Part of today’s Vancouver Sun (Canwest Global) editorial (hat tip to DC In YOW):
[…] The CRTC ruled this week on a complaint from the CBC that The Sports Network breached the conditions of its licence by offering viewers in various regions of the country a choice of what hockey game they wanted to watch, not once, but three times between October and December last year.
That, the CBC complained, was unfair. Not only did it breach the terms of TSN’s licence, but it constituted unfair competition.
If TSN were able to feed to local cable companies more than one game at a time in different regions of the country, it could command greater advertising revenue. Since the CBC does not have the ability to broadcast more than one game at a time, it would not be able to match TSN when it came time to bid on the rights to carry hockey.
In ruling in favour of the CBC, the CRTC largely ignored the question of fairness. Instead, it relied on past rulings and its interpretation of what the existing licence does and does not allow.
Lost, however, is the underlying purpose of the CRTC, which is to protect the public interest.
From a hockey fan’s point of view, that interest is being able to see as many games as possible. It should also be to promote the principle of highest and best use. If TSN can get more value out of hockey and reach more viewers with more games, then a regulatory regime that artificially limits the value of hockey simply serves bureaucratic inertia and mocks the idea of public interest.
Over the past couple of decades, although it was often controversial, the CRTC has served Canadians well by overseeing a dramatic transformation of the telecommunications industry while creating a relatively orderly if not completely even playing field for the broadcasting industry.
This fall, it is slated to conduct a badly needed review of the television industry.
But this ruling and other recent decisions on the telecommunications side strongly suggest that it’s also time to review of the role of the CRTC. The legislative framework under which it operates has struggled to keep up with the 500-channel universe and lies sprawling on the ice while the the [SIC] rapidly evolving Internet skates way.
You might want to think this through even more clearly (hint: reading this blog helps!), go to its logical conclusion, and add the suggestion for a “review of the role” of the CBC. If you’d read my blog it would save you a lot of time. You’d find that it has been my strong suggestion that we bypass yet another “review of the role” of the state-run media, because this would mark the 857th “review of the role” (by liberal-leftists), and jump to the part where state-run media is banned in Canada by law, and the part where in fact that notion should be enshrined in our Constitution.
PTBC was founded by Mr. Johannesen in 2000.
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