{"id":46299,"date":"2019-01-02T03:00:47","date_gmt":"2019-01-02T08:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=46299"},"modified":"2019-05-16T10:54:19","modified_gmt":"2019-05-16T14:54:19","slug":"in-violation-of-betteridges-law-of-headlines-this-question-can-clearly-be-answered-yes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2019\/01\/02\/in-violation-of-betteridges-law-of-headlines-this-question-can-clearly-be-answered-yes\/","title":{"rendered":"In violation of Betteridge&#8217;s law of headlines, this question can clearly be answered &#8220;yes!&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A few days back, <a href=\"https:\/\/coloneltedcampbell.blog\/2018\/12\/31\/can-we-get-rid-of-the-cbc\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Ted Campbell<\/a> posted under the title &#8220;Is it time to get rid of the CBC? Should we?&#8221; Betteridge&#8217;s law says the answer should be &#8220;no&#8221;, but in this case the answer is more like &#8220;Why haven&#8217;t we sold that thing off already?&#8221;:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>OK, the source of this <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/i\/status\/1072261597555539979\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">cringeworthy video clip<\/a>, Rebel Media, may be suspect to many ~ I do not follow them ~ but it does bring up a question: is this what we expect for the $1 Billion plus we pay for the CBC?<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Justin-Trudeau-softball-interview-screencap.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Justin-Trudeau-softball-interview-screencap.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"350\" height=\"286\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-46300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Justin-Trudeau-softball-interview-screencap.png 350w, https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/Justin-Trudeau-softball-interview-screencap-150x123.png 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=IFtsa9r_WUE\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The complete interview<\/a>, which I watched. looks, as someone else said, more like an advertisement for one of those online dating sites than news. It certainly caused a small storm about the CBC\u2019s bias \u2026 which, in this case, especially when compared to CBC journalists\u2019 question and comments directed to e.g. Andrew Scheer and Maxime Bernier, seems over the top, even by the CBC\u2019s standards. And that begs the question: is the CBC living up to its mandate? The <a href=\"https:\/\/laws-lois.justice.gc.ca\/eng\/acts\/b-9.01\/page-1.html#h-4\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Broadcasting Act<\/em><\/a> says (\u00a73(1)(d)(i), <em>inter alia<\/em>, that \u201c<strong>The Canadian broadcasting system should serve to safeguard, enrich and strengthen the cultural, political, social and economic fabric of Canada<\/strong>.\u201d I suspect that someone will want to make a case that the CBC, as a network, at least in it\u2019s English language \u2018news\u2019 services, has crossed a line and looks too much like a 24 hour a day <em>informercial<\/em> for the <em>Laurentian Consensus<\/em> as represented by the Liberal Party of Canada.<\/p>\n<p>[&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p>What does the CBC do? Basically it provides, in both English and French, three services:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.rcinet.ca\/en\/\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Radio Canada International<\/a> ~ this is Canada\u2019s voice to the world, it is, today, entirely on the internet. In 2012 the Harper government imposed a 10% cut on CBC\/Radio Canada ~ then CBC\/Radio Canada decide that RCI, which is little known, would have its budget cut by 80% from $12+ Million to just over $2 Million. That ended the era of RCI\u2018s shortwave, world wide service. It was a criminally <strong><em>stupid<\/em><\/strong> decision that, in my considered, professional opinion, should have caused the government of the day to summarily dismiss the entire CBC\/Radio Canada Board and all of the most senior managers for cause. Every country needs a \u201cvoice,\u201d RCI <strong><em>was<\/em><\/strong> ours \u2026 the gold standard for international broadcasting is found in the BBC World Service and Deutsche Welle, both still provides near global coverage using nearly jam-proof shortwave and satellite radio stations. Both, of course, make extensive and intensive use of the internet;<\/li>\n<li>CBC Radio ~ CBC Radio has a big, integrated network of stations covering most of Canada. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/frequency\/index.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">You can see a list of transmitters on their web site<\/a>. If you live in Arctic Bay, in Nunavut, population 850\u00b1, you are served by radio station CKAB-FM which is a community-owned CBC North rebroadcaster that gets its programming from CFFB in Iqaluit; if you live in Prince Rupert, BC, your are served by CBC Radio 1 (a national network which has a mix of local, regonal and national programmes) broadcasting on 860 KHz and if you live in Shilo, MB you are also served by CBC Radio 1 on FM from Brandon, the people in Twillingate, NL are served, again by Radio 1 from  Grand Falls which is rebroadcast on 90.7 MHz from a transmitter in Botswood. In short, CBC Radio is doing a first rate job of serving most Canadians, even if you find some of the content banal and biased. I think it is, by and large, money well spent because in many, many, many communities the CBC provides the only news and weather; but<\/li>\n<li>CBC Television is, in my opinion, a near total waste of taxpayer\u2019s money. As you can see from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbc.ca\/frequency\/index.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">this list (you have to select the province you want)<\/a> the CBC has only 14 English language TV broadcast stations which serve about 25 urban \u2018markets\u2019 and serves less than 10% of the Canadian market in prime time. (Rex Murphy, in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=kVyZuUyAASI\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">a talk to the Manning Centre<\/a>, quipped about the low audience levels of the CBC at about the 2\u201950\u201d mark.) It used to have hundreds of transmitters providing near national coverage but in 2012, when Canada converted to digital TV, it closed all but 14 because only a tiny number (certainly less than 5%, likely less than 2%) of Canadians want to watch CBC <strong><em>and<\/em><\/strong> do not have cable or internet access. Electing to not serve Canadians with many, many local TV stations was a smart business decision because, as you can see from <a href=\"http:\/\/channelguides.ca\/ota.php\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">this listing<\/a>, Canadians from Kamloops, through Kenora and on to Halifax and St. John\u2019s are served by other networks.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I think that Radio Canada International should be upgraded; CBC Radio should remain about the same, government funded and commercial free, and CBC TV should be closed, completely and the money saved should be used to directly subsidize TV, film and radio production in Canada based on Canadian content rules: <em>n%<\/em> for the production company being Canadians and using Canadian studios, <em>x%<\/em> for using Canadian talent ~ on screen and in in the studio, <em>y%<\/em> for using Canadian locations and so on.<\/p>\n<p>Some, at least half, I suspect, of the CBC\u2019s 14 television licences will sell, at auction, for a tidy sum, making room for new, innovative, probably ethnic, services in larger cities ~ Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto and Montreal and a couple of others. The CBC\u201ds excellent production facilities will also sell for a good sum to private entrepreneurs who will then host dozens of independent radio and TV programme producers. There\u2019s nothing wrong with Canadian production values and in a more open market I suspect that Canadian drama, public affairs, education and political commentary programmes can survive and even thrive, each on its own merits.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A few days back, Ted Campbell posted under the title &#8220;Is it time to get rid of the CBC? Should we?&#8221; Betteridge&#8217;s law says the answer should be &#8220;no&#8221;, but in this case the answer is more like &#8220;Why haven&#8217;t we sold that thing off already?&#8221;: OK, the source of this cringeworthy video clip, Rebel [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":35193,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,28,53],"tags":[97,1287,416,887,908,793,101],"class_list":["post-46299","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cancon","category-media","category-politics","tag-advertising","tag-betteridgeslaw","tag-cbc","tag-justintrudeau","tag-liberalparty","tag-subsidies","tag-tv"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/favicon.png","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-c2L","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46299","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46299"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46299\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46301,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46299\/revisions\/46301"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35193"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46299"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46299"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46299"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}