paulcrosstoronto’s Podcast

On preserving Canada's radio and tv history.  From November 25, 2021.  Radio history is part of our history.  But there's no publicly-funded, organized institutional repository or archive of significant audio or other records from Canada's radio history.  By contrast, the United States has a Radio Preservation Task Force at the Library of Congress.  In Canada, a charitable foundation -- the Canadi...

On the podcast career accelerator at Hot Docs. From November 12, 2021. The Hot Docs documentary festival in Toronto is offering young independent podcast makers an opportunity to learn from experts.  Their initiative seems like something that would appeal to many of the students I teach in the three academic programs I'm involved in; so I connected with the festival to find out more.  For educatio...

On the Future of News - Part One.  From November 4, 2021.  On various occasions this season I will explore aspects of The Future of News from perspectives of news production, distribution, audience -- including uses and gratification, user experience, and user feedback and response. I will connect these episodes with research I am conducting. In part one here, I scratch the surface on some recent...

On resisting the ongoing abuse of the War of the Worlds broadcast. From October 27, 2021 - just ahead of World Audio Drama day October 30th.  This is the fifth episode in my ongoing defence of War of the Worlds as brilliant fiction on radio; so powerful it gave the aggrieved print media of 1938 more fuel for its outrage about a newer, faster medium.  For educational purposes. The previous episodes...

From September 30, 2021.  On the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation. There is a role for everyone to play.  Here are some thoughts, based on points I raised in a letter to my member of parliament, in the days following the Every Child Matters march in July.

From September 10, 2021.  On the eve of the 20th anniversary of the events of September 11th, 2001. Broadcasting, podcasting, newspapers and online sites are full of features, analysis, documentaries and special reports about 9/11 including the memories of people who reported the events.  Some of that is by or about people who were on tv that day.  But for millions of people, the story started on...

On Emancipation Day.  Suppose it's the first time Canada officially commemorates Emancipation Day as a national holiday.  That would be on the news that day, would it not? I think news coverage was severely lacking.  Not a word in some major newspapers that weekend.  Almost nothing on broadcast news or newsroom social media.  Why not?  Do we just not want to know what it's really about?  From Augu...

From July 1, 2021: The Every Child Matters March through downtown Toronto. This time: walk with thousands from the Toronto Council Fire building  at Parliament and Dundas Streets to Nathan Phillips Square at Toronto City Hall.  Days after unmarked graves are discovered, containing the bodies of more Indigenous children who died at places Canada calls "residential schools", thousands of people join...

The murder of a young Black man by members of a racist white gang in a city park during fireworks for the Victoria Day holiday in 2001 should have sent waves of shock and outrage through the mid-sized city where it happened.  And beyond. It was two years before anyone was arrested in the killing of Howard Joel Munroe in Victoria Park in Kitchener, about an hour west of Toronto. This is not a true-...

In April 2021 there has been a great deal of coverage on podcasts, radio and tv of the one-year anniversary of the mass murder in rural Nova Scotia: April 18 and 19, 2020. For an in-depth examination of the case I highly recommend the series 13 Hours: Inside the Nova Scotia Massacre from CuriousCast.  Episode six is particularly valuable for its examination and exposure of communication and coordi...

The government of Ontario wants police to start random stops of people on the street or in traffic to make them justify having left their homes during the stay-at-home rules of the pandemic.  Who do you think would be likely to get targeted and stopped? A frightening order to be taking effect on the 39th anniversary of the formal signing of Canada's constitution.  But what's this? Some municipal p...

On the first all-female broadcast crew in NBA history. From March 25, 2021.  The Toronto Raptors become the first team in NBA history to have a game with an all-female broadcast crew: play-by-play announcer, analyst-colour commentator, sideline reporter, and broadcast show co-hosts.  It's just the third time in history a woman has performed the play-by-play.  First time was in 1988; and then, not...

“How radio listeners need their own baseball play-by-play”.  From March 18, 2021.  Listeners have been tuning in on radio to live play-by-play of baseball games for nearly a century.  In Toronto, Blue Jays baseball on the radio became the soundtrack of the city in the glory years of the early 1990s, when the Jays won the World Series two years in a row.  But now, the corporation that owns both the...

On pandemic stories in audio fiction. From March 11, 2021.  On the first "anniversary" of living in the pandemic, I'm listening for audio stories about living in a pandemic.  Audio drama -- ensemble, assembly or solo fiction -- is giving us new ways of exploring life in times of a pandemic...as escape.  For educational purposes.  Makes fair dealing use of bits from 2084 by Rainer Pluckebaum; On a...

On the passing of radio news star Dick Smyth.  From March 7, 2021.  Stories are being told as news reaches us that Dick Smyth has passed away.  His newscasts and his commentaries on 1050 CHUM are legendary.  One of a kind.  My unscripted thoughts, having worked with him at 1050 CHUM starting in 1985.  I neglected to mention how wary some people in the AIDS community were of speaking with me as I s...

“On women in radio on International Women’s Day”.  From March 4, 2021.  When academics and researchers write about women in radio they tend to lean toward public radio and community radio.  That's largely the case in a new book about women in radio in Canada.  It's another worthwhile edition.  I wonder if academia isn't missing a lot though, if more time is not spent examining the roles of some ve...

On hearing sounds from Planet Mars on the radio here on Earth. From February 25, 2021.  We are fascinated by the planet Mars.  It stands out in the night sky, and we are drawn to it.  Since the mid-70s, machines from Earth have been landing on Mars and gathering data.  Now, there's a new probe -- Perseverance -- on Mars, looking for signs of previous life.  And for the first time, part of the miss...

On how there's nothing funny about switching from a sports radio format to "funny". From February 18, 2021.  Among the effects of the mass changes at radio stations controlled by Bell Media is the trashing of labour-intensive sports formats in cities including Hamilton, Winnipeg, and Vancouver.  In Vancouver, TSN 1040 is now Funny 1040. Sports radio listeners are outraged; you can find their indep...

On World Radio Day - and its themes of Evolution, Innovation, Connection.  From February 11, 2021.  February 13th is recognized as World Radio Day.  It's an initiative of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization --UNESCO.  This year's episode of the podcast looks at the three themes of the day by applying them against specific developments in radio.  Of course, the poss...

On the mass layoffs in radio - including CFRB Newstalk 1010 and CJAD.  From February 6, 2021.  Hundreds of people have been thrown out of work in the past few days, in the midst of a pandemic...after spending the last year serving as essential workers in the pandemic...and helping to keep people informed.  Sure, I no longer have my Friday night newscasting gig.  But for most of the people thrown o...

On the power of a poem.  From February 3, 2021.  It was a tense moment in history.  Who knew what might happen as Joe Biden was being sworn in as President of the United States on January 20th? It was just two weeks to the day since a violent insurrection.  Whatever they had anticipated, people watching and listening remember this among the highlights of the day: the performance of a poem by Amand...

On whether news gathering is an essential service during a state of emergency. From January 27, 2021.   In Ontario, newspapers, radio and television broadcasting are listed on the province's document specifying businesses and services considered "essential" during the Covid-19 state of emergency.  So does that mean reporters are safe when doing their work? Is news gathering an essential activity? ...

How local radio reports on a national crisis happening in its own community.  From January 20, 2021.  The world was watching and listening as a mob invaded the U-S Capitol in Washington January 6th.  But to people who live and work in Washington, it's a local story.  Their local radio stations need to serve them.  This time, a taste of how news and talk stations in the city reported the story on a...

How a memo from a Radio boss does not violate a host's right to freedom of speech. From January 13, 2021.  Right-wing talk radio hosts in the U-S have been influencing and encouraging Trump supporters for years.  But since the election of November 2020, many have been going even further: they have been perpetuating the falsehood that he had won the election.  It took the violent insurrection of Ja...

On the different receptions Americans are given in Washington - depending on race.  From January 7, 2021.  What was obvious to anyone watching live video of the attack on the U-S Capitol during election certification is that the insurrectionists were mostly white.  That's something we'll have to bring back to audio reporting including radio -- describing who's there.  Because the story here for to...