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SATELLITE RADIO MAKING WAVES IN CANADA Pay-for-service options still waiting for CRTC approval Peter Wilson – CanWest News Service The regulators willing, I plan to have satellite radio in my car by the end of the year.
Despite initial doubts, I am ready to shell out the proposed fee of $12.99 a month to whoever gets the Canadian licence for satellite radio from the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission.
I'm willing to pay somewhere in the lower end of the $140 to $400 cost of a receiver, too. Fortunately for my bank balance, I probably won't feel the need to buy a special family-pack subscription for more than one radio.
Why the enthusiasm? Because satellite radio, it turns out, lives up to the hype.
I know this because I've been testing it for the past month with a loaner radio supplied by one of the two satellite radio applicants -- Canadian Satellite Radio Inc. -- hoping for a favourable decision from the CRTC, perhaps as early as spring.
Most of the time, and I'll deal with that later, the in-car sound pumped out by my 13-year-old stereo system has been -- allowing for road noise -- as good as anything I get from my CD player.
And I tried the radio, which, by the way, works just as well in my house, with both jazz and classical music, where clear sound is, at least to my mind, essential.
Commercial-free music
Plus -- and a major plus at that -- there were no commercials on the music channels.
And, while I would likely go for a slightly more high-end receiver than the one I was loaned, installation was a snap. I just plonked a heavily magnetized black satellite antenna -- about the size of chestnut -- on the top of my car, ran a wire from it through a window to the receiver. Then I plugged the receiver into my cigarette lighter for power.
Following that, I used the cassette deck of my radio to make the final connection -- not ideal for good sound, but it worked well enough for me.
Of course, before I did all this I had to go through an online setup of the service that, while it seemed incredibly intimidating in the instruction manual, turned out to be as easy as paying a bill online.
I drove across most of British Columbia's Lower Mainland testing the service and found that in open areas it was perfect, simply because the signal from the satellites that serves the United States market was unobstructed.
In some places, such as passing by a small bank of trees, would cause dropouts of anywhere from half a second to five to 10 seconds.
Driving through downtown Vancouver could cause far more lengthy disruptions.
I have been assured, however, that once the service is in place this won't happen. Repeater stations spotted around major urban areas will keep the signal flowing to your car whenever you lose the satellites.
On the service I was using, there were some 120 channels to choose from, including news, pop, dance/electronica, and more than a dozen sports channels.
Both Canadian Satellite Radio Inc., which will use the U.S.-based XM network, and the CBC, allied with Sirius, also in the U.S., have promised to add five Canadian channels to this and are committed to have at least 10 per cent Canadian content.
CSR, for example, would have a French music channel, a French talk channel, an English-language channel for new and independent music, a multicultural channel and an English-language comedy channel devoted to Canadian comics.
The new CBC/Sirius Canadian channels would include CBC Radio in French and English. Also promised are English and French channels dedicated to new music, emerging talent and youth-oriented programming. As well, there would be a Canadian music channel from Standard Broadcasting.
At first, mesmerized by the great sound, I didn't switch away from the satellite signal to other stations. The music was just that good and I'm just that lazy. After a few days, though, I found myself craving local news and current-affairs content and switched over. I did not -- likely because of my advanced age -- switch to local music stations.
This may or may not be a sign of things to come in the local radio market once satellite, admittedly a niche service to begin with, arrives.
While U.S. satellite radio services don't sell subscriptions directly to Canadians, it's been estimated that some 50,000 north of the border grey-market listeners use an address in the U.S. from which to pay their bills.
Michael Geist, chairman of Internet and e-commerce law at the University of Ottawa law school, said that having grey-market satellite radio in Canada is itself a grey area within the law.
"For satellite radio, there are licence restrictions that may raise concerns. However, for the moment the use of a U.S. service cannot be said to replace a Canadian alternative," says Geist. "This issue may become more complex once the Canadian services launch."
One caution, despite what you may have heard: Satellite radio doesn't mean commercial-free radio, except for the music channels.
News and sports programming carry commercials in the U.S. and this may become true for the Canadian channels as well. But that depends on what the CRTC does or does not allow when it issues one or more licences.
Radio News
- Most Canadians surveyed by Decima Research Inc. in November indicated they were unaware of satellite radio, but that could change quickly in the event of a favourable decision from the CRTC.
- 44 per cent said they were aware of satellite radio.
- 33 per cent of them, once they knew the particulars of the service, expressed an interest in becoming subscribers.
- Eight per cent suggested they were "very interested" in subscribing. |
