Television in Canada

Television in Canada officially began with the sign-on of the nation's first television stations in Montreal and Toronto in 1952. As with most media in Canada, the television industry, and the television programming available in that country, are strongly influenced by media in the United States, perhaps to an extent not seen in any other major industrialized nation. As a result, the government institutes quotas for "Canadian content". Nonetheless, new content is often aimed at a broader North American audience, although the similarities may be less pronounced in the predominantly French-language province of Quebec.
===Broadcast television ===
While American television stations, including affiliates of ABC, NBC and CBS, near the Canada–US border were available for several years prior, and gained a sizeable audience in cities like Toronto, within range of U.S. signals, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) was the first entity to broadcast television programming within Canada, launching in September 1952 in both Montreal and Toronto. Private CBC affiliates began operating late in 1953 to supplement the Corporation's own stations; the first private CBC affiliate in Canada was CKSO-TV in Sudbury, Ontario in October of that year, with CFPL-TV in London, Ontario following a few weeks later. All television stations that signed on in Canada were required to be CBC affiliates, as the CBC was the only television network operating in Canada at the time.
In 1948, there were 325 television sets in Canada, but thousands more were sold in the years from 1948 to 1952, most of them tuned to stations from either the Buffalo, Seattle, Cleveland or Detroit television markets. When Canadian television began, the Radio-Television Manufacturers Association of Canada estimated that 85,000 sets were expected to be sold in 1952. 95% of these were concentrated in Ontario, with 57.4% in the Golden Horseshoe region (40.2% in Toronto and Hamilton, 17.2% in Niagara Peninsula) and 34.6% in the Windsor region near Detroit. Television viewership outside Ontario was limited to British Columbia's Lower Mainland with access to American programming from Seattle and some sets in Montreal. Television sales were promoted by the arrival of CBC Television.
Following a review by the Diefenbaker government in the late 1950s, a number of new, "second" stations were licensed in many major markets, many of which began operating before the end of 1960. CTV, the first private network, which grew out of the inevitable association of these new stations, began operating in October 1961. About the same time, CHCH-TV in Hamilton disaffiliated from the CBC and became the first station not affiliated with either network, not counting the initial launch period of most of the soon-to-be CTV stations.
The 1980s and 1990s saw exponential growth in the multichannel universe, beginning with pay television services and later continuing with various waves of specialty services, usually launched in one fell swoop. The launch of direct-to-home satellite television services in the mid-1990s accelerated this growth.
==National broadcast television networks==
===English===
* CBC Television, a national public network owned by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC).
* Citytv, a privately owned television network owned by Rogers Media, with stations in Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia.
* CTV Television Network, a national private network (except for Newfoundland and Labrador and the territories) owned by Bell Media.
* Global Television Network, a national private network (except for Newfoundland and Labrador and the territories) owned by Corus Entertainment.
* APTN, the first national Indigenous broadcaster in the world.
===French===
* Ici Radio-Canada Télé, a national public network owned by the CBC's French-language division Société Radio-Canada.
* TVA, a privately owned television network owned by Groupe TVA.
===Multilingual===
* Aboriginal Peoples Television Network, a broadcast television network with television stations in the three territories and cable network carried nationwide on cable and satellite. Programming focuses on Indigenous Peoples. It operates in English, French and various Aboriginal languages.
Category:Television stations