Results tagged “mtvcanada”

Torontoist was very saddened to learn of yesterday's passing of Canadian animation legend Ryan Larkin.

Anyone can make a digital short and then use the interweb to distribute it around the world. It helps if it's something that people want to watch and then tell their friends about, but spreads the message better than playing to 14 people in the back of a bar.

Ah, convergence. It's a word fraught with different meanings, competing motives, and opinions up the proverbial wazoo. To some, convergence is a paradise of synergy, cross-promotion, and massive profits. To others, it's confirmation that more and more information is being disseminated by less and less people. Wherever you stand, however, the world of Toronto media overlords might be on the verge of becoming a whole lot smaller, as Alliance Atlantis confirmed today that one of the companies it is in exclusive talks to sell itself to is none other than Canadian broadcasting and publishing behemoth CanWest Global.

Between the groundbreaking (and Oscar-nominated) Walking in 1969 and his equally revolutionary follow-up, Street Musique, three years later, Ryan Larkin cemented his status as among the most daring and brilliant animators of his time, taking hand-drawn animation to a previously-unseen level of surreal impressionism. He was the rising star of the NFB, the protégé of, and successor to, Norman McLaren, but the pressure to top his earlier triumphs exacerbated his already-present problems with drug- and alcohol-dependency. He left the NFB in 1978, and after a "hazy" decade during which he managed to get himself off of cocaine, Larkin took up panhandling outside (the greatest restaurant in the world) Schwartz's deli in Montréal. This tragic fall from grace was chronicled in Chris Landreth's excellent 2004 Academy Award-winner for Best Animated Short, Ryan, which renewed attention on Larkin, who nevertheless chose to continue his long stint on The Main.

Bell Globemedia, owners of CTV, the Globe and Mail and a bunch of cable channels is in the midst of buying Chum, owner of CityTV, radio stations and even more cable channels. The resulting media conglomerate would be scary to say the least and probably own about half the specialty cable channels in Canada. It will also make the Canadian media scene just a little more concentrated. Bell Globemedia has indicated that it plans to keep CityTV intact but the question on all our minds is will they keep MuchMusic or MTV Canada?

San Francisco is proud host of a new reality show called "How to Get the Guy" that's unfortunately not a descendant of Will and Grace, Queer Eye, The L Word, American Idol etc. Also a biodefence lab is coming to the East Bay and SFist teaches wine pairing.

MTV Canada launched three months ago, and since that time one thing has become obvious: it's way better than MuchMusic. Less annoying VJs (including Daryn Jones, of Daryn Jones & Mista Mo fame) and way more addictive content (My Super Sweet 16 and Laguna Beach, to name a few) are just the tip of this sexy, American iceberg. Sure, MTV doesn't have any actual music videos and their website is a huge pain to navigate, but for some reason, that doesn't matter; it's all coated in MTV goodness. The two channels are so unequal in quality, it's like comparing The Daily Show to Last Call with Carson Daly. No contest.

Torontoist had heard for a while that MTV Canada's arrival was fast approaching which got us thinking about what MTV’s presence will mean for Canada’s own MuchMusic. Apparently, CTV is required to operate this station under a Talk TV license; therefore, more lifestyle programming and little focus on actual music and videos. So it would appear Much will keep its core audience and the two networks will have little to battle over. Right? Well, who knows? The impression Torontoist gets from watching MTV’s current “The drought is over” marketing campaign currently running on television is that they’re certainly looking to sway loyal Much viewers and are up for a bit of a fight.