The cable and satellite companies in Canada took the digital transition as an excuse to shut down broadcast stations that they owned and force people to get cable or satellite to keep receiving certain networks. CBC couldn’t afford to switch a lot of their repeaters to digital because the Conservatives kept cutting their budget every year and stacking the board with cronies.
So now there’s no CBC station broadcasting where I live. No Global. No CTV. For Americans, this is the equivalent of not having PBS, NBC, and CBS. Oh, and other than public broadcasters (like CBC and TVO) and a few independent channels, the cable and satellite companies own the broadcast stations.
