p2pnet.net News First:- Is the CBC, Canada’s national broadcaster, negotiating to run Microsoft advertisements on CBC web pages?

About a month ago p2pnet reader Simon Pole was checking out the news on the CBC and was amazed to see a Microsoft logo in the upper left-hand corner.

We found it hard to believe, as well. After all, the CBC site is advertisement-free, allowing it to report without the bias and under-the-table restrictions all too frequently associated with advertising deals.

The CBC must, “provide a reasonable opportunity for the public to be exposed to the expression of differing views on matters of public concern,” as the Broadcast Act, 3(l)-(l) states it.

Was the MSN / CBC page a hacker’s prank, perhaps?

Pole started Googling and found an example dated March 15 with fully functional links to Net ’services’.

‘Shopping, for, for example, includes this clickable selection:

“The MSN ads always seemed to be served up on secondary pages, never on the main headline page,” Pole told p2pnet. “Looks like they’re trying to fly under the radar.”

It does indeed, and moreover, examples - still online - date back to 2003.

Have Bill and the Boyz been negotiating with the CBC for two years ?

And are these test pages of what’s to become an MSNCBC news site similar to MSNBC in the US?

The answers are particularly relevant given the highly questionable tactics used by Microsoft in its bid to persuade the European Parliament to pass legislation it and other huge corporations wanted; and, given its current, much publicized efforts to monopolize on-Net advertising as it has done, and is doing, in so many other areas.

“Microsoft’s sponsorship of Canada’s premiere news-gathering operation is an extremely troubling development,” says Pole on his new Has the CBC sold out to Microsoft? web site.

“All signs point to the likelihood the CBC and MSN have cut some sort of deal. The CBC is now also providing content for MSN’s Sympatico webpage brand. (See the Sympatico FAQ as well).

“This is a big problem.”

And the ‘partnership’ appears to have already produced negative effects, says Pole.

Last year, the CBC went exclusively to a proprietary Microsoft audio format for streaming broadcasts and, “Again,” he says, “the CBC’s mandate is to provide accessible news, information and entertainment to Canadians.

“Putting streaming content belonging to all Canadians exclusively in a format controlled by Microsoft is dangerous. Microsoft could at any time force an upgrade of its audio streaming format to increase its profit (as it tried to do with Windows, triggering howls of protest).

“Microsoft could also unilaterally add a digital flag to this format that would prevent Canadians from listening to the CBC on the particular hardware they may have in their homes (such as an iPod or other device made by Microsoft’s competitors).

“One begins to wonder where the CBC ends and Microsoft begins.”

Pole told us he’s now contacted the Friends of Canadian Broadcasting, an independent, Canada-wide, non-partisan voluntary organization set up to “defend and enhance the quality and quantity of Canadian programming in Canada’s audio-visual system”.

Below are more MSNCBC ad pages on the CBC site:

• May 27, 2003
• June 13, 2003
• August 20, 2003
• March 22, 2004
• March 31, 2004
• May 7, 2004
• February 9, 2005
• March 1, 2005
• March 1, 2005 #2
• March 2, 2005
• March 3, 2005

These pages were found by googling http:/www.cbc.ca/storyview/MSN.

“The CBC MSN ad pages seem to have their own dedicated file directory within the CBC website, which is www.cbc.ca/storyview/MSN,” says Pole on his site. “These examples of CBC MSN ad pages found on Google were mostly provided by links quoted in blog and forum posts.

“The earliest CBC MSN page indexed is from May 2003. There are sporadic examples of CBC MSN ad pages since then, with an upsurge in March of this year. Though this may indicate an increase in the MSN ads the CBC is placing, it is more likely a result of Google’s indexing algorithm which may return more recent links in the first few pages of search results.”

p2pnet sent this email to the CBC today:

From: http://www.p2pnet.net
To whom it may concern:
March 19, 2005, 7:45 am PST

I run p2pnet.net and am contacting you to ask about Microsoft advertisements which have been appearing sporadically on the CBC web site since 2003. The most recent is dated March 15:

http://www.cbc.ca/storyview/MSN/world/national/2005/03/15/ItalyIraq-050315.html

Has the CBC struck a deal whereby it’ll soon be offering Net pages in collaboration with Microsoft?

If not, why are these pages online?

If so, what are the terms of the arrangement, who originated it and when is it due to commence?

Does this signal a general CBC policy which will ultimately end with advertising also being added to television and radio programs?

Given the CBC mandate, the Canadian government is presumably aware of the apparent Microsoft advertising arrangement. With whom are you communicating and/or reporting to?

Many thanks,
Jon Newton,
Editor, p2pnet

Stay tuned.

Something you think we should know? tips[at]p2pnet.net

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See:-
highly questionable tactics - Gates blackmailed Danish gv’ment, p2pnet, February 15, 2005
monopolize on-Net advertising - Microsoft premiers its adCenter, p2pnet, March 17, 2005

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