The beleaguered Canadian taxpayer foots the bill for the CBC.

Competitive information is exempt from ATI, I think for all Crown corporations, but definitely for the CBC. (So requests for stuff like audience research, show schedules, and probably journalists’ research would be refused.) That’s not to say that you couldn’t infer a lot from the non-exempt information, especially budgets, but my money’s still on a kook or an axe-grinder rather than a competing private broadcaster. The potential for bad publicity alone would seem to rule out them doing anything so stupid.

For now, anyone can make a link themselves by using the regular A HREF tags.

This should not have been a surprise to the CBC that there would have been a front end load as it was finally subjected to the ATI Act. This is part of Canada’s New Government and its institutions making themselves more accountable. Accountability and transparency costs money.

When you are providing a competing service in the public domain then you should expect to get blasted. As noted earlier, if I was a competitor I would ask a million questions and do my best to steal every good idea the CBC ever planned. Also, I would be looking for story material. (I sure hope it was Conrad Black that made the requests!)

I say give it about 90 days (if not less) and we will either have a leak or some armtwisting in the Federal Court of Canada. I have no faith that the name of the requestor will be protected by the CBC. It will be leaked.

I’m not sure any board of directors could justify such a move, but do what Kempton calls “black box operations” exist in commercial media? It’s possible.

I’m not even sure what qualifies as immoral in such an environment. Did anyone bid on the Olympics or NHL (or Desperate Housewives) simply to drive up the price? We’ll never know.

I just think that if I were a private broadcaster who could pay a nominal fee to poke my nose in the private business of one (and ONLY one) of my competitors – and have it cost them more money than it cost me! – I’d have a rollicking good time doing so.

Looks good to me.

The situation you describe is easily fixed. Even the judicial system has ways to deal with abusers and the powers that be can easily introduce measures to prevent abuse if necessary.

The idea that something can be “ATI-ed” should already put some senior CBC executives on alert to do their jobs in a responsible manner. (not that I am implying they are not doing it already)

Of course, there are some CBC executives who will always be more interested in covering their asses. And that is also part of the price to pay and we will just have to sort out those and try to ensure they are not operating above rules and laws.

Extension of time limits

9. (1) The head of a government institution may extend the time limit set out in section 7 or subsection 8(1) in respect of a request under this Act for a reasonable period of time, having regard to the circumstances, if

(a) the request is for a large number of records or necessitates a search through a large number of records and meeting the original time limit would unreasonably interfere with the operations of the government institution,

(b) consultations are necessary to comply with the request that cannot reasonably be completed within the original time limit, or

(c) notice of the request is given pursuant to subsection 27(1)

by giving notice of the extension and, in the circumstances set out in paragraph (a) or (b), the length of the extension, to the person who made the request within thirty days after the request is received, which notice shall contain a statement that the person has a right to make a complaint to the Information Commissioner about the extension.