Essay on Communication Technologies in Canada

Canada as a nation has been striving to characterize itself as more ?Canadian? for decades. This has included numerous struggles and events such as protests, bans, and the creation of the Massey Commission, to encourage national development in the arts, and support major companies like the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) and National Film Board (NFB). However, this has not been an easy task for the Canadian government, as major influences from below the border (the United States) have been captivating the Canadian audiences by large. American media has had a momentous revolutionizing effect on Canada, even through efforts made to define Canada with its own cultural identity.

The recent Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications (CRTC) (2013c) 'Broadcasting Regulatory Policy on the Distribution of Canadian Category C national news speciality services' marks a new regulatory approach to distributing competitive news and sports programming in Canada. This policy is a response to Canadians' concerns over consumer choice due to program bundling and an inability to select news and sports programs on a stand-alone basis (CRTC, 2013c; CRTC, 2014). Based on the Commission's public notice on 'Regulatory Framework for Broadcasting Distribution Undertakings and Discretionary Programming Services', the new regulation demonstrates an effort to reduce national news and sports program regulations and to

Canada is a country, proud of its culture and heritage. Canada is a country in North America alongside the United States and Mexico, boarded by the Arctic, Atlantic, and Pacific oceans. Particularly Canada is a multicultural, diverse country with two national languages consisting of French, as well as English. Although the language is diverse it is not the only element that changes across the country. In addition, Canada consists of just under ten million kilometers squared of land, which is the second largest landmass in the world. Likewise, Canada has everything from flat grass to beautiful mountains, sparse hills to large valleys with mesmerizing beauty. Something to consider about Canada and its success is the aspects of Canadian society, and what is contributing to the overall well-being of all Canadian citizens making Canada a great country to live in.

The service includes a touchpad home monitoring console to manage multiple utilities at home, including security sensors and cameras, thermostat, appliances and lighting. Management and access to these services is also available on smartphones through a home monitoring application. Rogers Communications provided a suite of digital marketing services to Canadian small, medium, and enterprise size business. Services include search engine optimization, mobile marketing, social media marketing, pay per click, and analytics. In May, 2013 Rogers Communications launched "Vicinity" a loyalty and marketing automation platform for small and medium businesses in Canada. The platform provides local retail businesses across Canada with the opportunity to provide customized loyalty

Rules revolving around Canadian Content (CanCon) have been set in place since the 1920’s. In 2005, revisions to the 1991 Broadcasting Act were made. Since this revision was made there have been further changes to the Act trying to create the best set of rules for CanCon to be broadcasted (Dewing, 2011). CanCon is an outdated concept that is causing consumers to switch to other forms of media. The CanCon rules cannot determine what is considered Canadian and they cannot keep up with the ever-changing forms of media. Canadian producers are only getting a slim portion of the industry even with the rules in place. Therefore CanCon rules should be totally eliminated.

Ever since the 1950’s more of the American culture has been known to influence Canadian ways of living through the media.

The U.S.’ negative dominance has been so damaging to Canadian culture that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, also known as the CRTC has had to step in and implement laws under the 1991 Broadcasting Act of Canada (Branch, Legislative Services). The CRTC says, “One of our goals is to ensure that Canadian broadcasting content meets the needs and interests of Canadians by delivering compelling, high-quality Canadian-made creative content from diverse sources on a variety of platforms (“Content Made by Canadians,” 2016). The role of the CRTC is to ensure that the United States, being the mega country that it is does not overshadow Canadian talent and does not limit the opportunities that Canadians may have when

Canada is considered to be a cultural mosaic, where all cultures are embraced opposed to a melting pot where it is expected to adopt one culture. Government regulated media is more favourable than policies based off of self-regulated solutions when addressing Canada’s media industries and cultural needs. Canadians place importance on national identity and without government regulated policies, the content in the media would have minimal Canadian information. According to the Aird Commission, when Canada’s media was operating through private enterprise, many stations expressed conflicting content, however, with state regulated media, broadcasting allows the nation to have a unified vocation. One unified message being sent to the nations citizens is more beneficial than multiple broadcasts on differentiated and insignificant information.

Each country has a particular fingerprint they leave with their media, and this is no exception with canada. As a nation we have a cultural identity we reflect with out movies and T.V. shows. Although Canada has been swamped with american media, CBC stays true to its roots by having “almost 100% Canadian content, with a mixture of dramas, comedies, documentaries and news programs”. In particular, Mr. D is a Canadian show featured on CBC, it strongly represents CBC’s mandate by including a large range of diversity, strong canadian traits in the characters and a purely canadian crew adding to Canada's cultural identity.

The CBC had a profound effect to the development of identity, heritage, and citizen in Canada because it proved that it could act as a powerful force in establishing a sense of national unity across the whole Canada. The CBC also countered the American influence and defended Canadian culture. It is recognized as one of Canada's greatest cultural institutions. It has become a leader in producing and distributing distinctive Canadian content, and symbolizes Canadian-made-media content around the

Loblaw Companies Ltd. is the largest Canadian based grocer with more than 1,000 stores operating in every province. Loblaw with 2015 sales of $44,4 bln and 29% grocery market share dominates in this industry .

The Canadian government sees magazines as an important part of their culture and gives Canadians a sense of identity.

In conclusion, Canadians are all being Canadian in their own customized way, making Canada the diverse jewel it

Canada is known as a very popular and welcoming country, but it has not always fit the multicultural status.

I suspect that the real motive of the Canadian government was not to protect Canadian culture in this dispute with the US. But rather, it seemed to concern more with political and economic factors. As appeared in the article, the Canadian government finally gave in and went on to settle the dispute (The Levin Institute, [1]). To me, that seems somewhat irrational to suddenly give up on one’s culture like they did, when the US threated to retaliate with trade barriers. As a speculation, I believe the dispute was motived by political and economic concerns. The Canadian government was attempting to defend the local media from a total domination by foreign media since it implies that Canadian businesses will be paying foreign corporations to have their products and services advertised on a magazine, even when local magazines have the capacity to provide the same type of service. Simply put, the concern seems to be related to the higher outflows of capital.