Media Beat: Feb. 02, 2023

Poll: Radio owns the ‘lion’s share’ of audio listening in Canada

AM/FM radio remains the largest source of audio for Canadians, according to the latest research radio on the go Poll by Signal Hill Insights and Radio Connects.

According to time spent listening in Spring 2022, AM/FM accounted for 39% of time spent listening to audio, according to an online panel survey of 3,114 Canadians ages 18 and older. Podcasts (7%) and free ad-supported music streaming (6%) each fell one point, while paid music streaming gained one point (14%). Signal Hill’s Jeff Vidler explains the facts in the following webinar.

Galaxy Broadband battles Elon Musk for remote internet service in Canada

A new player will soon be bringing access to high-speed internet to remote and rural communities: Ontario’s Galaxy Broadband just announced it is teaming up with UK-based OneWeb for a multi-year, $50 million deal to provide a low-orbit satellite internet service in direct competition with Musk’s Starlink. The launch of the service in Nunavut is already underway… – Clarrie Feinstein, Toronto Star

The Last Tango: Shaw waits for Rogers at the altar

Rogers Communications Inc and Shaw Communications Inc announced earlier this week that they have extended the deadline for their $26 billion merger from late January to February 17 as the companies await government approval.

The deal requires final approval from Industry Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne for the transfer of spectrum licenses owned by Shaw’s Freedom Mobile unit to Quebecor Inc.’s Videotron.

The best advocate for Rogers deals is rival Telus

… Telus documents disclosed during court hearings this fall show the Vancouver-based company’s tactics, from drafting anti-deals speech notes by NDP leader Jagmeet Singh to deliberations on mobilizing resistance from Western alienation activists and ” Meme factories” like Canada Proud were enough. – Andreas Willis, The Globe and the Mail

Lisa LaFlamme is just getting started

… LaFlamme, calmly sailing above the rubble, has other horizons in mind. She champions women in her industry, but equally important—perhaps more importantly—is her advocacy for women around the world. “I focus so much on the oppressed women and girls – like in Afghanistan, Iran, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the countries that are very close to me,” she says. “That’s where our energy needs to be directed.”

If you ask LaFlamme which stories touched a particular emotional chord, she mentions being in a tent in northern Iraq with a group of Yazidi women, one of whom displayed her most prized possession: a photo on her iPhone of her daughter being held as a sex slave by ISIS forces. These are the stories overlooked by the rest of the world that she still wants to tell. – Elisabeth Renzetti, lady of the castle

It’s not over yet

… A medium will not die if the content it contains meets the wishes of the public. That’s obvious, and in the past that meant music testing and focus groups. Today is all about looking at the competition and what you can offer that others can’t or won’t. Radio should be focused on personality and demonstrable commitment, which means doing a lot more than shut up and play the hits or do the same kind of talk radio you did 40 years ago or an intern or having a company “digital editor” posting generic gossip on Facebook. For podcasting, this means finding underserved niches of topics and audiences, amplifying the personality and entertainment factors, and curbing the urge to spend far more on production than the revenue makes up. Quality content may not be everything, but it is the basis for everything. You can’t make money for long if nobody wants to hear or see what you do… – Perry Simon, All Access

From Pamela (Anderson), with love

The glamorous babe from Ladysmith, BC, hometown, debuted January 31 in a nearly two-hour Netflix documentary that told almost everything. Here’s the trailer.

Remarkable

– Open-source code runs on every computer in the world – and keeps America’s critical infrastructure running. That’s what the US military has taken care of – MIT Technology Review

– Google shared a new AI research project called MusicLM that uses AI to make music and it’s the latest AI scaring artists for their jobs. – Brad Bennett, Mobile syrup