Archives for 1996

Ottawa, Canada. In the deepest cuts yet in a decade-long saga of budget cutting and downsizing, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) has slashed almost $200 million (CDN) from its budget.

Combined with measures announced a year ago, still working their way through the system, the latest cuts mean that the CBC is cutting a total of more than $400 million (CDN) from its current annual budget of $1.4 billion (CDN).

The cuts will have a profound effect on the scope of CBC radio and television programming. Beginning next fall (1997), CBC’s networks will have cheaper programming, more repeats, fewer regional shows, smaller news departments, more commercials, and far fewer employees.

FAR fewer employees. When the cutting began last year, CBC had about 9,000 full-time employees and between 2,000 and 3,000 part-time workers. By 1998, the full-time work force is expected to drop to 6,000.

Cuts are being distributed evenly across the CBC operations, including the radio services — four national networks, English AM & FM, French AM & FM. The English radio budget drops to $94 million (CDN) by 1998, down from $128 million (CDN) in 1994. The French radio budget drops to $62 million (CDN) from $82 million (CDN).

The surprisingly heavy hit to radio means that the impacts will be severe in the audio profession. It is expected that job loss in the radio sectors will be relatively high, due to the high percentage of the radio budgets that go to salaries. This means that hundreds of audio engineers and technicians will be out of work within two years.

In announcing the drastic measures yesterday, CBC President Perrin Beatty said the public broadcaster will preserve most of its local TV news operations, but do away with almost all other local television programming. He said the corporation would refocus on its mandate, to preserve and foster Canadian culture and identity, which means doing away with all U.S.-produced programming by 1988.

Changes to CBC Radio operations will include the elimination of most local programming except for the morning shows, and major reductions in network programming. CBC V-P of Radio Harold Redekopp says that original music production and arts programming will be reduced significantly.

New York, NY. Among the various stories of interest to the audio community emerging from the Interactive Multimedia Association’s IMA Expo’96, which wraps up today in New York, perhaps the most unexpected is news of a decision regarding the copyright status of MIDI data files.

The MIDI Manufacturers Association, (MMA) announced that the U.S. Copyright Office has decided that MIDI files are subject to mechanical compulsory licenses when not accompanying a motion picture or other audiovisual work.

This is a controversial decision. According to the MMA, it clears the air around MIDI-file licensing, and allows MIDI to move into the mainstream consumer audio market. MMA expects the decision to prompt publishers to reduce the fees they charge for licensing MIDI recordings of musical works. At the same time, it will lead to increased numbers of published MIDI files, and greater overall revenues to publishers.

“MIDI technology can dramatically improve music education, games and Internet applications,” said Tom White, President of the MMA. “But until now, licensing for audio-only MIDI files has been difficult and expensive.”

In essence, the Copyright Office has said that MIDI files are audio recordings, for copyright purposes.

Speaking for the Copyright Office, principal legal advisor Charlotte Douglass said: “[we] consider the media upon which aural sequences are recorded (unaccompanied by visual images) to be phonorecords and that such media are subject to a mechanical license or compulsory license under Section 115. The output of Standard MIDI files are works of authorship copyrightable as sound recordings since the information in the file causes the sound device to render the pitch, timbre, speed, duration and volume of the musical notes in a certain order, as does a compact disc player in conjunction with a compact disc.”

“This opinion clarifies for everyone that MIDI files are no different from other forms of audio,” said Brian Ward, special counsel to the MMA. “This has been the critical missing link for explosive growth in consumer interactive audio applications.”