MONTREAL: Telefilm Canada has announced funding support for 44 projects in its first round of Canada New Media Fund decisions for 2003/04.

Of the accepted projects, 18 are for pre-development/development (which includes market research and development of prototypes), 12 for production, 13 for marketing and one for distribution. The projects accepted for development, production or marketing cover a wide range of both media and content, including CD-ROMs, interactive DVD-ROMs, convergent websites, console games, multimedia installations and wireless products.

Most of the new media projects are in the entertainment, edutainment and documentary categories.

CNMF is under review and Telefilm executive director Richard Stursberg says changes to fund guidelines will be announced prior to the fall round deadline, Sept. 23. This year’s fund resource is $9 million.

‘The products we have chosen to invest in offer diverse content and are geared for success, with a number of them including marketing cross-promotions with popular television programs and consumer products,’ says Stursberg. ‘For the fall round, we will be making several key changes to the guidelines, following our Canada New Media Fund Advisory Committee meeting in June, which will ensure that we have an industry initiative that is more than ever in tune with our clients as we work towards the renewal of the fund.’

Projects originate from Atlantic Canada, Quebec (including nine in French), Ontario and Nunavut, and Western Canada.

The new guidelines and details about the new application procedure will be posted on the TFC website soon – tentatively late August. Changes will take effect for the fund’s upcoming Sept. 23, 2003 deadline.

The new application procedure will feature a two-step application process: Step 1 consists of a short ‘Expression of Interest Form’ for all applicants; Step 2 involves a long-form application for successful candidates from the ‘Expression of Interest’ stage. This full application must be submitted by the selected applicants within four weeks of notification.

-www.telefilm.gc.ca