And the way he looked at me and he came over and he started hitting me the same way that they were hitting. The system now being tested in Canada isn't completely set in stone. Canadian officials have been meeting with American lawmakers like Rep. Ed Markey and Jack Valenti of the Motion Picture Association in hopes of establishing a single North American rating system. What eventually emerges may look somewhat different than the test chip. It's important to U.S. program producers too because Canada is one of their biggest foreign markets.
Time is critical for Canadian programmers.
The government has mandated V-chips be available to all Canadian cable viewers this fall, and that's most of the Canadian audience, because cable is more prevalent North of the border. The clock is ticking South of the border too. The new U.S. Telecommunications Act requires V-chips be installed in all new television sets within two years.