The recent official exemption of Google from the Online News Act will see Canadian news publishers get $100 million a year from the company for the next five years, indexed to inflation. CBC/Radio-Canada’s portion of this fund is capped at seven per cent, split equally between the French- and English-language service. As we announced in this press release, CBC will dedicate the new funding to the hiring of local journalists in underserved communities, with a focus on Western Canada.
thats great news. CBC is such a jem.
/Radio-Canada’s portion of this fund is capped at seven per cent, split equally between the French- and English-language service
Shouldn’t this be split proportionately between French and English? That seems more equitable to me.
Regardless, I think this is good, at least if they follow their radio model. I like their podcasts too, so nice to see more local stuff in podcast form.
I don’t really like their news TV channel, it’s a little too 24 hour news cycle for me, and it’s really hard to watch via their apps because it’s just their commercial music 50% of the time. I’ve lost a lot of trust in TV news.
Shouldn’t this be split proportionately between French and English? That seems more equitable to me.
It depends—in proportion to what, exactly? Some things cost the same amount whether you’re using them 100% of the time or only 10%. Some costs may be shared between the French and English sides. Others scale with the amount of material being produced. Very few scale with the number of listeners, and French Radio-Canada is broadcast in large areas outside of Quebec. Splitting the money into even halves makes for simpler bookkeeping, and simplifying the bookkeeping saves money.
By census population
Doesn’t fully capture usage of the service (visitors to Canada are not counted, but citizens who are absent from the country more than half the year may be). Are bilingual individuals counted as belonging to both sides, or do they have to add a rider to the census asking us which language we want to support? If someone, for whatever reason, wants to throw their support behind the language they don’t speak, are they allowed? If not, why not? And what are you going to give Quebec to keep them from throwing a political hissy-fit over getting short-changed?
Dividing the money in half keeps the lid firmly on all those cans of worms.
I get the impression that you’re the kind of person who complains about their tax money going to services they don’t use. By that logic, my taxes shouldn’t go to funding child care or primary-school education, because I don’t, and won’t, have any children. Thing is, both of those are general public goods, and I support them even if they don’t benefit me personally, because having them makes Canada a better place to be. And yes, French-language public radio is also a public good.
