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The Global Television
Network is owned by Israel Harold "Izzy" Asper's CanWest
Global Communications Corp., owners of the Southam chain
of Canadian newspapers and the canada.com web portal, as
well as several other radio and TV stations around the
world. Global Television is Canada's third and most
profitable television network, serving about 89% of
English-speaking Canadians over-the-air in nine
provinces (probably 97% including cable and DTH). The
service started out in the mid 1970s, when the CRTC
began licencing "third" television stations across
Canada. The Global Television Network was originally
comprised of six "third" TV stations around southern
Ontario. However, the original owners of the Global
Network were plagued with financial trouble, prompting
them to hand over the network to Izzy Asper, then
Manitoba Liberal leader, who had already started up a
new TV station in Winnipeg out of an old one in Pembina,
North Dakota. He put the original Global network in
Ontario together with his Manitoba station and formed
the CanWest Global System. Over time, the system gained
more stations across Canada, and built itself up into
today's Global Television Network.
Global Television is
the most "American" Canadian television network, filling
the majority of its schedule with American programming,
which probably explains its profitability and popularity
(and probably some bad relations with the CRTC). It is
probably because of the fact that Global is not
officially a network, a status it can now share with CTV.
Now, Global is taking a much better stance on Canadian
content, even though this strategy won't visually
manifest itself for a while.
Global does not have
what could be called a main network schedule. The
stations on the Global Television Network have vividly
different schedules from each other, and those
differences were exacerbated when Global assumed
ownership of the WIC TV stations, except for CFCF, which
Global had to sell to CTV. Many other factors, such as
time zone separations, local programming, and ratings
for non-Global shows, including those aired on CH, have
influenced the variability of the programming across the
network.
There are some stations
in small television markets that are not on the Global
network, and yet still broadcast Global programming.
These stations are CJON, CKPR, CHFD, CJBN, CKSA, CITL
and CHAT.
Last year, Global
consolidated the websites of all of its stations into
the canada.com network. Each station can be accessed by
city.
The above information
provided courtesy Nelson Media
www.nelsonmedia.ca |
