BELL MEDIA specialty channels NEWS & SCHEDULES 2017

[ottawasnowdog]

Bravo/Space are strong brands why get rid of that.

[mtlguy]

Stupidest rebrand ever...Like I mention in the CTV thread, You use your network name on Sports or News channels maybe, but not on channels like these. How unoriginal is that? If the wanted the CTV brand to be there, simply add it to the actual name, like CTV's Bravo, CTV Space, with CTV in small letters above the name maybe.

The worst one is definitely, CTV Drama. What is that anyway...Did you see Suits on CTV Drama?? Wow the people who decided that should be fired today. I understand the idea behind the rebrand, but the names are the worst. Gusto was a very good name for that channel, not they are going to turn that into reality channel and will get the reality that are on Bravo right now I guess? Bravo may not have been very on brand (same as Bravo US) but please anything is better than what they changed it to. CTV Comedy is the only only that is OK as it is basically the same name with CTV in front.

Anyway, obviously trying to make a big brand and hub to compete with the Netflix of this world, but WORST new name ever...

[PokerFace]

Suits obviously belongs on Fashion Television. Did you see Suits on Fashion TV? Nope, but I saw 27 Dresses on Global Numbers, followed by Oceans Eleven, Twelve and Thirteen.

Global Numbers ... We're counting on you to watch us!

Coming soon... CTV Worst ... The Best is yet to come! When you've had a bad day, we'll show you how things can get even worse!

[mtlguy]

Also, CTV two is now CTV2...

[InMontreal]

Is Bell Media expected a press release about their specialties? Just to confirm they evacuated all CW shows from CTV2 to cable...

[mtlguy]

Is Bell Media expected a press release about their specialties? Just to confirm they evacuated all CW shows from CTV2 to cable...

All I found was this:
https://www.bellmedia.ca/upfront/specialty/

[lostjon]

There was also this press release from last Friday, as mentioned in the CTV 2018/2019 thread:
https://www.bellmedia.ca/pr/press/ch...018-19-season/

[InMontreal]

About Gusto rebranding as CTV Life... Don't you guys think it just sucks for anyone at Knight Enterprises who worked hard in the kitchen producing and acquiring shows and finally got their independent specialty channel up and running in december 2013, competing against Corus' Food Network which turned into a reality-based channel. Sure, when Bell came around with their banker and told them "Do what you do best : production, we'll take care of the acquisitions, programming and advertising sales", any independent company would have jump for joy. When Bell proposed to rebrand MuchMoreMusic/MuchMore/M3's analog licence with its existing 5.56 million subscribers, which took effect Sept 1st 2016, even more good news!

A look at the schedule back in september 2016... there they are, the Marilyn Denis reruns, the Masterchef Canada reruns, the Amazing Product Placement Canada reruns... typical Bell, but these shows were placed in dead timeslots. Fast-forward to now, what's on the schedule... What ? BONES ? The food is located *around* the bones, you idiots ! Reruns of David Boreanaz's Angel would have made more sense as vampires see humans as food. Hold on, 3x Bones in the afternoon... and... 5x Bones overnight, Eastern Time ? What the ?!?! Moving on, what else... Dog Tales Rescue. What is this, a reality show about a dog eating farm animals ? Some reno shows, but most renos include a kitchen so I'll let it go. And their website has videos about dogs... and Meghan Markle... and more dogs... sense a theme here ?

Come September 2018, 2 years after the Bell takeover, the Gusto brand will be thrown out to the garbage and become CTV Life. Life, as in, less food shows, add some HGTV-like shows, some FIY-like shows, some DYI-like shows, some non-food traveling shows (Dtour), add the cancon reruns like The Social and eTalk, and they're good to go with another BookTV clone, better known as Dumpster Zombie TV.

Edit : Add some Big Bang reruns... because... Bell.

[PokerFace]

You can't beat Bell, so you might as well sell. Plus, since I hate cooking shows, I would only watch Gusto if it was airing an old movie that I noticed listed in the guide. However, now that there's a CTV Life channel on the way, I'll probably pay more attention to the tv listings for it, rather than virtually ignoring it.

And that's what broadening a channel's content often does for its bottom line ... it often brings more eyeballs to the channel, even if the channel wasn't really a food-based genre channel before the rebrand. And if the first attempt at a rebrand fails, they just try again with another rebrand, or shut it down altogether.

The lines of content are often blurred, but if you put on your rose-coloured glasses and just watch what you want, you'll never have enough time to watch it all anyway.

[mtlguy]

Hulu's Castle Rock coming to Space/Crave

https://www.bellmedia.ca/pr/press/sp...-stephen-king/

[InMontreal]

The CRTC finally rubberstamped the sale of Comedy Gold to WOW Networks
https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2018/2018-230.htm

WOW Networks would acquire the assets of Comedy Gold for $6.8 million. It proposed a value of the transaction of $6,866,892 and a tangible benefits package of $687,000, which represents a contribution of 10% of the value of the transaction. (...) As a result of the tangible benefits arising from this transaction, WOW Networks will invest $687,000 on initiatives that will benefit the Canadian broadcasting system.

For a zombie Category B specialty Bell wanted to get rid of, currently airing only 3 shows in rotation anyone would remove it from their à-la-carte selections, and 680k remaining subscribers on Dec 31 2016, and kids grabbing their content online, $6.8 millions is a lot of money wasted, IMHO. I guess Bell Media owners are laughing all the way to the bank.

[TvAntenna]

The CRTC finally rubberstamped the sale of Comedy Gold to WOW Networks
https://crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2018/2018-230.htm

WOW Networks would acquire the assets of Comedy Gold for $6.8 million. It proposed a value of the transaction of $6,866,892 and a tangible benefits package of $687,000, which represents a contribution of 10% of the value of the transaction. (...) As a result of the tangible benefits arising from this transaction, WOW Networks will invest $687,000 on initiatives that will benefit the Canadian broadcasting system.

For a zombie Category B specialty Bell wanted to get rid of, currently airing only 3 shows in rotation anyone would remove it from their à-la-carte selections, and 680k remaining subscribers on Dec 31 2016, and kids grabbing their content online, $6.8 millions is a lot of money wasted, IMHO. I guess Bell Media owners are laughing all the way to the bank.

Now that they finially rubberstamped Comedy Gold what are they gonna rename the network as?!!! Shaw Direct has never carried Comedy Gold but they did when it was TV Land Canada but terminated it in I think 2010. Now the question is what they will revamp it into and is Shaw Direct gonna carry it or what?!!! Now Bell needs to get rid of Book Television but probably not gonna happen.

[bigoranget]

Now that they finially rubberstamped Comedy Gold what are they gonna rename the network as?!!! Shaw Direct has never carried Comedy Gold but they did when it was TV Land Canada but terminated it in I think 2010. Now the question is what they will revamp it into and is Shaw Direct gonna carry it or what?!!! Now Bell needs to get rid of Book Television but probably not gonna happen.

I really don't get why anyone would want to start a new TV station these days. The market is so saturated with TV programming and the amount of viewers is getting smaller every year. WOW Unlimited would probably be better off getting their content on Netflix, Amazon Prime or even CraveTV (or all three).

[CDN Viewer]

I agree, especially in the kids market, there are already tons of channels aimed at kids and youth. What will this channel offer that is different and will attract an audience?!

I think with online streaming becoming more mainstream and gaining more strength, the traditional TV channel industry needs to look at making wholesale changes to their business model which has become outdated. Its time to consolidate all these useless specialty channels into a few good quality channels. It's better to have 10 good channels IMO instead of 100 crappy ones that just repeat the same stuff over and over, which is the situation we currently find ourselves in. The days of launching tons of channels and milking consumers of subscriber revenue are coming to end as people can find most of the content online now.

[InMontreal]

The channel could get moved into an existing "kids" package and just automatically cash-in guaranteed monthly revenues regardless of low audiences... I expect WOW to launch a video app, so some users will make an easier connection with the TV channel and its content they can trust. 2 years from now, they could say they're bleeding money, try to get a way to bail themselves out, if not successful, DHX or Corus could "pull a Gusto" and take over operations for the 1st year, then rebrand it and fill it with unrelated, crappy filler programming...

[Hedgie-Rover]

I would like to believe WOW will expect something new and different to the kids market that others didn't, but as bigoranget says, there is too too much useless TV networks which they will had a hard time to fill with quality and original programming. Especially the kids ones. Corus lead a huge monopoly of deals with the biggest three kids brands (Disney, Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network) and DHX have agreements with the Dreamworks brand and shown on their channels the shows they own as well. (Obviously!)

But still, the problem of too kids televisions in the English-Canadian market is not foreigner as we have in the French ones, Télé-Québec first. Back twenty years ago, it will don't bother me much even I think we must push the boundaries to what kids of my age want to really see in screen. Thesedays, they is far too much of our Kids TV than actual kids watch regularly. For example, I never understood the appeal of Yoopa! if they tried hard to be the Canal Famille of this generation, but the old Canal Famille has struggling to make sure they will spend money to original content. In the Yoopa! case, more of their original offering are sketches and they have too much contents from the other countries to says by myself ''What's the point?''. It's explain why DHX's Télémagino is not a problem to me, for have experimented it for some hours last Easter.

[ottawasnowdog]

Any news on fall shows or schedules for the likes of Bravo/Space and Comedy.

[lostjon]

Any news on fall shows or schedules for the likes of Bravo/Space and Comedy.

Nothing at this time. Usually this becomes available sometime in August as we get closer to the fall season.

[InMontreal]

June 7, 2018
TORONTO (June 7, 2018) – In a bold move to strategically leverage Canada’s #1 entertainment brand, Bell Media announced today it will rebrand four of its leading entertainment specialty channels as CTV properties. Space, Bravo, Comedy, and Gusto will become CTV Sci-Fi, CTV Drama, CTV Comedy, and CTV Life.

Bell finally decided to move along with the unpopular channel rebrands, scheduled for Sept 12, 2019.
Bolstered by New Acquisitions, New CTV Suite of Specialty Channels to Be Unveiled Sept. 12
https://www.bellmedia.ca/the-lede/pr...eiled-sept-12/

[PokerFace]

It's good that Bravo Canada is finally getting a name change. Now I won't get it confused with the American version, even though they don't have anything else in common, other than the same name.