Media and the Search for Identity
From Assessment to Application: An Introduction
Beyond entertainment there is one absolute role that the media, through any medium, continuously serves: the media is a means of identification. This is especially true in Canada, an opinion shared by the Honorable Flora MacDonald as stated in the 1988 Communications Canada report, Canadian Voices Canadian Choices. (See paragraph 5).
We identify ourselves through every item of media with which we come in contact. As individuals, as groups and as members of a shared national community, our individual response to media affects both our sense of community and our self-identification. Through the music Canadians listen to and the television shows we watch, the advertisements we respond to and the newspapers we read, each person is furthering their own identity. Statements such as “I read the National Post” or “My favorite band is The Arcade Fire” are declarations of self.
The media’s ability to influence the developing Canadian identity is power, and as it is universally understood that with power comes responsibility, it becomes of vital necessity to address the importance of that responsibility with specific attention to how the Canadian media behaves in this role.
In the case of music-focused terrestrial radio in Canada the media’s power to shape the Canadian identity is being abused. Subsequently, this form of radio is faltering as a favoured medium. Following is an examination the truth of this statement and the answer to the fundamental question of “how do we fix it?” How do we save music-focused terrestrial radio from irrelevancy and better direct its role as it shapes the Canadian identity?
Progressive Hopes for Canadian Content in Radio and the Search for The Canadian Identity
The Canadian broadcasting industry is a central necessity in the building of our national identity. Radio is found in 99 percent of Canadian homes,(1) thereby, as stated by the Honorable Flora MacDonald in Canadian Voices Canadian Choices, “the power of radio … to inform, sell products, sway opinions, create stars, above all to provide large numbers of people with a shared experience, is enormous. It is of fundamental importance to our … cultural sovereignty that our broadcasting system be an accurate reflection of who we are ... It plays a major role in defining our national, regional, local and even our individual identities.”(2) As this is the case it becomes clear that the CRTC’s Canadian Content regulations are necessary and powerful laws that uphold a valuable understanding: that Canadians should have free and readily available access to Canadian radio programming and that our musical artists should be thoroughly supported. The responsibility to meet this understanding lies in the hands of Canada’s terrestrial radio broadcasters, and is a responsibility that, for various reasons, is not being met. The shortcomings of the current Canadian Content regulations, and the resulting failings of the terrestrial radio broadcasting system, prove the need for a solution: CANCON Pro is that solution.
The current Canadian Content laws are severely out of date. The present requirements are based simply on percentage quotas. For example, 35 percent of content played on popular music radio stations must be Canadian.(3) These percentage styled quotas were instated 40 years ago when the main goal of the CRTC was simply to inspire growth in the Canadian recording industry.(4) This goal was achieved and Canada’s music industry exploded, producing huge international stars. Unfortunately, the attainment of this goal has resulted in an unforeseen backlash: broadcasters, rather than drawing from a variety of Canadian artists, have taken to playing solely the music of our international stars to reach their content quotas.(5) The lack of incentive for radio broadcasters to play emerging artists has resulted in extreme repetition in play lists and an excessive focus on Canada’s international stars. This damages the radio broadcasting industry’s effect on our search for our national identity in that these famous artists have attained such celebrity that they no longer retain any true semblance of connection to Canadian roots.
Furthermore, radio has lost its excitement as a medium- the excitement created by breaking new bands and pushing the bar for creativity and production quality within the Canadian music scene. In fact, according to Stats Canada, the excitement seeking teen and young adult audiences have the smallest listening time of all the age brackets.(6) As the radio has lost excitement, alternative forms of entertainment are winning young audiences over.
Overplay of Canadian international artists neither furthers our understanding of our national identity nor makes way for the necessary support needed for Canada’s emerging artists. The overall result is a sense of disconnection that is driving audiences away.
The solution is CANCON Pro (for Progressive), an idea created by Indie Pool President, Gregg Terrence. His Let's Fix CANCON campaign is “committed to encouraging the CRTC to modernize Canadian Content regulations placed on Canadian terrestrial radio broadcasters ... [The] goal is to create incentives within CANCON that encourage Canadian radio stations to play more new and developing Canadian artists.”(7)
The proposal is that the current Canadian Content quotas remain untouched and that radio stations receive incentives, called CANCON Credits, for including developing artists in their daily broadcast. The credit system is based on four tiers of artist establishment. Each level of establishment comes with a certain percentage towards a CANCON Credit. The levels and values are as follows: a Canadian International Artist is worth .75 percent of a CANCON credit, an Established Artist is worth 1.00 percent, a National Artist is 1.25 percent, while a Developing Artist, otherwise known as an unsigned or independent artist, is worth 1.50 percent.* The simple genius lies in that the more emerging artists a station puts into rotation, the faster they can reach their content quotas (incidentally solving a huge array of other tribulations).(8)
CANCON Pro will provide broadcasters with an incentive for choosing the lesser-known artist, providing support for our emerging musicians and giving a boost to the entire Canadian recording industry as the original Canadian Content regulations did in the 1970’s.(9) The effects of CANCON Pro will result in the return of terrestrial radio to a position of legitimacy and force within the music industry and the reinstatement of radio itself as an exciting medium.(10) If put in effect, CANCON Pro will breath new life into Canadian terrestrial radio and our ideas of our national identity. The search for our national identity is stronger upon us than ever before and the radio broadcasting industry, under the guide of CANCON Pro, can lead us to it.
* Artists are assigned a position in the points tier through a rigorous assessment process based on home play, international play, record sales and if they are signed to a FACTOR certified distributor.
References
Beyond entertainment there is one absolute role that the media, through any medium, continuously serves: the media is a means of identification. This is especially true in Canada, an opinion shared by the Honorable Flora MacDonald as stated in the 1988 Communications Canada report, Canadian Voices Canadian Choices. (See paragraph 5).
We identify ourselves through every item of media with which we come in contact. As individuals, as groups and as members of a shared national community, our individual response to media affects both our sense of community and our self-identification. Through the music Canadians listen to and the television shows we watch, the advertisements we respond to and the newspapers we read, each person is furthering their own identity. Statements such as “I read the National Post” or “My favorite band is The Arcade Fire” are declarations of self.
The media’s ability to influence the developing Canadian identity is power, and as it is universally understood that with power comes responsibility, it becomes of vital necessity to address the importance of that responsibility with specific attention to how the Canadian media behaves in this role.
In the case of music-focused terrestrial radio in Canada the media’s power to shape the Canadian identity is being abused. Subsequently, this form of radio is faltering as a favoured medium. Following is an examination the truth of this statement and the answer to the fundamental question of “how do we fix it?” How do we save music-focused terrestrial radio from irrelevancy and better direct its role as it shapes the Canadian identity?
Progressive Hopes for Canadian Content in Radio and the Search for The Canadian Identity
The Canadian broadcasting industry is a central necessity in the building of our national identity. Radio is found in 99 percent of Canadian homes,(1) thereby, as stated by the Honorable Flora MacDonald in Canadian Voices Canadian Choices, “the power of radio … to inform, sell products, sway opinions, create stars, above all to provide large numbers of people with a shared experience, is enormous. It is of fundamental importance to our … cultural sovereignty that our broadcasting system be an accurate reflection of who we are ... It plays a major role in defining our national, regional, local and even our individual identities.”(2) As this is the case it becomes clear that the CRTC’s Canadian Content regulations are necessary and powerful laws that uphold a valuable understanding: that Canadians should have free and readily available access to Canadian radio programming and that our musical artists should be thoroughly supported. The responsibility to meet this understanding lies in the hands of Canada’s terrestrial radio broadcasters, and is a responsibility that, for various reasons, is not being met. The shortcomings of the current Canadian Content regulations, and the resulting failings of the terrestrial radio broadcasting system, prove the need for a solution: CANCON Pro is that solution.The current Canadian Content laws are severely out of date. The present requirements are based simply on percentage quotas. For example, 35 percent of content played on popular music radio stations must be Canadian.(3) These percentage styled quotas were instated 40 years ago when the main goal of the CRTC was simply to inspire growth in the Canadian recording industry.(4) This goal was achieved and Canada’s music industry exploded, producing huge international stars. Unfortunately, the attainment of this goal has resulted in an unforeseen backlash: broadcasters, rather than drawing from a variety of Canadian artists, have taken to playing solely the music of our international stars to reach their content quotas.(5) The lack of incentive for radio broadcasters to play emerging artists has resulted in extreme repetition in play lists and an excessive focus on Canada’s international stars. This damages the radio broadcasting industry’s effect on our search for our national identity in that these famous artists have attained such celebrity that they no longer retain any true semblance of connection to Canadian roots.
Furthermore, radio has lost its excitement as a medium- the excitement created by breaking new bands and pushing the bar for creativity and production quality within the Canadian music scene. In fact, according to Stats Canada, the excitement seeking teen and young adult audiences have the smallest listening time of all the age brackets.(6) As the radio has lost excitement, alternative forms of entertainment are winning young audiences over.
Overplay of Canadian international artists neither furthers our understanding of our national identity nor makes way for the necessary support needed for Canada’s emerging artists. The overall result is a sense of disconnection that is driving audiences away.
The solution is CANCON Pro (for Progressive), an idea created by Indie Pool President, Gregg Terrence. His Let's Fix CANCON campaign is “committed to encouraging the CRTC to modernize Canadian Content regulations placed on Canadian terrestrial radio broadcasters ... [The] goal is to create incentives within CANCON that encourage Canadian radio stations to play more new and developing Canadian artists.”(7)
The proposal is that the current Canadian Content quotas remain untouched and that radio stations receive incentives, called CANCON Credits, for including developing artists in their daily broadcast. The credit system is based on four tiers of artist establishment. Each level of establishment comes with a certain percentage towards a CANCON Credit. The levels and values are as follows: a Canadian International Artist is worth .75 percent of a CANCON credit, an Established Artist is worth 1.00 percent, a National Artist is 1.25 percent, while a Developing Artist, otherwise known as an unsigned or independent artist, is worth 1.50 percent.* The simple genius lies in that the more emerging artists a station puts into rotation, the faster they can reach their content quotas (incidentally solving a huge array of other tribulations).(8)
CANCON Pro will provide broadcasters with an incentive for choosing the lesser-known artist, providing support for our emerging musicians and giving a boost to the entire Canadian recording industry as the original Canadian Content regulations did in the 1970’s.(9) The effects of CANCON Pro will result in the return of terrestrial radio to a position of legitimacy and force within the music industry and the reinstatement of radio itself as an exciting medium.(10) If put in effect, CANCON Pro will breath new life into Canadian terrestrial radio and our ideas of our national identity. The search for our national identity is stronger upon us than ever before and the radio broadcasting industry, under the guide of CANCON Pro, can lead us to it.
* Artists are assigned a position in the points tier through a rigorous assessment process based on home play, international play, record sales and if they are signed to a FACTOR certified distributor.
References
(1) Communications Canada. Canadian Voices: Canadian Choices. [The Honorable Flora
MacDonald]. Ottawa: Communications Canada, 1988. pg, 1.
(2) Communications Canada. Canadian Voices: Canadian Choices. [The Honorable Flora
MacDonald]. Ottawa: Communications Canada, 1988. pg, 5.
(3) CRTC, Commercial Radio Policy 1998, http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/1998/PB98-41.HTM.
(4) Terrence, Gregg. Let’s Fix CANCON. 1999-2007. Artifice, Inc. 13 October, 2008
(5) Friends of Canadian Broadcasting. [Interview: Gregg Terrence] Friends’ Media Monitor Digest.
(6) Statistics Canada, Radio Listening, http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/080918/d080918d.htm
(7) Terrence, Gregg. Let’s Fix CANCON. "The Problem". 1999-2007. Artifice, Inc. 13 October, 2008
(8) Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, Interview: Cancon is broken, says Indie Pool president Gregg Terrence, http://www.friendscb.org/print/News/Friends_News/archives/articles07190502.asp
(9) Terrence, Gregg. Let’s Fix CANCON. "The Fix". 1999-2007. Artifice, Inc. 13 October, 2008
(10) Terrence, Gregg. Let’s Fix CANCON. "The Fix". 1999-2007. Artifice, Inc. 13 October, 2008
MacDonald]. Ottawa: Communications Canada, 1988. pg, 1.
(2) Communications Canada. Canadian Voices: Canadian Choices. [The Honorable Flora
MacDonald]. Ottawa: Communications Canada, 1988. pg, 5.
(3) CRTC, Commercial Radio Policy 1998, http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/1998/PB98-41.HTM.
(4) Terrence, Gregg. Let’s Fix CANCON. 1999-2007. Artifice, Inc. 13 October, 2008
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