Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby tuned » Wed Mar 28, 2018 5:48 pm

Public indifference? When ALL of the media and the method of distribution is controlled by a handful of corporations it's no wonder the average person is in the dark.
Is Bell or Rogers going to do an expose on any of their media properties on how they are screwing Canadians?
I think many Canadians would be surprised to learn that in 2018 the CRTC is still telling radio stations what music they can and can't play. The whole system is rotten to the core.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby splunge » Wed Mar 28, 2018 7:53 pm

wait, what? you said "...in 2018 the CRTC is still telling radio stations what music they can and can't play". What does that mean, please explain.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby groundskeeper willy » Wed Mar 28, 2018 8:20 pm

What does that mean, please explain.


Just one example for you: have you ever wondered why you don't hear 'oldies' stations in Canada, something that would have a tight focus on the 50s & 60s, similar to the well-crafted era-specific channels you can find on SiriusXM? The answer is cancon. The current regulations make it impossible to create that type of radio format in this country.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby tuned » Wed Mar 28, 2018 9:06 pm

104.3 is stuck playing "blues" music every night and went grovelling to the CRTC get out of playing it. They were turned down. I would be willing to bet that 99% of Canadians under the age of 40 have no idea this nonsense is going on. Who's going to tell them? Canwest? Rogers? Bell? Probably not since they benefit from one of their competitors having one hand tied behind their back.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby splunge » Wed Mar 28, 2018 9:27 pm

@groundskeeper, i would suggest that CFOS or AM 740 or the "Jewel" would disagree, just to name a few. the 60s-70s market for listeners is solid. 50s music people are dying off as radio listeners, if not literally. Its a numbers game, and stations prefer to program to a live market, in order to sell nationals to their demographic.

Cancon has little to do with shifting demographic sales preferences. For decades that has been the fallback excuse for lousy programming decisions.

@tuned. you're right about the CHLG blues thing.... although Canwest has ceased to exist for many years. Of course, the Blues listeners had a say. The big issue was what the original purchaser agreed to... and that has stuck through the years. I'm not sure Newcap "grovelled", but rather tried to make the case that there was no money in selling ads during that time.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby groundskeeper willy » Wed Mar 28, 2018 11:47 pm

You cannot execute a pure 'oldies' format in Canada (similar to what you'd hear in the USA or on satellite) simply because the cancon regs make it impossible. Looking at the vintage analysis of Jewel Toronto for March 27th and it shows 50% of their content is post-1980. And guess what? Scanning over their log, they're running about 75% of their cancon from this pool of post-1980 music (Candi & The Backbeat, Glass Tiger, Jacksoul, Diana Krall, Chantel Kreviazuk, Rita MacNeil, Moffatts, Anne Murray, Partland Brothers, Ginette Reno, Sattalites, Shania Twain, Gino Vannelli, Roch Voisine, etc).

Why don't they just run more 70s cancon? Because there's such a limited pool of titles, and most of those titles are so horribly burnt. Hence the reason for expanding the eras, you need to mine the cancon to hit that 35%, and in doing so, you become just like Jack or Boom, just with a broader music universe that goes a little further back in time.

It's not about programmers making lousy decisions, it's about archaic government regulations limiting choices for the listening public.

Jewel Toronto Vintage Analysis - March 27
Era // Percentage of airplay
2000-2014 // 12.0%
1990-1998 // 8.4%
1980-1989 // 28.9%
1970-1979 // 29.8%
1960-1969 // 19.0%
1945-1959 // 1.9%

The numbers don't lie.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby paterson » Thu Mar 29, 2018 8:05 am

I tend to agree with splunge, oldies formats are not the same as 30 years ago. Other than some special features, stations do not play much 50's music any longer since that demographic, at least age wise is leaving us. I think it is too easy to blame cancon if gold or classic rock stations have issues with ratings. I googled the top classic rock radio stations in the US. WLS-FM came up as the most popular in the USA. They come in at #12 in the Chicago market. Boom-FM in Toronto with a similar format is currently standing 5th in cume ratings and Q107 is #8 and Zoomer Radio is #10. All three of these stations play all gold. In the Toronto market Buffalo radio stations are available over the air with mostly clear signals across the lake and other than an automated station called Rock 102 in the early 80's none have ever had much impact with listeners in the GTA. As a matter of fact Boom FM was actually number one in Toronto about a year ago in terms of cume audience. So cancon can't really be the issue.

Lazy program or music directors, radio consultants that are always wanting stations to "tighten up" the gold library and focus too much on the most popular bands and songs in my opinion is the real issue. K FUN our local gold station here in Kitchener is notorious for burning out songs and artists. A group like the Doobie Brothers or INXS that have many hits and sub hits seem to be whittled down to about three songs for each group, or at least that is all I ever seem to hear.

Sirius XM? I have had the service for about 18 months and I am finding I am listening to it less and less. 70's on 7 and 80's on 8 tend to overplay the same artists a lot.
I hear Hall and Oates, Foreigner and Maria Carey a lot on these stations. Even Gordon Lightfoot, recently heard Sundown three times in the course of 5 days! Oddly enough I don't hear Anne or Gord much on our local stations anymore.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby jon » Thu Mar 29, 2018 8:42 am

From this morning's Broadcast Dialogue:
Corus Radio made layoffs across the country Tuesday including several positions at CKNW-AM Vancouver. The station’s talk shows will continue to be produced from its downtown Vancouver studios, while its newsroom will be integrated into Global BC’s operation in Burnaby. Jon Hall, Jeremy Lye and Tim Dickert were swept up in the layoffs in addition to on-air personalities Chuck Evans and Nick Cino at Corus Hamilton and 92.5 Fresh (CKNG-FM) Edmonton morning show co-hosts Dani Rohs and Jay Hatton. Longtime Q107 (CILQ-FM) personality Al Joynes, Q107 PD Blair Bartrem and 102.1 the Edge (CFNY-FM) PD Ross MacLeod were also let go. Tammy Cole, senior PD at Corus Winnipeg, will assume both PD roles. In a statement provided to Broadcast Dialogue, Corus spokesperson Rishma Govani said “(Tuesday), there were a handful of changes at Corus Radio designed to maximize our content delivery. We believe our new structure will help further grow audiences across multi-platforms and position our radio brands for the future.”

Broadcast Dialogue interviewed Corus Entertainment‘s Senior Vice President of News, Radio and Station Operations, Troy Reeb, last week prior to Tuesday’s restructuring. Listen to his...take on how the company is strategically moving forward as they navigate changing consumer viewing/listening trends on this week’s Broadcast Dialogue podcast.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby tuned » Thu Mar 29, 2018 10:44 am

Great article in The Straight on this.
https://www.straight.com/news/1050416/c ... o-newsroom
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby paterson » Thu Mar 29, 2018 12:22 pm

Thanks to the kind soul that placed my post in the correct thread. Much appreciated! To @groundskeeperwilly I do however agree that you cannot emulate oldies, gold or classic rock stations exactly the same as in the US. But really does that actually matter? I listen to Stingray music occasionally and they seem to play a fair bit of cancon on their gold stations. A restaurant chain in town has Stingray on all the time and today at lunch in the mix of all 70,s and 80's, 90's music I heard
Gowan, Blue Rodeo, Infidels and Steel River. Groups and songs that you will never hear on Sirus but songs that listeners here do remember and speaking from a ratings point of view I don't really buy the argument that cancon gold, even songs that didn't show up on Billboard or US charts is a detriment to ratings.

Just like the old case about cancon killing CKLW. At face value you could say that it was cancon, but the fact is CKLW was still top of the ratings until 1975/76. It had much more to do with FM radio overtaking AM because of superior sound and by the mid 70's FM radio was standard in most vehicles. Also CKLW had relatively new owners with Baton Broadcasting, a company that was much more focused on television and didn't own much in the way of radio. Finally by the late 70's CKLW was sounding dated in their approach and US stations on FM had better jocks, promotions, and better sound. It is interesting to note all during this time no other Detroit AM stations that were still playing music were ever a threat in the ratings to CKLW, even though the Big 8 was "forced" to play cancon.
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Re: Layoffs at CKNW and across the country at Corus

Postby Jack Bennest » Thu Mar 29, 2018 1:24 pm

Seems like layoff story morphed into "why can-con controlled" stations cannot compete.

:violent1: NW - in its prime played the best content, had the best programs, utilized the best news - AND a lot of advertising, employees, profits etc.

what has really changed? - NO resources given to the GM and no expectation of reward and profit.

Boy.....
what have I learned since leaving the mother corp-griffith - many :yahoo: yores ago
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