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Group Project
Group Project Overview: Students will be broken up into four groups and
assigned a country to investigate (Britain or Australia). As a group, students are
expected to answer 8 questions on their country and make a presentation on the
findings.
Due date: the answers and presentation are both due on your presentation
date.
Evaluation: Each group will have 30 minutes for their presentation and
questions. The answers and presentation is worth 40% of your total grade and
will be evaluated as follows:
• Research 40% (e.g. How deep have you dived into the available sources?)
• Rational 40% (e.g. Have you sufficiently answered all the questions? Is there
internal consistency between your answers?)
• Style 20% (e.g. Is your answer document well written, presented and
sourced? Was your presentation clear, concise and creative?)
Questions:
1. How do people receive and use TV?
In our class, I’ve demonstrated that in Canada 94% of Canadians subscribe
to TV. Cable is the most used platform, followed by satellite. Only a small
and declining proportion of the population rely on free, over-the-air TV.
Nearly 1 in 5 Canadians has broadband and the Internet is a growing source
of TV programming. Many Canadians watch TV programming from the
Internet, but spend only a small amount of time doing it (i.e. high reach, low
frequency activity). The introduction of Netflix raises questions about how
this may change.
Canadians love TV – they watch some 26 hours a week of TV. Specialty TV
channels are very prominent. The TV viewing environment is very
fragmented.
2. Who are the top broadcasters and their top shows?
In our class, I’ve demonstrated that in Canada CTV, Global and CBC are
among the largest broadcasters in Canada. CTV and Global are also part of
large conglomerates who own the top specialty TV channels.
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The top shows are largely American, although domestic shows have been
making progress and are close to breaking the top 20.
3. Who are the top TV distributors? How do they package their channels?
Rogers is the largest cable TV distributor in Canada. It has a basic package,
specialty packages and premium packages. Shaw cable packages in a similar
way.
Satellite TV operators Bell and Shaw Direct also have basic, specialty and
premium packages. Satellite operators package based on theme/genre (e.g.
news, sports, variety).
4. What are the public policy objectives for TV?
Canada’s broad policy objectives are in the Broadcasting Act. In other
countries, they could be in a Communications Act.
5. What are the key public policy agencies and their roles?
CBC, CRTC, Industry Canada are the key ones in Canada. CBC is the public
broadcaster and is mandated, among other things outline in the broadcasting
act, to create high quality, original content. CRTC regulates the industry to
ensure the creation of high quality original content.
6. What are the key rules, regulations and financing methods for original TV?
If you are going to create programming the market wouldn’t otherwise, you
can create an institution that does it (e.g. CBC) or regulate the private sector.
In Canada, access to foreign broadcasters is restricted so Canadian
broadcasters can profit from access to their shows and invest some of those
profits in Canadian shows. The CRTC also limits the number of licensees to
ensure each licensee is profitable. Cancon quotas (e.g. exhibition,
expenditure) are applied to ensure the creation of programming.
Simultaneous substitution, genre protection, Canada Media Fund and
production tax credits and important rules/funds.
7. What are some current public policy challenges facing the TV industry?
In Canada, some timely public policy issues are: vertical integration, usagebased-billing, over-the-top TV.
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8. What are the pros and cons of their approach to TV compared it to Canada?
Sources:
Provide a list of the sources you referenced.
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