Dan Zeidler passed away suddenly Tuesday. He was only 56.

Zeidler began working at CBC as a teenager in 1968 doing summer relief, becoming staff in National Television News in 1971.

He left Toronto in the mid-1970s to work in Thunder Bay, moved to Edmonton as Senior Editor, and then to Vancouver. He took a leave from the CBC in 1989 to join The Newspaper Guild’s International staff and later moved to CWA/SCA Canada and was based in Winnipeg, where he worked until his death.

He was active in unions and was among the group of 12 CMG members who were locked out in 1972 for supporting a NABET strike. This group became known within Union circles as “the Dirty Dozen.”

Zeidler leaves his wife, Hortense, and his sister. The funeral will take place on Saturday November 3 at 2 pm at the Thomson “in the park” Funeral Home, 1291 McGillivray Blvd, Winnipeg. In lieu of flowers, the family is asking that donations be made to the Winnipeg Humane Society or to a charity of your choice.

You’re welcome to share your messages of condolence and your memories of Dan here in the comments, or email drichmond@cwa-scacanada.ca and the messages will be posted on the CWA/SCA Canada website.

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	Obits	Posted at 6:03 pm (31 Oct 2007)

CBC’s network briefly blocked employees from from visiting social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace this morning. Also, some personal blogs, like John Gushue‘s and the popular anonymous Teamakers blog were not accessible.

John Mang, operations manager for B.C. radio said: “It looks like was was a technical glitch. It was certainly unintentional. One phone call and it is being fixed.”

Ray Carnovale, head of CBC’s I.T. confirmed that and said the blockage “may be something going on external to us.”

All regions should have access to all those sites again.

What I think was interesting was just how fast news spread in the Corporation. I was on-air at the time and was getting dozens of CBC folks emailing me within the space of an hour. It spread quickly within the Vancouver radio newsroom and, presumably, others.

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	I.T., Workstations and Desktops	Posted at 10:27 am (31 Oct 2007)

If you’re a journalist, researcher, or editor using Facebook, you may want to heed this warning from one of our own, a reporter in Vancouver.

For an inexplicable reason, last week Facebook disabled my account.

They say they have a policy of not permitting harrassing, threatening, obscene messages, or spam.

I of course didn’t do any such thing. I have always clearly identified who I am, who I work for, and so forth. Been completely transparent. Each message I have sent has been individually written, not “spam”. (I actually haven’t used Facebook that much.)

I have “appealed” my disabled status to Facebook. They have now responded that I am prohibited – they don’t tolerate anyone sending UNSOLICITED MESSAGES!

I’m not sure what we, or I, can do about this. Facebook won’t reveal to me what the message was, or to whom, which caused them to disable me.

I have responded to them that of course many journalists use Facebook for this purpose. And I have never harassed anyone. Anyway…this is just to warn you all who DO use Facebook for finding people – beware!

A bit later…

The PR person decided to re-instate me.

She said I had been “disabled” because I had posted very little information about myself, no photo or profile available, and WAS ONLY USING FACEBOOK TO “SOLICIT” contacts. That I wasn’t using it for private purposes (eg to connect with my own “friends”). Which is true.

So the lesson is…

1. Make your photo and even profile available – if you are going to use Facebook for journalistic purposes; and
2. have your own friends.

She warned me that if I only use Facebook to solicit people for ‘business purposes’ I will be disabled again. Journalists are NO EXCEPTION.

Guess to keep clean I’ll have to start messaging you all on the Facebook cbc network.

But this does have implications for those who have Facebook accounts and who only use them for finding people for CBC stories. Be warned.

Are you using Facebook for journalistic purposes? If so, do you find it valuable?

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	News & Journalism	Posted at 10:09 am (31 Oct 2007)

If you’re a host and dream of becoming an icon of Canadian broadcasting, turns out it’s pretty simple to do — at least on a computer. And one ex-pat now living in the U.S. has done just that. Steve Barker, who now calls Portland OR his home, made this George Stroumboulopoulos icon for his Mac computer.

Now, whenever he clicks on that icon, it takes him directly to the video streaming file of The Hour.

Talk about branding. Imagine how many times a day this guy sees Strombo, which serves as a fantastic reminder. An icon right on our listeners’/viewers’ desktop. You can’t buy that kind of advertising.
This is a cool idea. It wouldn’t take us much time (a day, max) to make icons for our top radio and TV shows and put simple instructions on how to link the icons to the streaming or podcast file of the latest episode.

Anyone? Bueller?

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	Fanatical Fans, Personalities	Posted at 7:37 am (31 Oct 2007)

The deadline to enroll in the CBC’s 2007 Payroll Savings Plan Program or make changes to your existing plan is tomorrow, Wednesday.

Information about the savings plan can be found on HR @ my fingertips.

(If you are a Short-term Temporary employee (less than 13 weeks), and are interested in participating, visit the Shared Services website for more information. Please note that if you are paid through Artist Payroll, the Payroll Savings Plan is not available to you at this time. However, you can purchase Canada Savings Bonds through most financial institutions this month.)

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	Financial	Posted at 10:51 am (30 Oct 2007)

I’m going to make a page here listing all of CBC’s blogs (which hopefully one day can migrate to something like www.cbc.ca/blogs).

If you work on a show that has a blog,
please email me the web page address (and, if you know it, your RSS URL).

Thanks!

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		Posted at 10:32 am (30 Oct 2007)

On this day in 1966, Vancouver-born actor John Drainie died of cancer at age 50.

He began in local & CBC radio drama, including the long-running family drama Jake & the Kid.

On TV, he did live CBC drama before moving to New York where he worked on Studio One & Alcoa Hour.

He was host of CBC’s This Hour has Seven Days for one season, and starred in the US drama series ‘Scarlett Hill.’

Hat tip to the excellent web site Today in Broadcast History.

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	Obits, Today In CBC History, Vancouver	Posted at 10:28 am (30 Oct 2007)

Sometimes I just don’t get eBay.

If I’m not going to clear at least $10 profit on an auction, why would I want to spend my time creating and monitoring the auction, replying to questions, then packing up and shipping the thing?

Case in point: Someone is auctioning off this coaster which was distributed with the launch of CBC Newsworld.

Starting bid must begin at $5.

So far, uh, no bidders.

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	CBC Merchandise	Posted at 12:14 pm (29 Oct 2007)

Is it just me, or does anyone else find it odd that the artwork hanging outside CBC Vancouver’s Regional Operations Centre (note the expensive signage) is of a hand unplugging some kind of connection? (Or, I suppose, if you’re not an under-caffeinated grouch like me, perhaps it’s plugging it in…)

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	Bloopers, Vancouver	Posted at 12:03 pm (29 Oct 2007)

Redesigning a web site, especially one with as many eyeballs as CBC.ca gets, isn’t easy. You’ll never please all the people all the time. And while most reviews of the latest redesign have been positive, one bone of contention heard is about the weather-box in the upper-left corner. Presumably the designers wanted something there to balance out the ad.

Now, an anonymous Vancouver programmer (not me!) has developed a tool to remove it from the site — well, to remove your ability to see it.

Some people using the Firefox web browser can download an extension to block advertising which, on the CBC site, makes the weather box hang in mid-air taking up valuable screen real estate.

The weather-box blocker is being promoted in Usenet newsgroups and on the popular social-news web site Digg.com.

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	CBC.ca web site	Posted at 11:54 am (29 Oct 2007)

For the full story, check out Paul’s blog.

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		Posted at 12:23 pm (26 Oct 2007)

I guess it’s not that redundant, but it drives me crazy when I hear someone promo the news by saying “And now, the news to 3 o’clock.”

Is it just me, or should that really be “the news at 3 o’clock” and not “to 3 o’clock.”

Judy? Anyone?

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		Posted at 12:22 pm (26 Oct 2007)

The union representing the majority of CBC employees says the Corporation’s much-debated new blogging guidelines are too restrictive and may be counter to the Collective Agreement the CBC and CMG signed.

The Canadian Media Guild, which represents 5,500 CBC employees, says it believes CBC employees need not be as restricted as the official guideline suggests:

The questions that bloggers should ask themselves are: Am I competing with the CBC? Am I exploiting my connection with the CBC (e.g. gaining some benefit from my connection that I might not otherwise have)? Is this blog, or its contents, likely to have a detrimental effect on my ability to do my job? If the reasonable answer to these questions is “no”, then the activity is acceptable.

This is what Article 12 says:

“12.1
Employees shall be free to engage in activities such as voluntary and/or paid work outside their hours of work provided:

a) that such activities are not in competition with the media services of the Corporation. This provision does not apply to temporary employees or freelancers;
b) that without permission, no employee may exploit his/her connection with the Corporation in the course of such activities; or
c) that such activity does not adversely affect his/her work for the Corporation.

12.2
Recognized on-air personnel must discuss any outside activities with their supervisor before engaging in outside activities.”

Any employee is free to engage in any activity provided that activity is consistent with the collective agreement. The questions that bloggers should ask themselves are: Am I competing with the CBC? Am I exploiting my connection with the CBC (e.g. gaining some benefit from my connection that I might not otherwise have)? Is this blog, or its contents, likely to have a detrimental effect on my ability to do my job? If the reasonable answer to these questions is “no”, then the activity is acceptable.

We take the view that only recognized on-air employees must discuss it with a supervisor before pursuing a blog or other online activity.

As in all things, use your common sense when participating in the blogosphere, particularly where you identify yourself as, or are easily identifiable as, a CBC employee. You are responsible for what you publish. When in doubt, get advice from the Guild before you post.

If you have any questions or concerns, please the Guild (info@cmg.ca) at 1-800-465-4149 or 416-591-5333.

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		Posted at 12:02 am (25 Oct 2007)

Radio-Canada television has been spanked reprimanded by the CRTC for airing a program at 7:30 p.m. which focused on pornography.

The Fric Show covers a number of topics each week, but after viewer complains, the CRTC said the Corporation erred.

9:00 p.m. is the generally recognized time when programming and language can get a bit racier — often called “the watershed hour.”

The CRTC has told the CBC that the matter will come up at its licence renewal.

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	The CRTC	Posted at 12:53 pm (24 Oct 2007)