CRTC keeps new media exempt from broadcasting regulation (CBC)

**Drew Wilson** · June 5th, 2009, 01:26 AM

Broadcasting content such as music and video distributed over the internet and mobile devices will continue to be exempt from regulation, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission announced Thursday.

The decision is a blow to artist groups who were hoping the CRTC would regulate internet content the same way it does television and radio to ensure Canadian content is represented.

It's welcome news, however, to internet service providers, who bristled at the notion they might have to monitor the amount of Canadian content on the internet and were opposed to the suggestion that a levy might be imposed on them to go toward a Canadian content new media fund.

In the decision Thursday, CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein said regulation was not necessary, because online media is not an immediate threat to traditional broadcasting.

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This whole 'internet not an immediate threat' to a traditional medium something I'll have to remember the next time the government bends to US foreign interests at the expense of Canada.