable – and it’s OK. Some of you might have questions that we don’t have answers for; that’s OK.

The changes are significant and will take time to talk through – more thoroughly not only with you, but with our stakeholders, partners and audiences across the country. This isn’t something we can deal with in one moment; (you can) trust that our communication will be ongoing and you will get all of the information you need. And believe me when I say that we will work through this together.

As for today, here’s what we’re doing. We pre-recorded a presentation a couple of days ago in both French and English. My presentation is in both languages [which, we will later hear, run intermixed at the same time on the sole audio channel] . I will talk to you about my three priorities – people, programs, and our safeguard (protection) plan and how they will be affected. Richard and Sylvain will then discuss how programs will be affected. Then we’ll come back here for a few questions and answers and we’ll wrap up.

[English and French videos run simultaneously with both audio tracks overlapping each other. Way to go, national governing broadcaster.]

We need $171 million and have to lay off 800 people. 400 for CBC.
The plan that was approved by the Board involves sales of a value of $25 million, which the government will allow.
You know that I believe in you.
Natural attrition, freeze salaries.
I’ve been surprised by some comments I’ve received about executive management compensation. It’s pay for performance, which means they’re paid only if a manager meets their performance requirements. $4 million is the total reduction these people are contributing. Removing bonuses doesn’t work in a world where we still wish to maintain some kind of competitiveness.
Sizable amounts of money we’re taking out of our program schedule – over $50 million.
Not changing noncommercial nature of radio; not adding American programming; maintaining strategic investments in new media; doing everything we can to maintain our presence in the regions. CBC and Radio-Canada to continue to work together.
We must shift from being a TV and radio provider to a source of video and audio content. Potential platforms, not just the present ones.

(Stursberg comes on, with the same overlapping of audio.)

Services will lose $85 million from budget.
Maintain share gains in ratings on both radio and TV. First time our all-Canadian schedule is beating all-American schedules [if that’s what he really said on the unintelligible audio feed] .
The process of news renewal must continue.
Continue to invest in new platforms. (Use the word “hostage.”)
Radio is about 19% of total English budget. $14.5 million of reduction, or 17%, will come from radio, the rest from TV. Networks, 62%. Trying to cut more at the level of the network.
All major morning radio drive shows maintained. Radio One schedule remains largely unchanged.
TV: More repeats, but maintain prime-time CanCon. This will maintain revenues to the maximum extent possible and our attractiveness to the Canadian people.
No stations will close.
Will direct more dollars to our online property.
Tomorrow all managers will meet with their staff, detail what the cuts are. Impossible to tell you exactly who will go and who will stay. There will be a lot of voluntary retirements, then use the vacancies to minimize extent of reductions. Nobody will receive any notices until the middle of May.
Will be a town-hall meeting where I’ll talk more about English strategy.
After the economic downturn ends, we’ll be back stronger.

(Sylvain comes on, thankfully speaking single-track English.) The real global problem for French services now is about $51 million. Then $34 million we have to solve internally. 336 positions to be eliminated, 70 from the regions. Money’s lower but layoffs are higher (compared to English) because we have a lot of people producing things internally.

Will try to organize schedule to preserve the ability of our services to bounce back. Two or three months. Will try to recover right after that [after when?] as the most powerful information and news services and be at the centre of Canadian life for all Francophones across the country. Thank you for helping us manage this difficult situation.

(French-language speaker admits audio problem. Then says it in English. Just go to iO, he tells us!) It’s important stuff, what we’ve just said.

As I told you from the outset, operational details will be told to you by teams rolling out in the next 24 hours. We have thousands of employees to meet, so please be patient with us. Expect to hear more about how this plan affects you, your group, your colleagues. (Can pose questions on iO.)

Q&A

Q. from Felicia Chin in Calgary: (No audio.)
Q. from Chantal Gélicas from Outaouais: (No audio.)
Q. from woman in French: Don’t you think your $125 million in asset savings are a bit high in the current market, and what happens if you don’t hit that?
A. (French): Some funds are due from certain transactions in accounts. Those aren’t effected by the economic environment. We’re quite confident we can put together the $125M.
A. (English): We’re looking at two groups of assets in the short term – amounts owed to us that we accelerate, which affects the budget in the years to come but gives us cash on hand. Second is real estate – try to see if we can sell and lease back. If we don’t get there, we have to go back to the drawing board.
Q. from woman (French): (Unintelligible; no answer given anyway.)
Q. from man: Budget reductions will do what to audience levels?
A. (French): We’ve done a lot of work on that. Next year’s ratings shouldn’t change. We’re still growing on the Web.
A. (English): Target this year was 8% share on TV; we are at 8.9%. I think that if we had not had these reductions we could have grown faster, but we have smart ideas in mind to preserve what we’ve got. Radio: Trying to maintain our share, but lift Radio 2.
Q. in writing (French): What about salary increases? (Restated in English: There’s a shortfall on salary funding. What’s that all about?)
A. from Hubie: We were expecting and the government has identified an increase of 2.3%–2.5% in salaries. Government rolled that back to 1.5%, a $7.5M hit.
Q. from woman: (Unintelligible.) (Diversity in the workforce?)
A. from woman: If we understand the question correctly, we’ve been planning for a while now to mitigate the damage through a voluntary retirement program so we can protect our junior employees [sic – hold them to that promise] and manage diversity through the workforce. This is a real key driver for us and something we are actively working with the unions on.
Q. from woman: CBC Television and revenue shortfall. Why is that every component in the corporation has to come through with job and budget cuts?
A. That question is an important one. Have to keep a couple of things in mind. We cannot continue to be just a conventional service. What I said in my opening remarks still holds, obviously: When we’re more and more one company and all the services benefit each other and transfer their work from one platform to another as we become a content company. This is all about all of our services being affected the same way. That’s why when our revenues drop, all sorts of revenues have been affected in this financial crisis.
Stursberg: It’s a $171M problem for the company as a whole and a $60M-to-$65M ad problem.
Q. from man: When you talk about working with the unions to reduce layoffs, tell us more about how that process has been.
A. We’re trying, in every way possible, to reduce the impact on employees. But with voluntary retirement and other programs, we hope to reduce layoffs. What we’re trying to do to bring this 800 number down is (voluntary retirement), and those conversations with the union are ongoing.
Q. from woman (apparently in writing): How can you accept to give 50% of the bonuses to senior management? Will you counsel voluntary retirement?
A. (French): They’re essential in the remuneration of anyone in the company. Tied to goals. They’ll be contributing $4M to the reductions. That contribution is important and needs to continue in the market we’re in.
A. (English): I know this has been a question. The senior executives of the Corporation and all the managers – all 553 of them – have these amounts paid to them only in circumstances when they meet criteria set in their original objectives. These 553 senior managers and executives will contribute about $4M to cost reduction. That’s a significant amount and represents, for the most senior members, up to 20% less in their take-home pay. I think that’s significant and we’ll do it that way.
Q., French, in writing: (Missed. About how to protect the regions.)
(Sylvain answers in French.) Stursberg: Increasingly we’ve been trying to push network shows into the regions for radio. Right now about 50% of radio programming is from regions. Same with TV: Regions really matter. That’s why we’ve been growing our supper-hour newscasts. For English services as a whole, about 38% of total costs come from the regions. We have cut the regions about half of their total proportion in the budget, and have succeeded in closing no stations. This is the best compromise we can make.
Hubie: Important to retain our geographic footprint across the nation, so that’s why we aren’t cutting stations. This all assumes we can get the dollars we need to balance budget.
Q. from woman in French: When you hear the numbers, there seems to be more cuts being made in French than English services, also dollars being taken out.
A. from Sylvain (French): On French services, particularly in Montreal, we produce a lot internally [I think he means in-house productions] . Budget is about 60% CBC/40% Radio-Canada. But salary costs for Radio-Canada are much higher.
Hubie: A lot of the French stuff is done internally with our own employees – very different from what CBC English does. But about the same number of employees in the two networks. So when you start taking costs out of French services, a very high number of employees are affected.

HUBIE: You know, obviously this is bad news. We can’t sugarcoat it in any other way. But we can’t afford to get lost. We’re doing really well in some ways. And you guys were reading we are doing exceptionally well in services both en anglais and en français. This is what we have to keep preserving so when the financial crunch is over we’re equipped to be a much better publish broadcaster and to work from a position of strength.

It’s been a tough morning. Thanks for listening to us.

(Ends 2009.03.25 12:44.)

Invitation to CBC/Radio-Canada’s financial update via closed-circuit

2009-03-25T09:49:00.001-05:00

Join the Senior Executive Team and me on Wednesday, March 25 at 11:45 a.m. ET for an overview of our financial situation, strategy and the changes to come. This presentation will be high-level and strategic, rather than operational. You can expect your Vice-Presidents and their management teams to start rolling out specific operational announcements within 24 hours of this briefing with more information about how the changes relate to your component specifically.

The presentation will be available for staff in the Centres through closed circuit. Your local Communications department will be providing you with the event location and closed circuit channel shortly.

If you cannot join via closed circuit, we invite you to listen in by phone. Due to a limited number of telephone lines, we ask that, wherever possible, you take the conference call as a group.

To listen in, please call:
English language dial-in information
416-340-2217 (local)
866-696-5910 (anywhere in North America)
800-8989-6336 (Overseas)
2785736 (participants’ code)

French language dial-in information
514-861-2255 (local)
866-696-5910 (anywhere in North America)
800-6578-9878 (Overseas)
5745586 (participants’ code)

The event will also be streamed live on iO! Check the portal on Wednesday, for the link. If you miss the event, it will be available on iO! after the fact as well.

Hubert

Mary Lou's Best Budd

2009-03-24T22:55:00.018-05:00

Traveling north of downtown Toronto, up behind the Lawrence Plaza, you begin to see the signs of a unique community.

Heading into the library to hear and see the famous Mary Lou Finlay reading from her book The As It Happens Files (Radio That May Contain Nuts), I'm greeted with a note on the door announcing that a substitute speaker will be taking Mary Lou's place.
It's going to be the current host of the program, Barbara Budd.
It won't be the historical figure that I used to watch on Live It Up! and thought was kinda hot, but Barbara is the voice that now commands rapt attention when anyone listens to the greatest radio program ever made in the entire world.

There go all my questions, and now who's going to sign my book?

Inside the library about 60 people have gathered, and they take the news in stride, as really, it is no minor thrill to meet Ms. Budd. For years, we've just plain loved that show, as they've always given us a voice with which to engage the world on behalf of curious Canadians. And no matter who it was behind the microphone, they were so droll and funny, and never ever intimidated or shocked.
Some of the interviews, Ms. Budd explains, were so hilarious that she sought the advice of Michael Enright on how to prevent herself from bursting into laughter while on the air. His advice? Dig a nail into your hand and say quickly to yourself "dead puppies, dead puppies, dead puppies."

When I first started reading the book, it was not a good experience. The writing was fine, but the great stories from the most exciting radio show just seemed to lie there, flat and lifeless, on the page.
Ms. Budd changes all that.
She was once an actress at Stratford and you sense that she's still quite ready to don a costume and lift the roof off any building with her oratory, eager once more to play the part, any part.
And when she reads aloud from Mary Lou's book it becomes so apparent what it was I was missing. These stories are ideally meant to be spoken, just as the stories were when they first aired. What seemed so antiquated as a non-web page/YouTube experience, suddenly becomes each a treasured gem that fills and lifts the spirit. Stories about brave and silly people that make human beings almost seem like a worthwhile species. The pages come alive when treated like a bedtime story for adults, young and old.
Even Obama gets a mention for writing one of the worst poems ever.

As Barbara signs my copy, I say "I had hoped to ask Mary Lou if it was hard to let go, to give it up."

Barbara answers "I think it was", and that's where we leave it.

All Quiet On A Street Called Front

2009-03-24T12:13:00.002-05:00

Is it too far fetched to suggest that one can feel the mood at the TBC from across town? Across the country?
A somber mood that reflects the concerns of every employee.
What will Hubert announce tomorrow when he addresses the nation?
Many speculate that it will be the closing of a few remote local stations.
Even more choose simply to wait for the official word rather than waste time on guessing.
And a few choose a more pro-active approach.

Manly, yes, but

2009-03-23T08:28:00.001-05:00

I’m going to float a theory here that only partly amounts to riding my own hobbyhorse.

Start with this photo-op artifact (Mike Cassese, Reuters) from James Moore’s announcement of the new Canadian Media Fund… on the set of Flashpoint:

Flashpoint is a big manly production about a big manly topic that people, even Toronto people, use an American term to describe: SWAT teams. The guys look fantastic in the various vests and cargo pants and wraparound holsters. Even iceblond cupcake David Paetkau looks good.

The show is American in everything other than setting, so of course it sold to the Americans. That’s what make it interesting to right-wing assholes: It thrives in the free market. But they also like it because it upholds nice manly values.

James Moore is hardly a right-wing asshole or a hick or anything else; he’s not uncultured, he stuck it out in French immersion in British Columbia, he understands technology. He’s no good at spotting Canadian (and “Quebec”) celebrities, but that’s not the point here.

The point is he’s a big guy in a male-dominated political party (I know, they all are, but follow me for a moment) and if he’s gonna show up anywhere to announce a new funding program, it’s gonna be at a big manly show. Right now Canadian shows don’t come any manlier than Flashpoint. (Check the size of Hugh Dillon’s basket.)

What about The Border? Too dicey with its implied mockery of Americans – sort of like Intelligence’s plain depiction of American spies in Canada. (Haddock says that’s one reason it got shitcanned.) Conservatives get quite riled at mockery of Americans.

Meanwhile.

CBC is, yet again, trying to demonstrate why it should exist, and everyone is acting like CBC and CBC Television are one and the same thing. What are CBC’s marquee shows?

Girl in relationship trouble
Time-travelling girl
Girls on horseback
Girls in heels burning Porsche rubber in Calgary
Girls leaving their all-thumbs husbands for a week
Gumtoothed gay “satirists”
Lapsed rocker dude in cardigans
Muslim-infiltrated prairie village

I was being sincere when I told Fuchs we needed more male-oriented programming. Right-wing assholes already think CBC = CBC Television is a left-wing bastion. Girly, effeminate programming automatically seems left-wing to them because girly, effeminate anything seems leftist to them.

Under the former programmer of a cooking and decorating network, that’s all CBC Television has to offer these days.

Why would anybody be surprised the Tories are so unsympathetic to the Corpse? To them, CBC is in the business of cultural emasculation.

Audience engagement on CBC.ca circa 2004

2009-03-23T07:44:00.003-05:00

Hey Gang, we've got a great discussion going on here. What will help even more is if we unearth some history. This document is from 2004. What have you guys got to share?

CBC.ca Audience Input 2004

Publish at Scribd or explore others: Presentations & Slid CBC

What Fox News thinks of the Canadian Armed Forces

2009-03-22T19:53:00.006-05:00

If you've been reading all the comments at The National Post, the Star and elsewhere slamming the CBC for alleged anti-military, anti-Canadian Forces coverage (of course these people never watch CBC, so how would they know?), well here is what Fox News, the favourite network for the neo-Cons, including probably most of the Conservative Party, including the caucus, thinks of the Canadian Armed Forces, from a Youtube posting.

That's the kind of support for the Canadian Forces those neo-cons and CBC haters who want to shut down the CBC will get if we go.

Come the revolution, we don't know WTF is going to happen

2009-03-22T17:29:00.005-05:00

As we continue to debate and wonder what future there is, if any, at the CBC, there is a much more important post than Robert Fulford's emeritus musing. Posted on his blog March 13 by Clay Shirky, an adjunct professor in NYU's graduate Interactive Telecommunications Program and net expert since the 1990s, it “went viral” within days. Although Shirky is writing about newspapers, everything he says applies directly to the CBC. His basic thesis, we're all caught up in the maelstrom of a media revolution, and no one knows what the fuck is going to happen next.

As Shirky says:

The old stuff gets broken faster than the new stuff is put in its place.

You can find the complete post here. Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable

This excerpt sounds just like the CBC:

Revolutions create a curious inversion of perception. In ordinary times, people who do no more than describe the world around them are seen as pragmatists, while those who imagine fabulous alternative futures are viewed as radicals. The last couple of decades haven’t been ordinary, however. Inside the papers, the pragmatists were the ones simply looking out the window and noticing that the real world was increasingly resembling the unthinkable scenario. These people were treated as if they were barking mad. Meanwhile the people spinning visions of popular walled gardens and enthusiastic micropayment adoption, visions unsupported by reality, were regarded not as charlatans but saviors.

When reality is labeled unthinkable, it creates a kind of sickness in an industry. Leadership becomes faith-based, while employees who have the temerity to suggest that what seems to be happening is in fact happening are herded into Innovation Departments, where they can be ignored en masse. This shunting aside of the realists in favor of the fabulists has different effects on different industries at different times. One of the effects on the newspapers is that many of their most passionate defenders are unable, even now, to plan for a world in which the industry they knew is visibly going away.

And

During the wrenching transition to print, experiments were only revealed in retrospect to be turning points. Aldus Manutius, the Venetian printer and publisher, invented the smaller octavo volume along with italic type. What seemed like a minor change — take a book and shrink it — was in retrospect a key innovation in the democratization of the printed word. As books became cheaper, more portable, and therefore more desirable, they expanded the market for all publishers, heightening the value of literacy still further.

That is what real revolutions are like. The old stuff gets broken faster than the new stuff is put in its place. The importance of any given experiment isn’t apparent at the moment it appears; big changes stall, small changes spread. Even the revolutionaries can’t predict what will happen. Agreements on all sides that core institutions must be protected are rendered meaningless by the very people doing the agreeing. (Luther and the Church both insisted, for years, that whatever else happened, no one was talking about a schism.) Ancient social bargains, once disrupted, can neither be mended nor quickly replaced, since any such bargain takes decades to solidify.
And so it is today. When someone demands to know how we are going to replace newspapers, they are really demanding to be told that we are not living through a revolution. They are demanding to be told that old systems won’t break before new systems are in place. They are demanding to be told that ancient social bargains aren’t in peril, that core institutions will be spared, that new methods of spreading information will improve previous practice rather than upending it. They are demanding to be lied to.

There are fewer and fewer people who can convincingly tell such a lie

A couple of comments from J. Frank

Shirky says:

The problem newspapers face isn’t that they didn’t see the internet coming. They not only saw it miles off, they figured out early on that they needed a plan to deal with it, and during the early 90s they came up with not just one plan but several.

That's right, most newspapers didn't see the Internet coming. The employees of CBC did, creating their own program websites before management knew what was happening. Then the mid-90s version of the CBC did get in early and the Corp was there years before CTV, ABC, CBS, Global and the majority of Canadian newspapers.

Then the top levels at CBC decided it had to “manage” the web. So it hired outsiders and appointed them as senior managers who, rather than listening to the employees who knew what they were doing, those senior managers went to conferences and meetings where they talked to all those clueless media managers from the newspapers and late comers, who didn't know html from a haddock, and came up with policies which crippled CBC online for years, making it just the same as everyone else.

We have to heed Shirky's warning:

Round and round this goes, with the people committed to saving newspapers demanding to know “If the old model is broken, what will work in its place?” To which the answer is: Nothing. Nothing will work. There is no general model for newspapers to replace the one the internet just broke.

And (with my emphasis)

Journalism has always been subsidized. Sometimes it’s been Wal-Mart and the kid with the bike. Sometimes it’s been Richard Mellon Scaife. Increasingly, it’s you and me, donating our time. The list of models that are obviously working today, like Consumer Reports and NPR, like ProPublica and WikiLeaks, can’t be expanded to cover any general case, but then nothing is going to cover the general case.

Society doesn’t need newspapers. What we need is journalism. For a century, the imperatives to strengthen journalism and to strengthen newspapers have been so tightly wound as to be indistinguishable. That’s been a fine accident to have, but when that accident stops, as it is stopping before our eyes, we’re going to need lots of other ways to strengthen journalism instead.

For years, from the 1960s to the election of Brian Mulroney, both the CBC and CTV were innovative organizations, trying things that no one else would. (Global, which the Conservatives are going to bail out, of course, was sitting on its ass taking profitable feeds from LA).

In this crisis, dynamic, well-funded and properly managed public broadcasting could be one way of strengthening journalism. Unfortunately, in this country, we have currently have a federal government who is bleeding the CBC to death (as well as pure science and the arts and the environment) in the name of libertarianism.

So if there is an innovation that changes journalism, the chances that it will happen again in this country are slim to none. Or if it does come in this country, you can be sure that the Harper government wouldn't want to fund it, and the Americans, or the Chinese or Indians or the British will.

What does that mean to us? We are living in the age of uncertainty. We are on ship that has lost its foremast, and the main mast is barely holding against the hurricane force winds. The captain can't navigate. There's an iceberg ahead. Are there enough lifeboats? And if we get in the lifeboats, land and a safe harbour is far far away.

It is interesting to note that Shirky is basing some of his ideas on new interest in Gutenberg.
And the Star had its own take on Gutenberg at this link.