Please help make sure the Aboriginal Peoples’ Television Network continues to thrive … in our communities, on our TVs and online. Write to the CRTC today to support APTN! The deadline for the public to send letters is February 27, 2013.
HERE’S WHY:
Canada’s broadcast regulator, the CRTC, will soon confirm whether cable and satellite companies must continue to provide APTN to all subscribers in the basic package. APTN has always been “must carry” since it started in 1999 and without it the world’s only national TV network dedicated to Indigenous people would not survive.
For the last seven years, cable and satellite companies have given APTN 25 cents per month for every subscriber. That adds up to about $33 million per year, virtually all spent on original news and entertainment programming. In those years, cable and satellite revenues have jumped by 74%. APTN is proposing that the money it gets from those same companies increase as well… to help make programs better, expand the news operation and do more digital programming for youth. APTN is asking for 40 cents per subscriber per month, an increase of 15 cents per month.
The catch is that cable and satellite companies would much rather keep that money for themselves and their shareholders.
APTN exists to showcase Indigenous cultures, provide news and analysis from and about some of the country’s most remote communities and tell stories that Canadian viewers can’t find anywhere else on the dial. The core of APTN’s most loyal and appreciative audience – Indigenous people – represents a minority of the country’s population that is hard-pressed to sustain a national commercial broadcaster. APTN is a public service broadcaster and deserves this country’s continued support.
The CRTC needs to hear from viewers who support an expanded APTN!
HERE’S HOW:
The CRTC is accepting comments from the public on this application until February 27, 2013. Make yours today! It’s easy. Here’s how you can help:
Write out a paragraph or two about what APTN means to you, why you support it, and how you wish it to thrive in the future. Some things you might want to mention:
– Your favourite show, or shows. Or something you learned from APTN news that you wouldn’t have heard any other way. Or what it means to see people from your community on air. Or anything else that you think is important for the decision-makers to know.
– Remind the decision-makers that this is one of the few places on TV you can see yourself, your people, your stories from a number of perspectives and a with minimum of stereotypes on a daily basis
– That you support APTN’s continued must-carry status and that you are more than willing to pay at least 40 cents per month to make sure it can thrive in the Canadian broadcast system.
1. Go to the CRTC site here. (You can also find APTN’s application on this page if you want to read more about it.)
2. Click on the Submit button.
3. Terms of use: Click “I agree” and then “Next”
4. Type of Submission: Click “Option 1” (intervention/comment), then “Next”
5. Choose applicant/licensee: Click the box beside Aboriginal Peoples’ Television Network, then “Next”
6. Click “In Support” in the first box. In the second box, copy and paste your letter of support, then “Next”
7. Indicate whether or not you would want to appear at the hearing to say more about your support for APTN; confirm your answer or give reasons you want to appear, then “Next”
8. Designated representative: click No; then fill in your name, address, etc.; then click on the box that says you will share your comments with the applicant (APTN); then “Next”
9. Check that the information is right then click box “Send me an email of this intervention” and then click “Submit”.
10. When you get the submission by email, forward it to Jean Larose (jlarose@aptn.ca), the applicant … and you’re done.
Thank you for participating in this important public hearing!