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The new CBC plan, a complete reversal of the corporation’s much ballyhooed proposed strategy of less than three years ago, is to go all out for a bigger piece of the Canadian advertising pie, including skimming bigger shares of the online digital ad market.

In late 2016, under former CBC/Radio Canada chief Hubert Lacroix, the corporation proposed “removing advertising from CBC/Radio-Canada.” The strategy, said the CBC report, would “free up advertising revenue to help… private media companies transition to a digital environment.”

Now, under the CBC’s new president, Catherine Tait, the public broadcaster — which received $1.1 billion in federal cash last year — aims to do the opposite. It plans to continue to use that billion-a-year public slush fund to grab more advertising dollars and build a digital machine that will make it even more difficult for its private media competitors to transition to a digital environment.

From the Globe’s report, it is clear the Tait strategy is to use the CBC’s public-funding base to convert the subsidized organization — which gets about 80 per cent of its total revenue from Ottawa — into a larger and more dominant player in Canadian media. Tait promised “a renewed commitment to growing commercial revenue. We want to be the masters of our own destiny, and reinvest in more great Canadian news and programming. And you are all key to this shared future.”

Barbara Williams, CBC/Radio-Canada’s new executive vice-president of English services, brought The National’s four anchors out on stage, where they apparently engaged in a little chatter. Williams asked Hanamansing (who is based in Vancouver) about The National’s ratings in Vancouver. His response was that sometimes The National beats the local viewership of CTV National News. Sometimes?