Village Gamer

Just in time for the celebration of Canadian music and musicians at the JUNO Awards next week, Canada Post is proud to give Canadians a preview of this edition of the Canadian Recording Artist stamp series, to be released in July, featuring for the first time, Canadian bands. Beau Dommage, Rush, The Guess Who and The Tragically Hip will be spotlighted in this fourth issue in a series created to honour musical legends. Read the rest of this entry »

Personally I feel that a long term investment in our own domestic creative industries would have been money well-spent. However, in a newly issued press release, the Province of British Columbia has provided the following preliminary estimates of immediate economic benefit to B.C. as a result of the Times of India Film Awards (TOIFA). The following preliminary breakdown of production impacts has been provided by The Times Group: Read the rest of this entry »

Communities throughout British Columbia can take advantage of a new suite of online tools and resources to help them strengthen and diversify their local economies. If you support economic activity for your community – a local government or First Nation – the Business Attraction Toolkit can help attract potential new businesses and investors from across Canada and around the world. Read the rest of this entry »

The Canada Media Fund (CMF) has posted the 2013-2014 Performance Envelope allocations to its website. The envelope system was designed to provide a greater degree of funding predictability to both broadcasters and producers by allocating funds to broadcasters at the beginning of each fiscal year based on past performance in commissioning and airing convergent projects. The allocation of funds, known as envelopes, is applied to the Performance Envelope Program as well as the Development Program. Read the rest of this entry »

Emily Carr University of Art + Design and the CUPE Local 15 support staff have reached a tentative agreement under the 2012 Cooperative Gains Mandate, Minister of Finance Michael de Jong announced today. The two-year agreement provides for modest wage increases funded from savings found within existing budgets, as required under the 2012 Cooperative Gains Mandate. This agreement covers about 160 staff working in a variety of positions ranging from information technology, administration, studio and library technicians, facilities and other services that support students and the institutions. Read the rest of this entry »

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has released statistical and financial summaries for Canadian specialty, pay, pay-per-view (PPV) and video-on-demand (VOD) television services. Revenues for these television services have climbed by 35.4% over the past five years to reach nearly $4 billion in 2012. During the past year, a significant portion of these revenues, close to $1.4 billion, was invested in the creation of a variety of Canadian programming, resulting in thousands of jobs in the Canadian production sector and new television programs for Canadians. In 2012, Canadian specialty, pay, PPV and VOD television services created 226 new jobs, directly employed 6,176 people and paid $487 million in salaries. Read the rest of this entry »

The Government of Canada has launched a national Call for Concepts to identify organizations who are interested in forming a pan-Canadian network focused on improving the literacy and essential skills of Canadians. The announcement was made by Dr. Kellie Leitch, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development and to the Minister of Labour, at the 16^th Annual Skills Manitoba Competition. Read the rest of this entry »

The Honourable Gary Goodyear, Minister of State for the Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario (FedDev Ontario), today announced a Government of Canada investment that will allow ThoughtWire to accelerate development of its innovative software platform, and access close to $2 million in financing from southern Ontario angel investors. Ted Opitz, Member of Parliament for Etobicoke Centre, accompanied Minister of State Goodyear. Read the rest of this entry »

Tony Clement, President of the Treasury Board, has announced the launch of a new pilot project that enables Canadians to submit access to information and privacy requests online. The pilot provides better service for Canadians by making the process of requesting government records simpler and more convenient. Read the rest of this entry »

The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has released statistical and financial information on Canadian broadcasting distribution companies for the broadcast year ended August 31, 2012. During the past year, cable companies reported a modest growth in revenues and subscribers, while satellite companies recorded a decline in both categories. The combined revenues for these companies increased by 4.2%, from $13.5 billion in 2011 to $14.1 billion in 2012. Similarly, the total number of subscribers rose by 1% from 11.4 million to 11.5 million. Read the rest of this entry »