CBC Cuts: "Hardly a Meltdown"

This is a repost of a Toronto Sun article:


Despite the sorry news that the CBC is cutting 799 jobs...it's still getting $1.1 billion a year. Hardly a melt-down...

Mr. Lacroix defends running U.S. game shows on grounds that they attract viewers and advertising. Now he says the Corp has to sell $125 million in assets to alleviate the shortfall...

Executive salaries have already been frozen, so maybe the 50% cut in bonuses now will be trimmed to 100%. Why are bonuses necessary when execs are already well-paid?

...Acknowledging that she had no inside knowledge about CBC layoffs or cutbacks, Ms. [Carole] Taylor [former chairman of the CBC (2001-05), and a former B.C. finance minister (2005-08)] said she opposed importing U.S. game shows and felt the CBC should 'not be going for ratings but providing a service that cannot be found anywhere else.'

...Lord knows, private broadcasting won't do it."


I just want to point out that there are Canadian-made shows on the CBC that I and other people actually do like to watch (besides Hockey Night in Canada, obviously):

• This Hour Has 22 Minutes
• The Red Green Show
• The Rick Mercer Report
• The Hour
• Marketplace

As for what to do with the other 20 or so hours of the day, here are my thoughts:

If the CBC doesn’t have the money or advertising to draw in a huge audience, that pretty much affirms its position as a public broadcaster. And what’s wrong with that?

The CBC doesn’t have the constraints of the privately-owned networks (pleasing advertisers mostly), so it can really be a place for fun and experimentation.

There are a ton of things the CBC could do, and perhaps, should have done, as a public broadcaster. Here's one: How about giving time slots to the public?

Got a garage band you want to showcase? Written a screenplay you would like to see come to life? Want to practice reporting skills by doing your own story on a Canadian person/event/issue?

It could be like YouTube for TV; public broadcasting for...public broadcasting.

This might actually get people to tune in more, if they, as the Canadian public, can make contributions to what’s considered “Canadian content.”

And Wheel of Fortune sucks anyway. What were they thinking?


Share your thoughts!

The End of Mass Media? Again?

Let me begin with a little excerpt from The Simpsons since it always seems to apply so well to real life:

BROADCASTER: On our panel is a porn star, a physics professor, a robotics engineer, a make-up artist, and...a print journalist?

NELSON: Ha ha! You’re medium is dying!


I don’t know if I listed the non-print journalist professions correctly, but what matters here is the idea that print is dying. And not just print; the CBC’s documentary The End, suggests even TV and radio might also be meeting their untimely demise – or timely; whatever way you look at it.

The truth is I would rather hold a book in my hands than read off a screen; then again, I don’t see the point of a computer without the internet. And I don’t listen to the radio. (When I worked in an office 2 summers ago, the same radio station was always on, and they played the same 10 songs 3 times a day every day. I’m not even exaggerating.)

What I think The End is getting at isn’t necessarily that radio, TV, and print are dying, but changing. The documentary called it an “evolution of choice.”

We don’t have to wait for our favourite shows or songs to come on, a decision made primarily by broadcasters and advertisers.

On that note, one of the most interesting things from the documentary is the idea of “conversation vs. consumption.”

Thanks to video on demand and TiVo, we can just fast-forward through commercials; with the internet, we can search for what we want, and make contributions to the content ourselves in however way we choose, which is usually honestly and without restraint.

I also want to mention something that was said aboutWikipedia - the idea that it’s “killing encyclopedias.” That, I’d have to disagree with because like radio, TV, and print, the same information will just move to another format.

Other complaints are that Wikipedia isn’t always accurate because anyone can add to it; that too I disagree with.

Wikipedia is a shared space. If someone makes something up and posts it, it'll get caught because everyone has access to it, making it more reliable in some ways.

Wikipedia’s contributors don’t have advertisers to please or government riding their butts to keep certain things out, like mainstream information-disseminating networks. It’s also free and easily-updated, whereas as the expensive traditional leather-bound versions are a little more difficult to add to.

Plus, finding what you want on Wikipedia is fast and can be done from anywhere with a cell phone – which apparently 815 million people bought last year. (As an added bonus, Wikipedia doesn't weigh a hundred pounds.)

The end of radio, TV, and print? Not likely. We’re more likely looking at the end of long attention spans. Hey, a bird!

What is Facebook up to?

They’ve got your name, location, phone number, email address, interests, beliefs, daily activities, pictures, conversations, dreams, and the names and related information of your family and friends. Basically, all the happenings of your life.

So who are they exactly? And what are they doing with all that valuable information?

Here's one answer:



I actually read through those painfully long and boring Facebook Terms of Use just to see if the video was was telling the truth, at least about the Terms of Use part. And what did I discover?

It was all there. (Then I realized that was the first time I ever actually read the Facebook Terms of Use.)





Another Term I found interesting was:

“We reserve the right, at our sole discretion, to change, modify, add, or delete portions of these Terms of Use at any time without further notice...It is your responsibility to regularly check the Site to determine if there have been changes to these Terms of Use and to review such changes.”

I don’t typically read any terms of use (Does anyone?), but this seems odd.

They could basically say,

“If the Company so hereto desires, the Company can irreversibly, conclusively, indisputably, irrefutably, sell all of your information to the fat cats of billion-dollar companies. The Company is not responsible for how this affects you, as you, the User, acknowledged, accepted, and understood, these unnecessarily complicated Terms of Use. And you can't do anything about it.”

Wait - isn't that what they're saying?

Gotta love that tricky language.

Realize, Resist, Revolt (website for MIT-ers)

I Stumble(d)Upon this neat site for MIT-ers, or I guess anyone who questions what they’re told...and then analyzes the heck out of it.








Just click on an intriguing button, and there you have it: a summary of pretty much everything you already knew from being in this program.

And it has fun pictures!

Why, Infomercials? Why?!

Do you ever see those infomercials that highlight herbal remedies that no one knows about but "totally work"? There’s always the same Letterman-style set-up with a fake night-time city in the background, and some person no one’s ever heard of being interviewed by someone else no one's never heard of. The whole thing = cheesiness (especially when it's on during the day).

Here are some of the more ridiculous quotes from an infomercial for Veggie Cal D. From what I could gather, it’s some sort of combination of seaweed, calcium, and vitamin D.

Said product:

• “is a natural medical insurance”
• “is a super-supplement”
• “is an insurance policy to better health”
• “can reduce risk of cancer by up to 50%”
• "is made from God-given nutrients”

From the interview:

• “They (pharmaceutical companies) don’t want you to know about it.”
• “I’m just reporting on what the scientific community is reporting on.”

In small print:

• “Results not typical”
• “Not tested by the Food and Drug Administration”
• “Not intended to prevent diagnose, treat, or cure any disease”

I’m sold!

Or, maybe I could just drink some milk, eat some cereal (with more milk), and chill out in the sun instead of inside with these ridonculous twisting-of-the-truth-o-mercials.

Ad-Less, Get More

Do you ever tire of opening the newest issue of your favourite magazine only to have to flip through 30 pages of ads just to get to the index?

Do you ever start reading a captivating article, turn the page and – UGH – it’s gone, replaced by some perfectly perfected supermodel you hope is simply the result of extensive airbrushing?

I know I do.


In my feeble quest to find alternative ad-free magazines, I made a rather shocking discovery: there are a lot of them. (So, on second thought, I guess it wasn’t really that feeble of an attempt.)

The slightly higher cost aside, there's an ad-less magazine for almost every audience out there, audiences that are currently being targeted and captured by the mainstream – and even ones that aren’t.

There are magazines for Christians, and divers, and poetry writers...And butchers, and bakers, and candlestick-makers. Okay, that last one was a joke (as far as I know); it just seemed to fit so well.


If you want to break free from the pressure to BUY! BUY! BUY! here are some alternatives:

- for Christians – Geez

- for Scuba Divers – In-Depth

- for Feminists – Bitch

- for Gardeners – Garden Gate

- for Science-Fans – Greater Good

- for Literary-Lovers – The Sun

- for Design and Photography Buffs – U&I

- for Political Junkies/ Environmentalists/ Culture Critics – Briarpatch; Adbusters; could also include Bitch

- for those who Like to Laugh – The Funny Times

- for a Little Bit of Everything – YES!


…and one last thing for Bloggers – Ad-Free Blog

If none of these sound like you, check out NewPages.com.

Danger: Buy This or Else!

Geez, advertisements must have low self-esteem. Yeah, ads aren’t people, but think about it: They pump themselves up by making us – the viewers/readers/listeners/consumers – feel bad about ourselves, constantly reiterating the plain and simple truth that we suck.

We’re ugly, fat, our homes aren’t clean enough, we aren’t eating enough McDonald’s, we’re not spending enough time with our family, our boobs aren’t big enough, we don’t have the newest…whatever.

Low self-esteem is the advertising business. How else are we going to buy things we don’t need unless that “need” is created?

OMG! Not blackheads! No, I can’t live another second with that regular face wash! I need the fancy one made with Sodium Methyl Cocoyl Taurate, Titanium Dioxide, Trideceth-9, PEG-5 Ethylhexanoate, Xanthan Gum, and a whole lot of other ingredients I’ve never heard of and can’t pronounce. You know, the one Jennifer Love Hewitt uses so I can be hot like her!

Speaking of hot people and skin cleanliness, I recently saw a commercial for a product called Acne Pro (which is pretty much the same as Pro-Active but for half the price and sans celebrity endorsements).

It opened up with two 20-ish women looking at a picture of a young guy with acne. They basically just call him “gross,” and say they would never date someone who looked like that.

An equally mean commercial for Axe hair care products demonstrates similar bullying tactics. In the commercial, a bunch of modelesque guys put on semi-ridiculous wigs and try to pick up girls, all of whom refuse.

The commercial ends with: “If guys like this can’t get girls because of their hair, what chance do you have?” Watch it if you haven’t seen it yet.



The sad thing is, even if these were the meanest commercials out there, commercials that are obviously just trying to make people feel bad about themselves so the multi-million dollar companies can sell their “miracle” product, people are superficial.

As much as I despise these commercials, it’s clear – at least to me – that we have become the advertisers, putting down others so we can sell ourselves that much better. Is this the long-term effect of advertising, or are we just naturally vain?