The CRTC hearings are going on as we speak. They have been written about in the newspapers. For example, this mornings (Wednesday) Toronto Star Business section had a good article about the cable companies fighting with the local OTA broadcasters. I guess you can search the internet for CRTC articles as well. Here is one link.

[Link: financialpost.com]

Hi RFMano7,

Hi guys!

Please note there has been quite bit news coming out of CRTC lately and you will have to read between the lines to see who will benefit from the new proposed rulings. It’s not always clear who’s on whose side when it comes the general public.

I have included number of sites you can read different articles, an application for new OTA HDTV station across Canada unfortunately the CRTC has rejected it. Last year in Kamloops BC the CBC stop broadcasting OTA signal. CRTC decrease time restrictions on the number of commercials per hour networks can broadcast prime time. You can read about that as well.

As I see it now no one is really looking after our interest at this time. Basically it comes down to dollars and cents the networks “want to make more money” and who will have to pay for it? (Free OTA what we have had since the networks started broadcasting.) Cable and satellite companies are looking after their own interests they don’t want to the new rulings to cut into the profits and I guess in the end we will end up falling through cracks.

You will have to come to your own conclusions at this time. My only hope is that more people receive OTA signal, then they will recognize us as market and be forced to continue broadcasting OTA.

Who knows maybe the CRTC will let the big boys fight it out, but insist the networks broadcast OTA "free" for who ever can receive it, but I wouldn’t hold my breath on that.

Happy reading :-(

If you want more just to google CRTC OTA




[Link: cbc.ca]

[Link: saveourcbckamloops.ca]

[Link: cbc.ca]

[Link: engadgethd.com]

[Link: cbc.ca]

[Link: digitalhome.ca]

If all the Canadian OTA Stations went off the air tomorrow I wouldn't even know. I wouldn't even miss them, for that matter. It would be sad to see TV go this way, but how many people really know that you can get free Digital TV? (other than the fine folks who read and contribute to this forum)

I can catch all the programs I watch on a Buffalo station; I'm sure most of us could.

I think the CRTC is foolish and just wasting money on such a useless matter as giving companies like CTVglobemedia and Global the oppportunity to rake in more money...for what? Carrying the same programs I'm getting for free from Buffalo?

OTA tv stations should be available to people where: 1)Cable is not available or offered; 2) Cable or staellite is not affordable; 3)and as most of us have come to realize--it's an alternative. Rogers, Cogeco--whoever will not get any money from me for TV ever.


OTA all the way!!!!

A fellow DXer in the WTFDA said he was talking to an engineer at CKWS-TV 11 Kingston. The enginner stated that CKWS doesn't intend to use its digital allocation of ch 69, and instead "flash cut" from analogue 11 to digital 11 on the 2011 transition date. Likely a lot of stations will do this.

The fact that Kamloops has no OTA CBC-TV station (but oddly still has SRC OTA), and most of BC no longer has CTV OTA since CHAN-TV & rebroadcasters switched to Global, doesn't bode well for OTA in much of Canada. Enjoy free TV while you can. Funny, there was more to watch on TV when there were only 8 channels instead of 130. If the CRTC would allow true a la carte "buy only channels you actually watch" service for cable - and let the channels nobody watches die, then I'd be happier with cable.

Good point. When I tell friends and family how I get my HDTV fix some are surprised its possible and one was convinced what I was doing was illegal!


I don't fit into this crowd. The bulk of the TV programming I view is from Canadian outfits. As for my kids, probably 90%. Think TVOkids here. I have to ask if you watch the news out of Buffalo though (assuming you are in Canada) ? I have no interest in the latest 3 alarmer burning out of control at Main and Filmore. :)


Its smart business on their part. Colour me socialist, but I feel there is value in having a Canadian identity.


You must be the proverbial city slicker 'cuz where I live I'd saw the majority of the real estate does not have cable TV available.


Most people can afford Cable or Satellite TV. But why should I have to pay? Isn't that what the commercials are for? :)

|3)and as most of us have come to realize--it's

Preaching to the converted here. Cable and Satellite have the advantage in quantity, but not in quality, IMO. I had cable and internet via Rogers for years and was paying 110$ a month. That works out to 1320$ a year. And now they want more money so I can view digital channels? What's up with that?! That's an HDTV set there. Or the mother of all OTA setups. I'm in a good location and have plenty of programming available for free. Others aren't so lucky I admit. BTW, if you shop around for high-speed Internet you can get it for 19$ a month tax incl. Paying 45$ to a cable provider is not good value.

It's interesting to note that most, if not all, OTA broadcasters lease space at their transmitter sites to radio stations, cellular providers, etc., so it's not as if their transmission infrastructure is a black hole to their bottom line. I'd venture a guess that in fact, most OTA broadcasters, with stand-alone tower sites, have virtually no cost to operate/maintain their transmitters, when revenues from co-locating are considered -- they're just not raking in gobs of extra money that they think they deserve if they could charge BDUs for use of their signals.


Couldn't have said it better myself.


Not by a longshot. I've never quite understood how in America, where I always assume profit trumps all else, that THEY'RE not the ones whining about why OTA still exists, but no, here we are in Canada, trying to do away with free, all in the name of profit for monopolistic corporations.
And look at how local stations are almost nonexistent, nowadays. Broadcasters think they can make more money simply by importing more Hollywood gossip trash programming.
Sad indeed.

Hey donnyjaguar;

Yeah, When I hear about some the decisions that the CRTC makes I can get caught up in it just a bit too much. I'm in the Niagara region where "local" news comes from Hamilton. So, I do appreciate that I have the choice of watching local TV for free. For years growing up that's all we had, because my folks refused to pay for cable tv. Now that I subscribe to Bell AND Dish Network (NO, NOT FREE TO AIR) I find myself wondering: "Why am I Paying for these channels that also have commercials?" In theory, they're taking in revenue--twice--aren't they?

Local broadcast channels should be available for free to the masses. Even with satellite tv, I find myself watching the "main" networks more than Discovery, MTV, Much and even TSN.

I agree with you when you say that we should have a Canadian Identity, but how about some local identity too. The only local thing on most Toronto stations is the news. CHCH is E! most of the time and then 30 or 60 minutes of news, CFTO is CTV just like every ofther CTV affilliate. I flip around for the CTV news and it's Some station in Regina, not the national news. There are markets smaller than Niagara (Kingston) that have a local tv station. The CRTC rejected an application for a braodcast station out of St. Catharines, because giants like CTV, GLobal and even CITY cried that they would lose ad revenue is there was one more staion on in the area.

Yeah, my cable is through Cogeco, and I am paying more because I don't have it bundled with Cogeco Cable tv--but that will never happen. My brother is a cable contractor and even he gets frustrated with Cogeco. They took Discovery HD and put it in a separate package-that pissed him off.

I can't even get that ,in the last two years the analogue signal has degraded to a ghosty mess and despite the 30Kw on Daniel's listing I can't get the 18-1 HD signal.


I was a local booster of the ppl who were setting that up and I could've dropped a nuke on Ottawa when I heard the decision!

-just did a quick scan...again the only CDN HD I get is CBC and SRC. If it goes like what some of you are saying, then all I need is a indoor attenna as the US stations are more than powerful enough [but you know that already].

crap..crap..crap

Oh.... i get my broadband after picking up one of those portable Motorola modems to use with Rogers, I kinda like...15 seconds
to transfer between computers..no expense or hassle in maintaining a home network and routine power off to keep from being "pinged" when the 'puters are only being used as HTPCs/DVRs or themselves are hibernating or off.

RFMan07, so for the past couple day's i've been trying again with scans on ch.40 to pick up CTV 9.1 with no luck on the Hisense USDTV 2020. So last night i decided i would just try to set it back to factory default by using the following key combo.

• GUIDE
• ASPECT
• EXIT
• PROG INFO
• 0

I then went through the initial setup and this time i let it get to ch.40, waited a few seconds and unplugged the antenna so it wouldn't hang, then I finished the setup. To my suprise CTV 9.1 was detected and on my list now!! :-)

So i manually scanned everything else above ch.40 and i got all of my other previous channels back, so now i'm happy as can be with 21 Digital channels to chose from with 2 more to come when OMNI 1 and 2 finally start broadcasting content in Toronto.

I read in the paper the other day that Bell Xpressvu is going to make available freebie HDTV channels on their satellite systems. I'm not sure if this means the FTA owners will be able to view them. Guessing it will mean only the Bell subscribers get a couple of bones for free if they have the HDTV box. The details, in the article, were conspicuous by their absence.

Talk to me about channel 44 and 18. I get a full-scale carrier on 44-1 (whch I see is registered to Rogers for Omni MT) and absolutely jack on 18. Given that I'm getting 11 SDTV perfectly I just assumed there was no signal on 18. Is there something there?

Hi donnyjaguar,

Here we go, I did another scan today and here is what I am receiving.

44-1 82% No video
57-1 76 CityTV
64-1 85 No video
65-1 88 No video, No Test Pattern, Global TV
66-1 82 SUN

Not picking anything up on 18, pretty sure there is nothing there.

From a Canwest press release...

"The digital transmitters are launching just as new episodes of our viewer favourites return to the networks. We are offering our viewers the best programming via the best quality broadcast signals," said Barbara Williams, Executive Vice President, Content, Canwest Broadcasting.

-- guffaw! sure, sure... they make it sound as if they planned this, when they actually whined to the CRTC and got multiple extensions over several years, before they even bothered with OTA HD

It may only be me but I think there seems to be a distinct sense of passive aggression the way some of these Canadian stations and adopting digital broadcasting, weeks of test patterns instead of content, on and off broadcasting, miniscule powered transmitters, repeated requests for extensions, etc.

CRTC turning down applications for more HD stations is not good, I think there isn’t enough competition and only a few large players here in Canada are controlling the TV industry it is more like a monopoly and they can just push around the CRTC.

Look at the cell phone industry here in Canada the price for the service is very high compared to other countries. Last year while on vacation in China I noted everyone seem to have the latest and greatest cell phones. I ask a sales man what was the cost for cell phone service he told me full service was about 10 dollars US per month. As I see it, competition brings better pricing polices as well as more innovated products.

The Canadian TV networks and suppliers have a good thing going for themselves, sit back and collect monthly fees. They just have to force (Crying were not making enough profits, were poor) the CRTC to do what they want. I wonder if they ever think of new creative ways or new products in order to make more profits.

I am sure they are thinking, "Why should we kill the golden goose, lets make more money"

DaMeatMan: Great to hear that you finally got CFTO!!!

How about that eh? All along that may very well be what we had to do. Doesn't make sense though, but I guess whatever works. :)

Most of the shows I rely on are on CFTO, so I'm quite content.

What do you expect, we have the leafs that haven't done anything for decades, yet you cannot afford a ticket (even if you could get one). Just put together an MLS team that bombed in their first season, look to bomb in their second, yet they are sold old. Why should TV stations be any different. They don't have to do anything, or offer anything new, we seem to love to pay for mediocre entertainment. In fact take away from us and make everyone pay the price. Can't get cable, tough, buy a dish.
Must be nice to be able to stick your own antenna up, pick up the US feed, then rebroadcast it to us suckers, with your own profitable commercials overlayed.

If all that is being discussed happens, I am sure glad I can pick up a lot of Buffalo stations from where I am.
I can always get my local news from a paper or the internet.