Tories hack Telefilm's $14.5M new media fund
CBC News
Canada's Conservative government is axing a $14.5 million program ? administered by Telefilm ? which fosters the creation of internet content and its distribution, according to a report by the Globe and Mail.
The story, published Saturday, says the Canadian New Media Fund has been cancelled.
The move comes in the wake of a series of cuts by the Tories to several arts programs this summer.
Only last week, the government had announced it would slash the following programs because they were deemed out of date:
- Trade Routes ($9 million).
- the A-V Preservation Trust ($300,000).
- the Canadian Independent Film and Video Fund ($1.5 million).
- the National Training Schools Program ($2.5 million).
- PromArt ($4.7 million).
All programs will disappear by the end of March 2009.
Arts communities have been outraged by the cuts and say they are hoping for announcements of new programs soon.
Canadian Heritage Minister Josée Verner has not indicated whether the programs will be replaced. Rather, she has stated that they needed to be updated.
Raja Khanna, a co-CEO of GlassBOX Television, says the cut has dealt a hard blow to Canada's interactive media industry.
"We have no idea what's going on," Khanna told the newspaper.
GlassBOX captured a Gemini Award and other international trophies for Degrassi.tv, an online community website. The company also created the acclaimed website of Discovery Channel's Race to Mars series.
Can this travesty have an effect on future installments of CCN?!? Where the hell is our culture headed?!? The Tories are raking in billions of dollars for this nation yet they seem intent on killing its cultural impact locally and abroad.
What gives?!?
Comments
22:31 Sun Aug 31st, 2008
Jack? Stephane? Gilles? That lady from the Green Party... are you getting this?
00:36 Mon Sep 1st, 2008
Man, don't ask me who to vote for in replacement of the Tories... It's just wayyy too painful to think about. Still, is it as painful as seeing these outrageous cuts in our cultural grants?
There's a multimedia center in Montreal (SAT) that had a million dollar grant from the federal government to fund new entertainment avenues and events that got cut down to... 30 000$. From 1 million CAN$ to 30 grand. These guys are spazzing out!
Vote Cthulhu. He knows about culture. Yuggoth cultures, but that's all the same...
00:56 Mon Sep 1st, 2008
If they really are just updating the programs, that's fine, but somehow I'm not feeling very optimistic...
01:17 Mon Sep 1st, 2008
It somehow seems...unlikely that it's simple updating, doesn't it? I mean -- why not specify what that means as you announce the cuts? So I'm feeling your lack of optimism, gw.
03:05 Mon Sep 1st, 2008
"Updating". Nice spin. Hopefully this will not impact the future success of this site too much, but I will say I now hope Mr. Harper does call for his Fall election.
10:48 Tue Sep 2nd, 2008
damn it, i can feel a bite being taken out of a site like this already. damn government!
11:12 Tue Sep 2nd, 2008
I'm more determined than ever to show Telefilm and the Government of Canada that their money is not being wasted here at Z2H!
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songteller
22:19 Sun Aug 31st, 2008
Everyone should get up in arms over this. There's a probable election coming in the Fall, so now's the time to speak up. Here's a website with a lot of info that can help you do that:
http://www.new.facebook.com/group.php?gid=67705440222
You need a Facebook account for it, but you can always make an empty Facebook account just to access this page.