The death of broadcast radio

Jon Landau famously wrote in 1974 "I have seen rock and roll's future, and its name is Bruce Springsteen." This, of course, was before Bruce Springsteen became famous outside New Jersey and the household name that he is today.

While this statement might have been a bit overdone, there's no doubt that Mr. Landau was prescient in predicting Bruce Springsteen's later impact on rock and roll. This statement was written by Mr. Landau after having seen Mr. Springsteen and the E-Street Band perform in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The performance must have been a revelation for Mr. Landau - a moment when he realized nothing would be the same, ever again, for rock and roll.

Well, I too have had my moment of revelation, when I realized that nothing would be the same, ever again. What it that, you ask, that will never be the same, ever again? Why, broadcast radio, of course.

It's becoming increasingly clear, at least to me, that broadcast radio will soon be dead, both in the sense of broadcasting to reach a wide audience and broadcasting over the AM and FM bands of the radio spectrum. I doubt that I'm the first to reach this conclusion. But it was my moment of revelation, and I insist on enjoying it while I can.

The fact that broadcasting to reach a wide radio audience will soon be dead can be seen from radio's sister medium, television. The increasing number of specialty channels on television and the trend towards program distribution over the internet signals the demise of television broadcasting. Television viewers now have the choice of specialty channels to meet every interest, with additional channels being added each year. If you doubt this, take a look at your local cable provider's lineup or what's available on the internet.

Television broadcasting, in the sense of the television signal being broadcast over the air, has long been replaced by cable television except among those die-hards who refuse to pay for cable and still have an antenna on top of their house, or rabbit ears on their TV. I expect cable will soon become the primary medium for internet access and television viewing, rather than simply for program distribution.

"Broadcast radio is still alive and kicking", you might tell me in response. Yes, but just give it time. I expect broadcast radio over the FM band to rapidly diminish in the next few years, just as AM radio gave way to FM radio. What will cause the death of broadcast radio? Internet radio. Yes, my moment of revelation came this past Christmas when I received my latest toy as a present, an internet radio.

If you've been reading this blog up until this point, you will know how enthusiastic I have been about my Sirius satellite radio. Well, I'm sorry to say, internet radio just blows satellite radio away. While my Sirius satellite radio gives me Symphony Hall, classical music 24/7, with internet radio I now have the choice of classical music from Australia, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Holland, Italy - well, you get the picture. Radio from all over the world. All that you need is an 802.11b or 802.11g wireless router, an internet connection and an internet radio and you're off, never to listen to broadcast radio again.

While I don't believe internet radio is available for your vehicle yet, there have been several announcements of internet-enabled vehicles and WiMax networks to distribute the content. Just give it time.

What does this mean for CBC Radio Two? Well, the tremendous irony in all of this is that it was the CBC's decision to decimate classical programming on Radio Two that caused me to investigate satellite radio and internet radio in the first place and to become an adopter - a mid-to-late adopter in the case of satellite radio, an early adopter in the case of internet radio. Talk about driving your customer base into the arms of your competitor!

Yes, CBC Radio has hastened its own demise. Sorry, CBC Radio, but there it is.

Alternatives to CBC Radio, Part II: Satellite Radio

I've been promising to write about my experience with satellite radio as an alternative to the classical music programming previously offered by CBC Radio Two. Well, I see it's been over a year since I made this promise, so I believe it's now time to talk about satellite radio in more detail.

For those of you who have tried listening to CDs, your iPod or streaming audio over the internet and have found all of these alternatives wanting, satellite radio may just be the alternative that you're looking for.

First, you will want to choose between Sirius and XM satellite radio if you're living in Canada. In the U.S., Sirius and XM have merged but it has yet to take place in Canada. Go to the Sirius or XM web sites and register for a trial subscription. You can listen to both on your PC (and I use the term "PC" here to refer to both Apple computers and non-Apple computers, although there are some anal-retentives who have been brainwashed by advertising and believe that the term "PC" refers only to personal computers which use a Microsoft OS, which is simply not true). Listen during your trial subscription and decide which is best for you.

The next step is to do as I advise, not as I did. What did I do, you may ask? I started small, going step-by-step. I should have jumped directly to my final installation, but I had to go through the learning process of each step before I found this out. You can save yourself several steps by learning from my experience. Or not.

First, I bought a satellite radio for the Sirius service, as well as a home kit. I installed the car kit (which comes with the radio) in my primary vehicle and set up the home kit with the Sirius receiver in the kitchen.

The home kit comes with a window antenna. The window antenna, as the name implies, can be installed inside the home on a window sill, or can be installed outside on the roof of the house. To install the antenna outside, you will likely need to purchase an extension cable as well as find a way to run the cable through the exterior of your home or apartment, condominium, thatched hut, cardboard box under a highway overpass, or wherever you happen to be living at the moment.

Wherever you install the antenna, it should have a clear view of the sky, the direction depending on the region of North America that you live in. In my region (North East Canada) the antenna needs to be facing West, Northwest or Southwest. I experimented with different locations for the antenna, finally settling on the interior of the house, just inside the first floor dining room window, even though the dining room window faces another two storey home and did not offer a completely unobstructed view of the sky. To improve the view of the sky I had to set the antenna on top of a step ladder.

This worked well for a time, but I would periodically lose reception. This typically seemed to occur between 7:00 PM and 9:00 PM. There would be sudden silence, and one was never sure whether it was a quiet segment of the piece being played or a loss of reception. Slight movement of the antenna to the left or right would often restore reception, but it was annoying to have to adjust the antenna several times a day. Also, the step ladder did not fit with the decor of the dining room. Of course, the problem was that dining room window did not offer a completely unobstructed view of the West, Northwest or Southwest. But then, if you consider your own dwelling, you will realize how difficult this may be to achieve.

I decided that a rooftop antenna was the only solution. I ordered a rooftop antenna from Dogstar Radio. There are other stores which sell the antenna, including Sirius, but the antenna was out of stock at Sirius when I needed it. Dogstar Radio had the antenna in stock, shipped it quickly and it was a hassle-free transaction. I highly recommend Dogstar Radio.

Once I had received the antenna in the mail, the next step was to install it on the roof. If you have a satellite TV mast, TV antenna or other such object on your rooftop, this should not be a problem. I, however, had nothing of the sort. You can, of course drill holes in your roof and screw the satellite radio base directly the roof or to the fascia on the roof siding, but this did not appeal to me.

Instead, I purchased a 45-degree ABS Y-coupler used for plumbing and a length of 2 inch diameter ABS pipe from Home Depot and installed the Y-coupler on the plumbing vent on the roof. I cut the 2 inch pipe to approximately 2 feet, stuck it into the smaller pipe of the "Y" and attached the antenna to the 2 inch pipe using the fittings provided with the antenna. Thus, no permanent damage was done to the roof.

I ran the cable through a vent in the roof and into the attic. Now, here's where I made another mistake. Having only one radio (in the kitchen) I decided to run the cable down through the second floor, down to the first floor kitchen where I could attach it to the radio. To do so, I had to remove one of the kitchen cabinets, drill a hole through the kitchen ceiling/second floor, run the cable under the bedroom carpeting, into a closet, then up through another hole in the bedroom ceiling and into the attic. While this wasn't a huge amount of work, as you will see later, I could have made my life much simpler.


After installing the satellite antenna, extension cable and satellite receiver in the kitchen, life was good. However, there was a problem - I had satellite radio only in the kitchen. I also wanted satellite radio in the bedroom (as do we all).


I could have purchased a cable splitter, then run another length of cable into the bedroom, but this was now becoming complicated. I discovered that there is a signal repeater system, also available from Sirius, called the "Sirius Echo". It consists of two devices - the Echo Transmitter and the Echo Antenna. The Echo Transmitter attaches to your satellite antenna, and the Echo Antenna attaches to your satellite receiver. The Echo Transmitter transmits the signal received over your antenna to the Echo Antenna attached to your receiver. You can have several Echo Antennas receiving from the same Echo Transmitter, and thus multiple satellite radio receivers spread throughout the house. So I ordered an Echo Transmitter (which comes with an Echo Antenna) and another Echo Antenna from my friends at Dogstar radio.

I set up the Echo Transmitter in the bedroom closet, although I could have just as easily set up the Echo Transmitter in the attic, and avoided the hassle of running the cable down into the second floor bedroom. I placed the first Echo Antenna in the kitchen, next to the satellite receiver, and the second Echo Antenna in the bedroom, next to my second satellite receiver.

The cable running down from the second floor bedroom into the kitchen now became unnecessary, since I had wireless transmission from the bedroom to the kitchen.




You can see now what I should have done from the beginning:

- decide how many satellite radios you wish to install in your abode

- install a rooftop antenna from the beginning

- purchase an Echo Transmitter and install it in central location, easily reached by the rooftop antenna. In my case this would have meant installing the Echo Transmitter in the attic, and avoiding all of the cable installations.

- purchase as many additional Echo Antennas as you need and install them throughout your abode

I installed all of this over a year ago - in September 2007, to be precise - and it has worked flawlessly since then. I highly recommend this set-up.

It should not need to be said, but I'll say it anyway: I have no relationship whatsoever with Sirius Satellite Radio, XM Satellite Radio or Dogstar Radio. I'm just a satisfied customer, of Sirius and Dogstar, at least. I never tried XM Satellite Radio, although I'm sure the service is just as satisfactory as Sirius. When organizations, products or services perform well, they should be praised and publicized. And when organizations (such as CBC Radio), products or services not live up to expectations, they should be castigated.

The CBC begins to be responsive!

Well, will wonders never cease to exist! The CBC is now advertising upcoming programming changes on the CBC.ca web site, in advance of their implementation, and actually allowing listeners and/or viewers to comment! This is, of course, a change from past practice when the only comments that were allowed were via the "inside the CBC" web site, which proclaimed itself as the "official blog of the CBC".

A case in point of the CBC's apparent change in policy is the announcement of the new hosts for the weekday and weekend programming. The CBC announced on June 10 that Tom Allen would continue to host the weekday morning show, from 6:00 AM to 10:00 AM, although the new show will feature a "mix of musical genres".

Julie Nesrallah will host a new classical daytime show during weekdays from 10:00 AM. to 3:00 PM.

Rich Terfry, who records under the name "Buck 65", will host a drive-home show from 3:00 PM. to 6:00 PM.

Molly Johnson will host the new weekend morning shows from 6:00 AM to 10:00 AM.

Peter Togni will be the new host of Choral Concert on Sunday morning.

Jurgen Gothe will host a new show on Sundays from 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM.

I wish the new hosts well in their new ventures, but I (as a formerly loyal CBC Radio Two listener) will not be there to tune into their new programs. As I have mentioned on this blog, probably ad nauseum, I have defected to Sirius satellite radio, where I find programming much more to my liking. However, I continue to protest the changes taking place at CBC Radio Two since I believe my rights as a shareholder in the corporation are not being respected by CBC management. What are those rights? Why, the right to be consulted on such programming changes and the right to voice an opinion on the proposed programming changes, in an open and democratic forum.

It is the final point - the right to voice an opinion on the proposed programming changes - that has finally changed at the CBC (or so it seems, based on this latest announcement). CBC Radio Two listeners can now register on the CBC.ca web site and actually make comments on the proposed changes! Of course, it seems that the CBC management is continuing their past practice of ignoring the comments, but at least this is a good start!

It is interesting to read the comments that listeners have left on this site regarding the new programming - the comments are overwhelmingly opposed to the new programming. CBC management, when will you sit up and take notice that you have embarked on a voyage of self-destruction?

CBC Radio Two - Where does the music take me?

If you're like me, you've likely become fed up with the CBC Radio Two programming changes that have taken place. But what to do?

In my May 4 blog entry, I discussed alternatives to CBC Radio Two. The video clip above illustrates my preferred alternative to CBC Radio Two programming.

In a future blog entry I'll describe my experience with Sirius satellite radio (which has been excellent, by the way) and some tips on getting started with your own satellite radio installation.

Nine months later, and listeners are still outraged!

I found this discussion on the "inside the cbc" radio web site. Well, it's good to know listeners haven't forgotten yet what CBC Radio Two used to be like.

Symphony Hall was cancelled? The Singer and the Song cancelled? Well, I can't say that I noticed - or even much care anymore, for that matter - since I quit listening to CBC Radio Two in favour of Sirius satellite radio.

Can CBC Radio Two really survive by gradually cancelling its best programming, until only the dreck remains? Only time will tell.

What is being reported in the media about the CBC Radio Two changes?

Although I haven't been searching for newspaper articles on the recent changes in the CBC Radio Two evening schedule, I have found several of interest.

The first is from the Ottawa Citizen on May 5. Here are some excerpts:

"More changes are coming the way of Two but nothing CBC radio management is ready to talk publicly about. What they will happily talk about are ratings, which, given current trends in radio, are impressive."

I find this mind boggling! CBC radio management is planning more changes, but they are not ready to talk publicly about these changes! Are they doing surveys? Actively consulting the CBC radio listeners? Announcing these changes well in advance and requesting feedback from the consumer, who also happens to be a shareholder in the corporation? Apparently not.

"While commercial radio listening is down across the board in Canada, CBC has held steady and its listeners have remained faithful: Nationally, CBC radio commands about a 10-per-cent share of the radio audience with larger chunks in some areas -- most notably in the Ottawa region where a quarter of the adult radio listening population is all CBC all the time -- either Oneor Two or a slice of both. The remaining three-quarters is scattered among the myriad of commercial stations."

Imagine this - you have a 10% market share in a competitive industry where consumers can easily switch to your competitors (at the touch of a button!), and yet you are willing to blow off your customers by making radical changes in your product without first surveying your customers to determine if you will lose them as customers! Does no one in CBC Radio management remember past marketing gaffes - for example, the New Coke debacle?

"Nationally, those CBC percentages mean that approximately 2.75 million adult anglophones listen to Radio One each week while about 850,000 tune in to Radio Two. The numbers are approximate because CBC only calculates data in areas of the country where it owns stations."

Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Satellite Radio - are you listening? Would you like to have 850,000 new subscribers?

"Another way of looking at it is that about one in seven radio-listening Canadians regularly tune in to Radio One and about one in 20 listen regularly to Radio Two. That share of the audience hasn't changed significantly for many years but data shows that CBC listeners are tuning in for longer periods and listening less to other stations."

This should be a dream come true for any company. Consumers use your product regularly, your market share may not be growing, but at least it's not declining and the consumer is using your product more each day. What's more, you have a guaranteed source of revenue - the ever-suffering taxpayer!

"Barry Kiefl, a ratings specialist and president of Ottawa-based Canadian Media Research, says it's difficult for non-CBC listeners to appreciate the loyalty that CBC radio commands.

"When you tell people outside of that one-quarter group that CBC radio is No. 1 in Ottawa," he says, "they don't believe you because they never listen to CBC." As with most radio, commercial or public, CBC gets its biggest audiences in the mornings. Anna Maria Tremonti, host of The Current, is the most listened to morning radio host in Canada.

The CBC says it is now in the top three in 14 of the 18 markets in which it has stations. So if it wasn't broken, why fix it? Challenging what appears to be an obvious conclusion, Jennifer McGuire, chief of CBC radio programming, says the Radio Two changes were implemented not to attract a younger audience but a "sustainable" one."

Hmmm, what is more sustainable than an audience that listens to you until the day they die? Do they really believe that the former CBC Radio Two audience, who have very likely abandoned CBC Radio Two in droves, will be replaced by an equal number of 35 - 49 year olds? What incentive is there for a listener to abandon their favourite radio station for CBC Radio Two?

" "The Radio Two audience is good and very important to us," she says, "but the reality is that no new audience is coming in and any new audience that does come in is in the 65-plus demographic. So there are no 50-, 40- or 30-year-olds coming in. Long term that is not sustainable. But we're targeting the service to adults; we're not going after teenagers." "

I find this somewhat laughable. Are we really to believe that there are 65+ year olds who are suddenly deciding to listen to CBC Radio Two, abandoning perhaps Q-107 in Toronto, CHEZ 106 in Ottawa? No, CBC Radio Two is something that you discover relatively early in life. What better sustainable audience is there than a new cohort each year of twenty-something listeners who are looking for an alternative to commercial radio? And by "an alternative to commercial radio" I do not mean a public broadcaster playing music similar to what is already on commercial radio.

"There were two other considerations also, she says: To widen the musical selection of CBC to better reflect the homegrown musical output and to make Radio Two relevant where it currently has no impact -- especially in the Maritimes where its audience is tiny to non-existent. "Radio Two does well in Vancouver but does badly in the Maritimes," says McGuire. "And that matters." Two, she hastens to add, is still 88-per-cent classical but has broadened its jazz content and, with Canada Live, will carry more "regional" music."

Still 88% until CBC Radio management guts the daytime schedule, as they have the evening schedule.

"McGuire's decision to shorten news content on Radio Two is forcing news junkies to flip channels and, according to listener reaction, is a major irritant. Changes at Radio One, adds McGuire, are also being driven by the results of a massive arts and culture study the CBC launched across the country three years ago.

"It had implications for Radio One around comedy, arts journalism and drama," she says. Which is why there will be more drama in morning prime time and more comedy and arts journalism across the schedule. For better or worse, the changes mean that some programs have bitten the dust, including Radio One's trailblazing Global Village that featured world music and mini-documentaries from around the globe. The rest of the CBC schedule simply caught up with Global Village, says McGuire.

"Global Village was a phenomenal success story," she says, "but we found that a lot of the musicians it was bringing to CBC radio are now part of our mainstream. It's the same thing with the stories -- many you'll be hearing on The Current. So the need that created Global Village has morphed into something that's more mainstream." Faithful listeners exact a price for their loyalty and reaction to the changes -- especially on Radio Two -- has not been universally warm. Listeners communicate through Internet discussion groups and blogs -- including the CBC's own blog, which has featured much discussion."

Ha! Just try finding a blog to make your comments! As you will have noticed if you have been reading my entries to this blog.

"Friends of Canadian Broadcasting spokesman Ian Morrison says he hasn't been inundated with complaints but has had "a few e-mails" every day since the changes began. "The writers aren't in cahoots but you notice certain patterns," he says. "

Patterns, for example, such as outrage that, as a shareholder, you were not consulted? Feelings of betrayal after your decades-long loyalty was snubbed?

" "These people seem to feel that Radio Two belongs to them and it's part of their life. If someone mucks around with it, it really pisses them off and they say it's going to the dogs. I'm sureit's not going to the dogs. It's changing and if it didn't change over time it would end up becoming totally irrelevant. Some people really like the changes, I'm sure, but they don't send e-mails to Ian Morrison saying 'what the hell is happening?' " "

"These people seem to feel that Radio Two belongs to them and it's part of their life". Well, perhaps people seem to feel that Radio Two belongs to them because it does in fact belong to them. See clause 3.(1) of the Broadcasting Act, 1991, which states:

It is hereby declared as the broadcasting policy for Canada that
(a) the Canadian broadcasting system shall be effectively owned and controlled by Canadians

"Although CBC radio runs relatively cheaply -- Radio One costs about $100-million a year and Radio Two $10- to $12-million -- the publicly funded broadcaster runs a risk, however small, of irritating influential decision-makers.

"CBC is clearly making a determined effort to reach certain demographics," Morrison says, "but in the process they are annoying a lot of very important Canadians -- judges, CEOs, politicians etc. I don't know how to quantify that elite thing but there could be a political implication -- you're annoying people who are the decision-makers or who talk to decision-makers. But in a month or two I think it will settle down and people will be used to it." "

Finally, a point I can agree with. Yes, in a month or two it will settle down - only because CBC Radio Two listeners will have moved to other stations - Espace Musique, Couleur FM in the Ottawa/Gatineau region, Classical 96.3 FM in the Toronto area or Sirius or XM satellite radio across the country.

The second article is from the April 9 Montreal Gazette, by Mr. Hugh Anderson. You may read the entire article here. I fully agree with the sentiments expressed by Mr. Anderson. I wish there were more in the media like Mr. Anderson who would write on this topic.

If you are aware of any other newspaper articles, please let me know. I'll add links to them on this site.

Alternatives to CBC Radio Two

I'll take another break from describing my quixotic attempts to obtain a response from CBC Radio management on the recent changes to the CBC Radio Two programming and discuss some alternatives to CBC Radio Two instead. I thought the steady diet of invective, rage and bitterness in these blog entries may not be that interesting to many readers. I'm trying to make this blog educational as well. I'll document my interactions (one-sided though they may be) with Mr. Robert Rabinovitch, President and CEO and Acting Chair of the Board of Governors of the CBC, next Monday.

So, a big part of your life has been ripped out from under your feet, leaving you dazed and bewildered. What do you do? Well, you start to post (or attempt to post, see some of my earlier entries to this blog) comments on CBC Radio Two's web site, provide feedback to the CBC, write letters, start petitions (see Return Classical Music to CBC Radio) and begin writing a blog (such as the very blog you are reading now). But what do you listen to when you are not doing all of these things? What fills the void left by CBC Radio?

At first, I thought it was simple. I'd get over not having a full newscast at 6:00 AM when I wake up. I'd continue to listen to "Music and Company" in the morning, without the newscast and without the Arts Report. I'd just learn to like it. Well, as it turned out, 15 minutes of news is just what I need to wake up in the morning. Two minutes of news, then classical music lulls me back to sleep. Besides, I like to start the day with some idea of what's going on in the world. So, I thought it would be a simple matter to tune the clock radio to CBC Radio One, wake up to Radio One, switch to Radio Two when the news is over, switch back to Radio One before going to sleep and so on. This plan lasted one or two days, then the radio stayed tuned to CBC Radio One for the duration.

And I'd learn to appreciate "Tonic" (jazz in the daylight!) and the god-awful "Canada Live". This idea lasted for all of about twenty seconds, although I tried listening to both shows for a week. I found my self tuning into "Espace Musique" in the evenings (102.5 in the Ottawa/Gatineau region, see the link to the right) or "Couleur FM" (97.5 in the Ottawa/Gatineau region, another link to the right). I find "Espace Musique" a bit too inconsistent for listening to on a daily basis. "Couleur FM" is pleasant, but it is light classical music and has too many commercials, but this is the price one must pay when the public broadcaster has abandoned classical music in the evenings. In the Toronto area, there is "Classical 96.3 FM", also light classical but enjoyable. For other Canadian cities, well, as far as I can see you might have to go to satellite radio - or carry your PC to every room in your dwelling where you want to listen to classical music over the Internet. If anyone knows of other classical music stations in other Canadian cities, please let me know and I'll put links here. I haven't tried to do an extensive search - I know there are several in the Montreal area. I just don't know the frequencies, Kenneth.

Another alternative is to abandon broadcast radio entirely. To hell with the bastards! If they're going to program crap, I'll create my own programming! To do this, one requires an iPod.

Now, I expect just about all of you have heard of the iPod. I'm no Luddite, but it took me until this past January to buy my first iPod. And what a revelation it is! How brilliant, to be able to have a vast CD collection in a device the size of a chocolate bar (or pack of cigarettes, or small cell phone - whatever is your frame of reference).

It is easy enough to use that even those doddering old fools in the 49+ age group - the ones that CBC Radio Two wants to abandon in the evenings in favour of the dynamic and sprightly 35 - 49 year olds - could use one. Of course, you need a PC, and all of this costs money. And it's not quite as accessible as a $29.95 radio and some batteries or an electrical outlet. But never mind.

The next step in the program-your-own-classical-music project is to purchase an FM radio transmitter for your iPod; for example the Griffin iTrip. This is an amazing little device that attaches to the dock connector of your iPod and can play your music through any FM radio. Of course, the iPod has to be quite close to the radio, and you have to tune the radio to a relatively clear station to use it, but it is extremely easy to use and works well. Again, easily within the grasp of the geritol generation, the 49+ age group, even though their mental faculties may be failing them.

For the car, there's the Monster iCarPlay Wireless FM transmitter. It also works well, in my experience. The only danger here is that of trying to select your next playlist while driving. You're better off to wait until the vehicle is stationary! And of course, I would advise the 49+ age group to have a passenger manipulate the iPod at all times - it's best to keep your eyes on the road, given your failing eyesight, poor hearing and generally diminished response times! (For those of you who have persevered to read this far, I am being facetious. There is no reason, that I can see, for CBC Radio to have singled out the 49+ age group as being a less desirable audience than the 35 - 49 year old. And, for that matter, what about those under 35?)

This has been, by no means, a comprehensive discussion of the alternatives to CBC Radio Two, and I am sure that there are those who can add much, much more on the topic of iPods and wireless FM transmitters. I have not yet investigated Satellite radio - next on my list of things to do. If you have any comments or additions, please feel free to write. And of course, the fact I am discussing alternatives to CBC Radio Two does not mean I am no longer thoroughly outraged at the authoritarianism of the CBC. I am only being practical.

Next week: my letter to Mr. Robert Rabinovitch, President and CEO and Acting Chair of the Board of Governors of the CBC.