Upstart to Compete with Shaw Cable and TELUS Optik TV

[jon]

In the words of the Winnipeg Free Press, "A small Montreal company wants to shake up the television distribution business in Canada, proposing a coast-to-coast IPTV (Internet protocol TV) service." ref. - http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/busine ... 74845.html

IPTV is the same technology used by TELUS and the other telcos, as well as ethnic and other special interest providers who run their own stand-alone cable television service without the cable (coaxial and optical) infrastructure that cable companies currently own. Unfortunately, IPTV refers both to using the Public Internet and your own private network on your own wires, as the telcos do, to deliver television to their customers. That distinction is important, because private networks tend to be a lot more reliable.

The CRTC is considering this application in a June hearing:

Airdrie, Beaumont, Blackfalds, Calgary, Chestermere, Cochrane, Crossfield, Edmonton, Fort McMurray, Leduc, Lethbridge, Nisku, Penhold, Red Deer, Strathmore, Sylvan Lake and their surrounding areas in Alberta; Estevan, Moose Jaw, North Battleford, Prince Albert, Regina, Saskatoon, Swift Current, Weyburn, Yorton and their surrounding areas in Saskatchewan; and Winnipeg and surrounding areas in Manitoba
Application 2012-0185-5

Application by Colba.Net Telecom Inc. for a regional broadcasting licence to operate terrestrial broadcasting distribution undertakings to serve the above-noted locations.

The applicant requests the following condition of licence:

The licensee is authorized to distribute, at its option, as part of the basic service, KREM-TV (CBS), KHQ-TV (NBC), KXLY-TV (ABC), KAYU-TV (FOX) and KSPS-TV (PBS) Spokane or alternatively for each signal, the signal of a different affiliate of the same network located in the same time zone as that of the licensed area and included on the List of non-Canadian programming services authorized for distribution, as amended from time to time and approved by the Commission.

Applicant’s address:

6465 Trans Canada Highway
Ville Saint-Laurent, Quebec
H4T 1S3
Fax: 514-335-6035
Email: josephbassili@colba.net
Web site to view the application: http://www.colba.net/CRTC/Ouest

[drmusic]

I was curious about this myself. Unfortunately the application is in French.

[PMC]

The english version of their website tells alot about the company. There is probably an english version of the submission to the CRTC... Dan ?...

[jon]

If I'm reading it correctly, their web site indicates that you have to have their Internet before you can have their IPTV.

Not offering their IPTV over competitors' Internet service will certainly save them a lot of headaches, given Shaw's history of periodically blocking IPTV vendors like NexTV.

[johnsykes]

As an addendum to this thread......my father was a longtime sales exec with Muzak in Montreal and Winnipeg. He was the first to have background music piped into a bank in Canada, that in the mid-60's. Banks no longer can afford such luxuries (tongue-in-cheek comment) and I have no idea now if any bank has Muzak or any piped in music.

I'm wondering how that worked.....was it similar to what is now cable piping in TV signals etc?

[jon]

I was quite intrigued to discover that Muzak was originally distributed over the same wires that delivered power. A couple of lines from Wikipedia put together explain it:
"The original technical basis for Muzak was developed by inventor Major General George O. Squier who, in the early 1920s, was granted several US patents related to transmission of information signals, among them a system for the transmission and distribution of signals over electrical lines...the transmission system changed from power lines to telephone lines and eventually subcarriers on commercial FM stations, and finally satellite."

The FM subcarriers refer to the fact that FM stations can broadcast up to 4 audio channels, but only two are required to broadcast in stereo. The other two can be used for private purposes as no standard stereo or mono FM receiver would pick up those two additional channels. These two extra channels are generally known as SCMO in Canada, Subsidiary Communications Multiplex Operation, and SCA in the U.S., Subsidiary Communications Authorization.

The Muzak of the 1960s, being a mono service, only required one of those SCMO channels on a single FM station because it only came in one variety: elevator music.

Some FM receivers did not reject SCMO particularly well, and were fairly noisy in low audio segments of FM broadcasts on stations that used the SCMO channels,

To the best of my knowledge, in the 1960s, CKLG-FM carried Muzak as one of its SCMO channels, and CHQM-FM carried competitor Q Music as one of its. Both were licensed through the then regulator, BBG. Customers of both services were supplied with special SCMO FM receivers tuned to the relevant frequency.

[johnsykes]

Actually Jon, you've just shaken my "brain" a bit......my Dad, when in Winnipeg, was working for George Chandler, who, at the time owned CJOR.....George died and Marie took over.....Dad then left and returned to Rediffusion in Montreal. That would have occured during the period 1958-1960.

[jon]

In the period John Sykes refers to, 1958-60, I believe that Muzak was still using phone lines to deliver their music service.

I don't believe that SCMO channels were available until FM stereo was licensed in Canada, which was not until around 1960-62, to the best of my recollection.

One final bit of Muzak trivia: they "went off the air at night". I remember my father telling me of a sales trip to Seattle around 1960 with my mother where they had to entertain a group of customers in their hotel room. The hotel provided Muzak in every room. They didn't notice that it had gone off before the party ended. And were awakened at 6:00 a.m. when it came back on again.