Before this year, Super Bowl commercials were blocked in Canada by a practice called simultaneous substitution, which aims to protect Canadian broadcasters while allowing TV viewers to watch U.S.-based channels. When programs are shown at the same time on both Canadian and U.S. outlets, the Canadian broadcaster gets to substitute its ads for U.S. ads on the American feed.

So a Canadian tuning in to CBS to see the Super Bowl 50 last year didn’t see the glitzy ads from U.S. advertisers, but rather more mundane fare from the likes of Bank of Montreal and the Loblaws supermarket chain. That has angered Canadians, who have been forced to go to YouTube if they wanted to get a look at the most talked about Super Bowl ads.

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But this year, Canada’s broadcast regulator will change the 40-year-regulations to allow American Super Bowl ads to air, saying it's for the sake of consumer choice. While fans are happy — Hirsch-Allen knows his wife and other Super Bowl guests “seem to care much more about the commercials” — the decision has infuriated the National Football League and Bell Media, the parent of Canada’s largest broadcaster, CTV, which have banded together with Canadian ad agencies and the creative community to cry foul. Backed by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), there are even calls for the government of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to override the decision by the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission and reinstitute the ban on Super Bowl ads.

Michael Geist, a law professor specializing in Internet and e-commerce at the University of Ottawa, says that the idea of simultaneous substitution is increasingly irrelevant in a world of specialty channels, recording devices and live streaming. He thinks the Super Bowl decision is “a kind of toe in the water” that may eventually lead to the end of the substitution practice entirely.

That would be bad news for Canadian broadcasters. Simultaneous substitution of ads is worth an estimated $250 million (Canadian) a year to the broadcasters, who build their programming around access to popular U.S. series and sports events. The Super Bowl is the most watched broadcast in the country; last year, 8.3 million Canadians watched the Super Bowl in English and French while only 3.9 million tuned into the most recent Grey Cup, the championship game of the Canadian Football League.

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In turn, broadcasters are supposed to use some of that ad revenue to invest in Canadian programming.

The NFL is livid at the Super Bowl ad change. It says it sold the rights to its schedule, including the Super Bowl, to CTV under one set of rules and now finds those regulations changed midstream. The league also complains it’s been unfairly singled out, with no other program aside from the Super Bowl affected. “It’s random, arbitrary and pretty harmful,” said Jocelyn Moore, the NFL’s senior vice president of public policy and government affairs. “We’re just asking for a fair shake.”

It's clear the NFL doesn't like the prospect of lower ad revenue for the broadcast. When U.S. broadcasters bid for rights to the Super Bowl, they don't typically pay for access for Canadian viewers. So when Audi, Honda or Skittles buy ads for this year’s game on Fox, they will effectively be getting free access to millions of Canadian consumers.

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