I’m back in Michigan and am watching the CBC, Canadian Broadcasting Corp., for the Olympic coverage. When I was a kid, I figured only people living near Canada get the network, since we were getting it through the antenna.
Now, I have it on cable TV, which should be more or less the same around the country. I mean, I can’t even imagine not having CBC for Olympics since they actually cover it all live and show some of the more “non-major” sports. Of course, they love to bash the U.S. everytime they get to, but I kinda figure we deserve it.
Actually, I remember back in 2000, NBC didn’t show any of the Sydney Olympics live and CBC was my main channel for 2 weeks. I can’t fathom if most of the country had no access to this network.
I asked my wife, a Californian, but she only had antenna TV growing up, so of course they didn’t get CBC. Does everyone who has cable/satellite get CBC and if not, doesn’t your Olympic coverage fall entirely on the very weak NBC?
Only those lucky enough to live near Canada get it on the cable AFAIK. I’m a Detroit transplant to Chicago, and I really miss the ol’ Canuck Broadcasting Channel.
I’ve never seen CBC on any cable/satellite package in the US, so any Americans who pick it up would be near the border.
Personally, I lived in Erie, PA for 2 years, and I could occasionally get very fuzzy Canadian TV from London, Ontario, so I never really watched much of it. The radio stations, on the other hand, came through clearly and were much less full of commercials than the US side, so quite a few people listened to those.
My brother lives in suburban Toledo OH and he has the CBC on his cable TV. He says it is very nice to see the Olympics on CBC in order to have them covered without the all-American-competitors-all-the-time perspective that NBC uses.
Ahh, the CBC: Mr. Dressup, The Friendly Giant, The Polka-Dot Door…
and does anyone remember “The Uncle Bobby Show”? I’ve even talked to Canucks who don’t remember that one. He had “Bimbo-The Birthday Clown” who was this big robotic clown machine that would come out and sing a birthday song to the boys and girls. Utterly terrifying.
Growing up in northern VT, I got CBC and CTV on my cable system. Shortly after I moved to college, they even added a French channel from Quebec. I went ot college near Albany, NY, and no Canadian stations there. I now live much further north in NY and once again get CBC and CTV.
To be fair, CBC usually has an almost-all-Canadian-competitors-almost-all-the-time perspective going on. They certainly skew their coverage towards events that Canadian athletes are expected to do well in. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. The ineptitude of NBC coverage (which I get on cable) truly is something to behold, though.
They did carry the CBC Toronto station. Watched the old John Bynner show with Super Dave. Reruns of the original “SCTV”. And Canadian football!
There was also a French language station from a small town right across the lake. They played some really great films without cuts late on Sunday nights.
Oh my GOD do I miss CBC for the Olympics coverage. There are quite a few Canadians down here (US) who get the Canadian satellite dish and service. I want to be close friends with one of them for the next few weeks.
That would mean you got CTV, AND CBC. (The John Byner show was called Bizarre, and was on CTV. And it recently came out on DVD!)
(Also, I discover when I go to confirm Bizarre was CTV and SCTV was CBC, I discover that the ‘poster/box art’ on imdb for Bizarre is an Avengers video cover… Bizarre indeed.)
Buffalo area cable systems all have Channel 5 (CBC) and Channel 9 (CTV) from Toronto. A few have 19 (TVO) and 11 (an independent from Hamilton). None have CITY TV, the French channels, Global, or any of the tens of little UHF ethnic stations from Toronto.
Most Buffalonians seem to prefer CBC olympic coverage over that on American networks. The Canadian coverage is no less patriotic, but there’s fewer sappy background stories.
Ah, I guess my area wasn’t close enough then. We got wkbw, Fox 29 and other Buffal stations, but none of those other channels ring a bell (channel 11 sounds familar…was that similar to our PBS?).