Sirius Canada

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Sirius Canada
Type Private Satellite radio
Founded 2005
Headquarters Markham, Ontario, Canada
Key people Mark Redmond, President and CEO
Industry Broadcasting
Products Satellite Radio,
Website www.siriuscanada.ca

Sirius Canada is a Canadian partnership between Standard Broadcasting, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and Sirius Satellite Radio, which was one of three services licensed by the CRTC on June 16, 2005 to introduce satellite radio service to Canada.

The service's conditions of license provide for a minimum of eight Canadian-produced channels, and a maximum distribution of nine American services per Canadian channel.

Unlike its competitor, XM Radio Canada, Sirius Canada is a private company, and therefore not required to release quarterly financial result data.

Contents

[edit] Subscription package

Main article: List of Sirius Satellite Radio stations

The initial lineup was announced on November 2, 2005, and will include 100 channels, including 10 Canadian services.

[edit] CBC Programming

[edit] Standard Broadcasting Programming

[edit] Astral Media and Score Media Programming

Five of these channels (Radio One, Radio 3, Première Plus, Bandeapart and iceberg) are also offered on the US Sirius network.

In June of 2006, Sirius also added an audio simulcast of The Weather Network on Channel 185.

Contrary to some initial expectations, CBC Radio Two and Espace musique are not included, at least in part because, as their terrestrial CRTC licences allow nearly 80% of "special interest" (i.e. classical, jazz) music to be foreign, they would not be in compliance with the CRTC's mandate that Canadian-produced satellite radio channels carry 85 per cent Canadian content.

Sirius Canada's license prohibits them from broadcasting "localized" content such as local or regional newscasts, weather forecasts or traffic reports. As a result the Radio One feed does not include local programs or weather forecasts. Instead, the network's local programming blocks are filled with repeat airings of other CBC programming.

The Canadian subscription package of 100 channels includes the 10 Canadian channels listed above and most, but not all of the US channels. List of Sirius Satellite Radio stations includes a graphic notation of which services are and are not available in Canada.

On April 24, 2006, it was announced that Sirius would become the exclusive satellite radio broadcaster for Canadian Football League games, beginning with the launch of the 2006 CFL season on June 16. [1]

[edit] Other differences

In addition to the differences in programming there are some other minor differences between Sirius Canada and the US.

When Sirius Canada launched, it did not offer signup over the internet; instead, new customers had to activate over the phone. Currently Sirius Canada offers activation over the phone, and internet activation with a reduced activation fee. As of October 2006, Sirius Canada allows internet streaming of material to subscribers.

The selection of Sirius-compatible radios sold in Canadian retail channels is limited to only the Sirius One, the Sirius Starmate, the Sirius Starmate Replay, the Sirius XACT XTR3CK and the Sirius Sportster Replay. In particular no battery powered portable receiver is currently being sold. However, people report that Sirius Canada will allow receivers purchased in the US to be activated on the Sirius Canada system.

It is possible to activate receivers purchased in Canada on the US network or vise versa but the receiver's firmware is different and if you do this you will have a chance that some of the 11 channels listed in the Made in Canada section will be missing.

[edit] Howard Stern

Main article: Howard Stern Show

On September 2, 1997, Canadian radio stations Q107 (Toronto) and CHOM (Montreal) began airing the Howard Stern Show. That day, Stern called the French "peckerheads" and said that "the French should bend over for me the way they did for Hitler". That broadcast, and others, led to thousands of complaints to the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council. As a result of the complaints Q107 continued to air the Stern show but with an eight-minute tape delay and some bleeping. CHOM stopped airing Stern in August of 1998, and Q107 did the same in November 2001. Corus Entertainment dropped Stern because they wanted to return Q107 to an all music, classic rock format. It was also problematic that Stern had been available since early 2001 on WBUF, Buffalo without the twenty minute delay or onerous editing that was taking place on Q107. Stern later announced his move to Sirius, effective January 2006, as the U.S. Federal Communications Commission has no jurisdiction over content on subscription-based services such as cable television or satellite radio. However, the CRTC has always held content jurisdiction over content on cable services and is apparently able to regulate satellite radio content as well.

Sirius Canada's licence decision made no explicit reference to Stern but does obligate the company to maintain the same standards (i.e. the CAB's Sex-role Portrayal Code) as for conventional stations. The decision also recognizes Sirius's ability to air "adult" programming in separate packages, but even these must comply with the Code. (By way of comparison, even adult content from Canadian pay-per-view providers is subject to review prior to broadcast, to ensure compliance with the Code.)

Sirius Canada later announced that Howard Stern's two channels, Howard 100 and Howard 101, would not be available to its Canadian customers. Naturally this has generated negative response from Canadian fans of Stern, some of whom have claimed that they would not subscribe to any service absent the two Stern channels. According to Gary Slaight, CEO of Standard Broadcasting:

The CRTC, who we are licensed to, would eventually force us to take Stern down, because we have standards we have to abide by in this country when you own a broadcasting licence. (source)

Nonetheless, pressure from fans, many of whom were reportedly continuing to purchase grey-market Sirius U.S. receivers, continued to build. For instance, Josef Radomski, a Canadian writer, announced on the January 11, 2006 Howard Stern Show that he had started an online petition to bring Stern to Sirius Canada.

However, the CRTC had not in fact banned Stern's broadcast in Canada — Sirius Canada instead chose not to risk provoking an issue with the broadcast regulator. Nonetheless, there is some ambiguity in the licence conditions. Some media commentators suggested that Sirius Canada's reluctance to carry Stern had less to do with regulatory concerns and more to do with unwillingness to pay the American company's syndication fees for the program. Others might argue that Sirius Canada was simply trying to avoid the public relations and regulatory battle that would likely follow if it decided to carry Stern.

When Sirius Canada finally announced on February 1, 2006 — three months after the Canadian service's launch — that the Howard 100 channel would be made available to all subscribers effective the following Monday [2], the announcement was covered by most media outlets but did not generate any significant backlash.

Mid-May 2006, Sirius Canada announced that it will be adding Howard 101 to its lineup. The channel has been made availble to listeners in June of 2006 as part of a 10-channel addition to Sirius Canada's channel lineup.

[edit] External links

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