RE: A disservice to CBC by Richard Stursberg (Globe & Mail, June 17, 2006)
Richard Stursberg engages in sophistry when he seeks to redefine primetime as 7 p.m. to midnight. Doing so inflates CBC Television's Canadian content levels. In the real primetime, 7 to 11 p.m. CBC's Canadian content has averaged 68% since Stursberg's arrival on the scene, down from 85% in the years preceding.
Stursberg could have time-shifted CBC's pet American reality show in the Eastern time zone to avoid pre-empting The National. He chose not to do this in order to augment CBC's audience by adding those Canadians who tune in to the US channel and instead receive CBC's signal through the sleight-of-hand of simulcasting.
At least his values are transparent.
Sincerely,
Ian Morrison
Spokesperson
Friends of Canadian Broadcasting
