Charles Falzon is definitely not your typical marketing exec.

The following list provides contact information for kids show buyers at selected Canadian broadcasters, along with insider info on what these casters are looking for, and how to go about pitching to them. The information is extracted from an international list to run in the February/March issue of KidScreen.

U.S. animation cable channel Cartoon Network has picked up the first 26-episode season of Zixx, and began airing the CG-animated/live-action hybrid in its Saturday morning lineup on Jan. 21.

Film and television production in Canada took a dip for the second straight cycle, according to Profile 2006, the industry report from the CFTPA and Quebec’s APFTQ.

The adoption of new technologies and sagging film and TV production will dominate bargaining involving Canadian producers in 2006, as collective agreements with all the major unions and guilds are up for renewal.

In the past few editions of Prime Time, some attendees have complained that the CFTPA has been offering the same old same old. The event’s panel topics – and the conversations they have ignited – had mostly to do with producers grumbling over the level of support from government, broadcasters and distributors. (Of course, those doing the complaining were mostly government, broadcasters and distributors.)

Deborah Osborne is a post-production manager with 25 years’ experience on feature films, TV series, and live-to-air programming. She was on the organizing committee for Alberta’s recent High Definition Production: The Definitive HD Seminar, and presented a session there on HD Deliverables. Here she provides a recap of the seminar in anticipation of the CFTPA Prime Time panel High-Def CanCon: Are We Ready?

When the market for mobile video takes off – or continues to take off, rather – it will not, observers insist, go the fizzled-out, cash-poor way of the Internet.
A quick look at the numbers: currently, only 3.1% of the 16 million cell phones in Canada can play video, and only 10% of those users ever tune in, according to mobile shop QuickPlay Media. But, by 2008, roughly 90% of the projected 18 million cell phones will be video capable.

Sylvain Gagné of Christal Films contends that Karla is an important film to share with Canadians as – if nothing else – a cautionary tale, adding that he doesn’t fear a public outcry against the film or its partners.
The controversial U.S. feature about the exploits of convicted murderers Karla Homolka and Paul Bernardo was scheduled to open across Canada through the distrib on Jan. 20.

Rick Feldman, NATPE’s president and CEO, calls the annual conference and exhibition ‘a mirror of the business,’ and, as such, mobile content issues will factor heavily into this year’s event, Jan. 24-26 in Las Vegas.

CBC News hopes to strike a new note – five new notes, in fact – with 25-54-year-old news viewers across the country, but the early word from media buyers says the new and more youthful approach from the Ceeb’s newsies may already be falling flat.

Global Television’s primetime soap Falcon Beach premiered to 576,000 viewers on Jan. 5 in its 8 p.m. timeslot, according to BBM, despite stiff competition from hockey coverage on TSN.