CAB president pushes policy-makers to ponder ‘Me Media’

Take a look at Pandora.com, where users can find their own 'personal DJ.' Type in a song or an artist and the website designs a radio station based on that initial hint of taste. 'And after you do that, ask yourself if it makes any sense for the CRTC to continue to regulate commercial radio...'

That's one of the big questions Canadian Association of Broadcasters president Glenn O'Farrell posed last week to the Broadcast Executives Society. Urging those attending to consider this and other stats and anecdotes, he painted a picture of what a regulated industry is up against in an increasingly unregulated world of fragmented content distribution. O'Farrell welcomed a government review of the television landscape, but served up cautionary warnings that, in order for Canadian content to thrive, policy-makers need to think long and hard about the 'unprecedented challenges to the old order.' In pursuit of today's 'audience of one,' he said, broadcasters are forced to compete with one hand tied behind their backs.
By Jesse Kohl
September 26, 2006

Take a look at Pandora.com, where users can find their own ‘personal DJ.’ Type in a song or an artist and the website designs a radio station based on that initial hint of taste. ‘And after you do that, ask yourself if it makes any sense for the CRTC to continue to regulate commercial radio…’

That’s one of the big questions Canadian Association of Broadcasters president Glenn O’Farrell posed last week to the Broadcast Executives Society. Urging those attending to consider this and other stats and anecdotes, he painted a picture of what a regulated industry is up against in an increasingly unregulated world of fragmented content distribution. O’Farrell welcomed a government review of the television landscape, but served up cautionary warnings that, in order for Canadian content to thrive, policy-makers need to think long and hard about the ‘unprecedented challenges to the old order.’ In pursuit of today’s ‘audience of one,’ he said, broadcasters are forced to compete with one hand tied behind their backs.

‘The current policy regime assumes new distribution technologies will conform to existing rules and operate through gates and within walls,’ said O’Farrell. ‘History shows us they don’t. If the going-forward objective is putting Canadian content in front of Canadians, then our policy apparatus must be sharply re-oriented.’

The unregulated broadband universe O’Farrell spoke of is drawing more and more Canadian eyeballs in the new ‘Me Media’ universe, according to data compiled by Armstrong Consulting for CAB. About one in ten English-speaking Canadians have downloaded a video in the past month, and one in four Canadians Internet users aged 12-29 have downloaded a full-length film or TV program (compared to 16% in the US).

‘In this world, I want what I want when I want it on whatever device I happen to be using, and I want it wherever I am,’ said O’Farrell. ‘Me Media have colonized an unregulated parallel universe, where, beyond the reach of government policy and the CRTC, they are stealing growth and competitive advantage from conventional, regulated mass media by the hour.’