Media Beat: February 04, 2019

By David Farrell

Toronto traffic legend Darryl Dahmer steps down after 45 years

The 680 News traffic reporter has called it a day and put his longstanding airborne career in park. Watch the farewell on BT TV

Media News Digest: La Presse wants money, Global expands Morning Show, Sportsnet cuts Elliott Price

News about news: La Presse has launched its voluntary contribution initiative, starting up a website to allow people to contribute $5 or more on a monthly basis or give a one-time donation of an amount that they want. Saturday's edition included a special section of mostly self-congratulatory articles, including an impressive list of investigations that… – Steve Faguy’s blog

Canada’s telcos per gig revenue most expensive anywhere

Canadian telcos make 70 times as much per gigabyte, per person as telcos in India, and 23 times as much as Finland. – Mathieu Galarneau, HuffPost

OMNI TV Lunar Holiday schedule

To celebrate the Year of the Pig, Rogers’ multicultural brand rolling out a roster of festive Lunar New Year programming, including the annual special Celebrating the Year of the Pig, and China’s premier television event CCTV Beijing – Chinese New Year Gala. Also, don’t forget to tune in to a special viewing of The Monkey King 3 and Beautiful Accident during Chinese Super Cinema Night. It all begins here, on OMNI Television, starting Monday, Feb. 4.

Forget about Shaw Communications

Shaw’s television and internet businesses are incredible, but its wireless division isn’t nearly as good. Compare that to Telus, which has done a much better job maintaining wireless margins. – Nelson Smith, The Motley Fool

CBC head under fire after comparing Netflix to the British Raj

In a brief interview with The Globe, CBC supremo Catherine Tait acknowledged her comments may have been “hamfisted,” but she felt there may be “lessons from history” that could help shape the policy response of governments that are grappling with the growing power of U.S. tech giants such as Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix and Google. – Simon Houpt, The Globe and Mail

Attention music lovers: N.S. radio station selling its entire vinyl collection

Stingray-owned Mix 94.1 and Zed 97.9 on province’s North Shore are going digital and need to offload thousands of records. All the money will go to Viola's Place Society, which operates a homeless shelter on Marsh Street in New Glasgow. – CBC News

The spirit of (local) radio: How one tiny Ontario station keeps listeners tuning in

CJAI 92.1 FM, a community radio station on Amherst Island, about 30 kilometres west of Kingston, in Lake Ontario, was created in 2006 by a group of residents — including veteran broadcaster Peter Trueman, who had retired to the island — to promote local content and community events. It now reaches roughly 10,000 listeners from Picton to the western edge of Kingston and airs more than 40 hours a week of live shows: Jazz Jim’s Vault (jazz classics and history), Saturday Night Barn Burner (lesser-known artists with a focus on rock), Sally’s Books (readings from selected books), and Birding (birding), to name just a few. – David Rockne Corrigan, TVO

Neil Carleton’s induction to Amateur Radio Hall of Fame

On Saturday, January 19, 2019, with temperatures hovering at -24 Celsius, 50 Almonte Amateur Radio Club (AARC) members and friends gathered for their annual dinner evening in Almonte, ON.

The highlight of the event was the formal induction of club member Neil Carleton, VE3NCE, into the Canadian Amateur Radio Hall of Fame (CARHOF). – The Milestone

Spotify in talks to buy podcasting giant Gimlet Media

By acquiring Gimlet, Spotify would get a huge shot in the arm in the podcasting arena. Founded by former This American Life producer Alex Blumberg and former Boston Consulting Group consultant Matthew Lieber in 2014, Gimlet has become a podcasting production powerhouse, behind such hits as StartUp, Reply All, The Nod, and Homecoming. – Nicole LaPorte, Fast Company

Vice to axe 250 staff in latest round of layoffs

Vice has announced plans to sack 250 staff, as a wave of job cuts affecting the digital media industry continues to hit companies around the world amid questions over the sustainability of ad-supported online publishing. – Jim Waterson, The Guardian

Does a little Australian TV channel give us clues for radio’s future?

Oxygen is just a collection of on-demand TV shows. On the TV Guide, it exists as a virtual channel - the EPG slot there to promote the shows available on-demand. When you channel-surf into Oxygen, it isn’t giving you a live TV channel at all - in fact, the show conveniently starts at the beginning. It’s an on-demand service - not a live TV channel. Programming has been chosen based on how well it’ll perform as an on-demand product.

What could radio learn from this? – James Cridland, Radio Info

Opinion: Why media love white racist stories

Pointing out and condemning individuals for their racism is popular because it exemplifies what scholars Eve Tuck and Wayne Yang would call a “move to innocence.” Moves to innocence are the rhetorical moves that people use to distance themselves from genocide and colonization. – Rima Wilkes (UBC) and Howard Ramos (Dalhousie U), The Chronicle Herald

Netflix spent $1.8B on advertising last year

Netflix may not have any advertising on its streaming service, but it is no stranger to marketing.

The company has quietly become one of the biggest advertising buyers in the entertainment industry — and that spend continues to grow as the company ramps up its original programming efforts. – Media Post

IoT consumer market projected to hit $104B by 2023

The consumer Internet of Things market is projected to reach $104 billion by 2023, growing 17% annually until then.

The consumer IoT market was estimated to have reached $46.8 billion in 2018, according to the forecast by ReportBuyer. – Media Post

RIP

Manitoba sports legend Bob Picken died Jan 30 from cancer at age 86. From his early days as a baseball player, competitive curler and golfer to his decades of covering sports on the radio for CJOB, CKY and CBC to his countless hours of volunteering his time, Bob was a man with a wealth of knowledge, an ability to tell a story, and the kindness of a true gentleman. – Ted Wyman, Winnipeg Sun