A lame Senate report on the CBC’s future
Early in the twentieth century, the American journalist Walter Lippmann and the philosopher John Dewey butted heads over how a modern democracy could possibly govern itself, given that so few citizens had the time, ability, or inclination to study the complex issues of the day. For Lippmann, the only non-violent answer lay in governance by an intellectual and technical elite that would rule, in the public interest, on the basis of “manufactured consent,” a consensus built around “necessary illusions” created at election times using the tools of modern propaganda. Dewey...
Read MoreAre broadcasters on the web “unfair” competition for newspapers?
Bob Cox’s editorial on the CBC’s new strategic plan is a welcome contribution to the dialogue concerning the future of public broadcasting in this country. (Mr. Cox is Publisher of the Winnipeg Free Press and Chair of the Canadian Newspaper Association.) It raises issues that have been the subject of debate in Europe for some time, and which need to be resolved if the inevitable restructuring of the CBC is to have the support of the country’s newspapers. Some context will, I hope, further clarify the issues. When the BBC was took to the airwaves in 1922 as the world’s first national...
Read MoreWhat Bill Chambers Needs to Know About Public Broadcasting
CBC brass, apparently stung by criticism of its plans to pull out of production and focus on digital, mobile media, have taken to lashing out at critics in an unseemly way. The latest example was posted Thursday night on the corporate website, and it is highly revealing. In an otherwise mostly ad hominem attack on one of the many critics of the corporation’s survival plan, Bill Chambers—who bears the title Vice-president, Brand, Communications and Corporate Affairs, CBC/Radio-Canada—makes the following statement: “There is no archetype of public broadcasting. Public broadcasters...
Read MoreLetter from Former CBC Board of Director Members to Current CBC Board
Here is the complete text of the open letter to current CBC Directors from nine former members of the Board of Directors, released July 13, 2014. Note: I had no role in the origination or composition of the letter, or in the soliciting of signatories. I am publishing it here simply to make it as widely available as possible. –wr July 14, 2014 Monsieur Rémi Racine, Chairman Board of Directors, CBC/Radio Canada CBC 181 Queen Street C.P. 3220, succ. « C » Ottawa (Ontario) K1Y 1E4 Re » Future of CBC/Radio Canada Dear Mr. Racine, We the undersigned, former members of the Board of...
Read MoreCBC Announces a Dubious Survival Strategy
The CBC’s strategic plan to shift priorities from broadcast to digital services and outsource virtually all but news and current affairs programming is, on the whole, a sensible strategy—from a purely business perspective. It saves money by reducing production and distribution costs. Shedding more jobs will further enhance the bottom line between now and 2020; up to 1,500 positions will be eliminated in the plan announced today (June 26). The thing is, though, that the public broadcaster is not a business in any conventional sense. It exists not to make money or to satisfy any financial...
Read MoreAbout Wade Rowland
Ranked among Canada’s leading literary journalists, Wade Davies Rowland has written more than a dozen books on subjects ranging from television journalism, organized crime, and international environmental law to his current concerns, which include communications technology, the philosophy of science, and technology and human values. Full author bio.