Canadian TV producers continue to go overboard in pursuing production subsidies from the Canada Media Fund after the industry fund completed its first year in a familiar position: over-subscribed.

But where the increased demand from indie producers is coming – digital media – underlines just where the CMF, and the Canadian industry, is headed.

The CMF told Playback Daily that it received close to 1,800 applications for coin from indie producers in fiscal 2010/2011, well up from nearly 1,000 applications for all programs in 2009/2010.

The 85% increase in applications at the CMF follows the introduction of an experimental stream to create digital content, where around 460 applications were received, following the end of the former Canadian Television Fund on April 1, 2010.

There are no comparative statistics for earlier years as the experimental stream did not exist before 2010/2011.

At the same time, combining the experimental and convergent streams, the program budget for the CMF came to $350 million in 2010/2011.

The fund has no comparative program budget number yet for 2010/2011, as it continues to review the first year of operation for the CMF.

But it does point to a $327.7 million total funding commitment for 2009/2010, which increased from $287.1 million in 2008/2009, and a funding commitment of $252.4 million in 2007/2008.

In 2009/2010, the former Canadian Television Fund supported 931 projects in all streams, including production, development, versioning and digital media, after receiving close to 1,000 applications in all that year.

The CMF does not year have a comparative statistic for total number of projects supported in 2010/2011, and points instead to the nearly 1,800 applications its received in its latest fiscal year for investment.

The CMF is key to Canadian producers getting their shows onto domestic primetime schedules and emerging digital platforms, ahead of international sales.

Since its earliest years during the 1990s, the fund has been consistently over-subscribed.

But in recent years, CMF administrators have worked to ensure the industry fund is more manageable and transparent for indie producers and broadcaster-affiliated producers that tap its production subsidies.