Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - 12:36: Toronto Mike'd #210

Episode Date: December 27, 2016

Mike chats with Marc Weisblott of 12:36 about the current state of the media in Canada.

Welcome to episode 210 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a local independent brewery producing fresh craft beer. And Chef's Plate, delivering delicious and locally sourced farm fresh ingredients in refrigerated kits directly to your door. fresh ingredients, and refrigerated kits directly to your door. I'm Mike from TorontoMike.com, and joining me this week is 1236 newsletter doctor Mark Weisblatt. Welcome back, Mark. Hey, Merry Christmas, Mike.

Merry Christmas. Happy Hanukkah to you. For the first time since 1978, these have lined up. We can celebrate together. Joy to the world. That's right. And making it back here for, what, my fifth time in the Toronto Mike basement bunker. This is number five for you. So it's like, remember that Saturday Night Live sketch when Tom Hanks came back for number five,

and he got in the club or whatever, and they gave him the jacket? So you get nothing of the sort, but I will give you more beer, but more on that soon. I just got word. I know you were on Twitter as you made your way to New Toronto, but the princess has passed. This is a big deal for guys our age, that the princess has passed away at the age of 60.

Carrie Fisher. And everybody wants to chime in whenever a celebrity dies, which has been, what, a daily occurrence here in 2016? Seems like it. You always have to make sure you burnish your personal brand a little bit by making sure the world knows that you, too, are mourning for the latest celebrity to leave this mortal coil. You're absolutely right.

Do you have a Carrie Fisher story? Any Carrie Fisher anecdotes you have? Because if you don't, you're going to miss out. This is the moment. What do you got, Mike? I mean, you got anything? Here's what I got. You were a Star Wars guy growing up, I guess.

Like many children of the 70s and 80s, every birthday party I went to for a period of time included a couple of things. A rented VCR, because people didn't know these things. So a rented VCR and a copy of Star Wars, many in a row. It became an ongoing joke. I'd go to a birthday party, they'd have the VCR they rented, and they'd play Star Wars.

I saw that movie at so many birthday parties in the late 70s and early 80s. Well, here we are in the holiday season stupor, and of course, I can't help but keep scanning social media, seeing what's going on. And it's a good time of year to keep some distance from everything that's happening in the world. But people cannot help themselves, can they? It's like, you know, take a few days off.

Like, put the phone down and stop despairing about the state of the world. And it seems like the usual suspects out there just can't bring themselves to that point. And look at me. I'm sitting right here today, interrupting my vacation to talk to you about all the wild and wacky things going on. So I don't know if we're better than anybody else.

For those wondering, you and I have organized this episode. So we actually have like four distinct categories we're going to update everybody on. We have number one, radio, then we have television, then we have journalism, and then we have what I call the digital

part of the program. So this is a well, we put a lot of thought into this. We're going to cover a lot of ground. People will be better off for having listened to this episode. 210. Toronto Mike's survey respondents say that some of them want me here and

some of them don't. I've got to deliver. I've got to bring it for the people that actually think I'm okay. Yeah, so I when Elvis was on, was that last episode? Yes, it was. We talked about that. He appeared on quite a few worst lists.

Like, I don't like this guy. You are on a lot of best of lists. Some people love you. Some people strongly dislike you. I don't know what they could possibly dislike. You educate me. And I have my ear to the ground. I'm a savvy guy.

I'm following a lot of stuff. I learn so much from you. And to the guy in the survey who doesn't like your voice, you have the voice I wish I had. What character in that voice? Doing what I can here, Mike. At the same time, look, we've just lost George Michael. Christmas Day.

Died at 53. Yes. And I think when it comes to unifying forces in the popular culture, he was a big one. I think, you know, people comparing it to David Bowie and Prince when they died earlier this year. But George Michael was like a mass mainstream figure. Pop star. Yeah. There was nothing obscure about him, if you were around at the peak of his fame

when that Faith album came out. When that Faith video was on high rotation, right? Absolutely everywhere. So I think this is a distinct kind of musical death in that people in a certain demographic can relate. And at the same time, radio stations that were in their Christmas Day programming mode, autopilot, voice tracking, no one there watching the board. Everything's automated these days.

I'm glad you mentioned this because I'm driving home Christmas night and I'm actually, I'm going to tell you you I know my uh you heard that last episode with Elvis right so you heard organically we had we played I played Last Christmas so suddenly we start talking about and I played it back after hearing about George Michael's death it's kind of almost eerie but we start talking about Make It Big which was a really important album in my life when I was discovering Top 40. And then we talked about the Faith album. And I think I remarked like every song on that album is like a hit. It was a hit-laden album and it was everywhere.

And then Elvis is talking about how he discovered Wham later. And I said, I didn't, but I discovered them early. And they were great back in like the mid-80s or whatnot. But this guy had the faith, I guess, as we talked in a previous episode about how much music emerges from the ashes of like 10 50 this guy had the face for mtv slash much music handsome as all hell and he had that perma five o'clock shadow i don't know how he did it but he just looked freaking cool and yeah so i'm driving sorry i'm off on a tangent here, but I'm driving home Christmas night and I'm flipping to the stations

I think might actually play like some. I want to hear some Wham or George Michael and some stories and stuff. I couldn't find it. I went to Boom, nothing of the sort. Like they're playing everything, but I went to see if Q107 might do it. I tried 104.5.

I went to the usual suspects, nothing. And then you're right. It's because it's all automated and pre-programmed and you can't turn on a dime on Christmas Day. There's nobody in the freaking building probably. Even Chum FM, which would be the biggest station in Toronto for the George Michael fan faithful, at least as of Tuesday morning. So this is December 27th. You'd think everybody's back to work and back to normal. And they were still running canned programming. I think it's because we got to get the stat day for Christmas,

but we need the stat day for Boxing Day. So you can argue Monday and Tuesday are like the, in lieu of it being a weekend, these are your days off. And then everyone comes back on Wednesday. Well, look, I mean, it's not that long ago in the dark ages of Ontario when Sunday shopping was still outlawed. Boxing Day sales were not actually on Boxing Day, right? You had to hang out and cool your heels. And the fur guy would take that big fine every year.

Who was the fur guy? Paul Magder. Right. Who would take that big fine every year? Who was the fur guy? Paul Magder. Right. One year, 1987, there was a photo on Reddit, courtesy of the Toronto Public Library. It showed a lineup outside, same the record man, and A&As around Young and Gould from 1987.

Something seemed a little curious about the caption on the photo. It mentioned the stores weren't opening until 11 o'clock that morning and i thought well that's a little uncharacteristic for boxing day it turned out that year the boxing day sales were on sunday because the 26 was on saturday so there was a loophole in the law where they were allowed to open sunday uh at time, this was scandalous by the standards of the city and province and jurisdiction that you would allow for Sunday shopping. And the reason they got to do it was because the 26th, a stat holiday, was on the Saturday.

So that year was the big breakthrough where Sunday shopping was finally allowed. We were liberated, but not before 11 in the morning, not until after church. I remember on City TV, they talked to the fur guy, Madger? Magder, yeah. On Spadina. And I remember it was always like,

well, the fine is a lot less than the money he's making that day, so he pays the fine, but it's almost ludicrous to think how recent that was, where you had to shut down Boxing Day and on Sundays and all this. But here, I'm playing the song. When I hear this song, I almost want to get up and slow dance with you. It's like a Pavlovian response. Don't get excited, because I'm not going to do it, but I feel like it because in grade school, primary school, we called it, this is one of the songs they would play,

like grade five, grade six, and then you would get the guys and girls to slow dance. This was one of the staples when I was in primary school. It's a big deal, Careless Whisper. And that sax solo. Anyways, George Michael. I actually do have a message from Elvis because we talked about

George Michael last episode. He said this is only the second time in his life that he has cried over a celebrity death. The first being Prince. So either he's getting more emotional as he ages, you know what I mean?

Like that can't be a coincidence, right? The floodgates are open. But he cried when he learned of George Michael. Elvis, hope you're feeling better. A topic of conversation at Christmas dinner with my family is, is Elvis depressed? Based on his Ted Kaczynski-esque beard he now sports. Is he wearing that?

Elvis would be happy to know he came up at the dinner table. Like, what's going on with Elvis? What's up with that beard? So I don't know if you saw that photo. Okay, well, my main motivation in getting here today was to dispute something that Elvis said on the last episode. And sitting down with you here, he had to get this all out

in the open about how ridiculous he felt it was that you were obsessing over this song playing in the background. He, I think to quote him, he said, it's not a story, it's just some guy whose dad was on Electric Circus, I think is how he worded it.

So other than the elvis episode and this elvis this episode where i'm sort of talking about it sort of meta or whatever the only two episodes i ever talked about dalton pompey's father on electric circus was the chris zelkovich episode which was right after dwight drummond and i had to update everybody with this exciting news and then i brought it up briefly to bob Bob Elliott, which it was like two minutes in a two hour episode. It was, you know, heartily. And it was kind of relevant because Bob Elliott is like the

Canada baseball Blue Jay guy. Like, that's the story he needs to know. But here, here it is. I am of the opinion, you're going to be the tiebreaker here, so I am of the opinion this is absolutely a story. Like, it brings together an active Toronto Blue Jay

and the most beloved electric circus dancer of the late 80s and early 90s. To me, it's amazing that this story is true, and it is. Elvis just doesn't seem to get it. What do you think of it? Okay, so that's why I'm here today. I came stomping all the way across town to take issue with how little Elvis felt about this story. I think you would have to remember that the cowboy from Electric Circus was once a big deal.

Right? I mean, this was like a weekend afternoon ritual watching Electric Circus. They still shot it during the daytime. Do you remember this? It was on, I think, 3.30. Yeah, absolutely, yeah. Saturday afternoon. They would repeat the same show again on Sunday.

And they had a whole cast of characters, right? I mean, it was like a whole whack pack in the Electric Circus universe of all the dancers on the show. And as you watch things unfold over the months and the years, you would get to know who all these people were. They all became like D-list Toronto celebrities. And as they started to get attention in different fields, maybe they'd be like an extra in a movie or brought in for a fashion shoot somewhere, they would always update on what was going on

in the personal lives of the electric circus dancers. The cowboy might have been the most famous one of all because not only was he on the show, they would use him in promos that they would run all the time. Keep in mind, this is like the 30-channel universe of the late 80s, early 90s in Toronto. If somebody was on TV regularly, a lot of people saw them. I mean, that was enough to be known and recognized. And even in Toronto back in the day, you could call yourself a famous person. So the fact that the electric circus cowboy

went on to make his own 12-inch single and that a quarter century went by where nobody gave it any thought. Right. I was on top of what was happening with the pop culture. I think I remember hearing this on the radio, Energy 108. If it wasn't 108, it would have been AM640 when they were doing dance music.

And you hear the song, and it just takes you back to a certain time and place. The style of the song, right? You've got Deborah Cox doing the backing vocals. It's a complete ripoff of the CNC Music Factory? You've got Deborah Cox doing the backing vocals. It's a complete rip-off of the CNC Music Factory, if you remember that. There's like two more... Strike it up!

That was Black Box. Same vocalist, same style. All this sort of Euro house style. And there are two or even maybe three distinct songs that they were plagiarizing for this tune, this Summertime, Summertime. And you just know that their high hopes were riding on the fact that this could get airplay on the radio stations, Canadian content, everything else.

It's just a symbol of where things were at with pop culture in this city in the early 90s, all wrapped up in this one awful summertime, summertime song. And, you know, the fact that this was by the Electric Circus Cowboy, the fact that the Electric Circus Cowboy went on to be the father of a Toronto Blue Jay. Amazing. Thank you. Perfect Toronto Mike story. I'm going to cut this out and send it via email to Elvis because he doesn't listen to many episodes. I asked him if he had ever heard a Mark Weisblot episode and he said no, although he subscribes to 1236, which is important. He does subscribe and he loves it. Okay, that's a start. So I was really excited that day when you broke the story of Kendrick Pompeii, the electric circus dancer, when you had the MP3 of his song, right? That was like a real crowdsourced, hive mind, Toronto mic experience. Thank you.

And I put out the newsletter that day with the subject line, my father, the Electric Circus Dancer. So Elvis is wrong, and I think you nailed it. And I agree. By the way, I've had conversations with Monica D'Ole since this discovery, and she says she's asked all the time about the cowboy. To this day, she's still being asked about the cowboy dancer at Electric Circus. And you had, what, 30, 000 spins of the screen yeah and i haven't checked in in a while but yeah people people i

think the people who like the story so if you have some kind of nostalgia for electric circus and you have some appreciation for the fact that dalton pompey is a toronto blue jay who hopefully makes the team out of spring training this year all if you're that person who gets the story, you love this story. People have tweeted at me, peak Toronto story of the year. When you dig the story, you really dig it. And if you don't get it, like Elvis, it's just a guy whose dad was on electric circus. He often does because he has very poor taste. He completely missed the boat on this one.

as he often does because he has very poor taste. He completely missed the boat on this one. And Canadian music back then was really slow to catch up with the trends, right? People look today at Drake and his whole OVO sound universe, and they think this city was always with it when it came to musical trends. But back around the day of Electric Circus, there weren't really any Canadian rappers.

I mean, your friend Maestro. Dream Warriors. He made a bit of a breakthrough. Dream Warriors, they're having a reunion tour this spring. So there'll be a lot of nostalgia for that coming up in a few weeks. I'm sure the media will be all over that one. It's irresistible. But beyond that,

there wasn't much by way of rap. And if you were a rapper, you were categorized as being in the dance music industry. So it was still very embryonic compared to what it became in subsequent decades. When Cardinal kind of kicks it up a notch, But you're right, yeah. And so this is what it was, to try and be a star. How do we turn the electric circus cowboy into a celebrity, right? You could imagine all the fervored conversations and meetings and strategy sessions about how they were going to sell this guy, Kay Pompei, as the next big Canadian pop artist. And it didn't work. And I guess he had to go and get a real job, didn't he?

I mean, he had to support his kids somehow. Yeah, absolutely. Baseball camps are expensive when you're good. So I'm glad it all worked out for him. And the prospect that his son will not only make the Jays next season, but use this as his walk-up music. Thanks to Toronto Mike. I think you have yet to reach full validation for the effort you put in on this story. That'll be the next domino to fall.

So I'm going to, you know, I will update people as things change. For example, I had Denise Donlan here. It would have been appropriate, I think, to talk about Electric Circus. It's all happening at this 299. But I decided to skip any reference to Electric Circus just to avoid the backlash. So when I have something to report, I will. I'm going to try to get Dalton Pompei in here. will. I'm going to try to get Dalton Pompey in here, and I'm really, really eager to get this summertime, summertime as his walk-up music at the Dome. And when I hear that plane in the background as he comes to the plate in April, then I'll know I've done my job.

It's going to be the best branding this podcast could ever ask for. Speaking of topics that people are sick and tired of hearing about, are we going to update on Ann Romer here? Yes, I have a very fresh note from a CP24 viewer. In the TV part of this episode, we're going to definitely talk Ann Romer. Some people want me to stop talking about Ann Romer, and I have lessened my Ann Romer talk, but there will be an update in this episode for sure.

I would not be sitting here if for some reason there was an embargo on being able to talk about Ann Romer. I even thought about the idea of getting like a cupcake decorated, a happy third retirement Ann Romer, bring it over here. But it seemed like a lot of effort for an audio bit. Based on the email I'm going to read, or sorry, as a comment on my blog, torontomic.com, I'm going to read, she's not retiring anytime soon, so let me, we'll get to that though. Okay, hold my breath.

Hold your breath. On the Ann Romer front. Patreon.com slash torontomic is where people can go to help crowdfund this project, which, can I share with the audience what you said to me before we began recording? I'm doing it anyway, that you mentioned that you think maybe,

I don't know, in the zeitgeist, maybe there was a corner turned for Toronto Mic'd or something to that effect. I don't want to put words in your mouth, but it seems to have gathered some steam. Yeah, I think you made the transition this fall from being a podcast with familiar guests from Toronto media that people would listen to depending on whether or not they were interested in the guest to a recognition, realization that this podcast is great no matter who is sitting in this chair with you and that, you know, by being here episode after episode, week after week, that there's a continuum here, that there is a story that's unfolding.

Some familiarity and threads throughout. The experience of Toronto Mike, a guy in New Toronto who does a podcast in his basement. And I think at this point, you have a listenership that's paying attention no matter what's going on here, episode after episode. That's the sense I'm getting. It helps that you also have the comment section, that you did that feedback form. How many responses did you get? Was it 180, I think, last I checked?

There you go. That's 180 people who have been paying attention to the story that's unfolding on this podcast. So, yeah, it's terrific. It's amazing. I'm not going to say this started happening with me becoming a regular on the show, but coincidentally, it might have had something to do with it. There are no coincidences. Thank you very much.

This is episode number five for you. I think other than people like Elvis, you're the first guest to have five appearances. This is a new watershed moment. Five-timers club. That's right. And by the way, not in front of you because it's down the floor over there, but there is a six-pack of Great Lakes beer

waiting for you there. I thought you were coming at three and you knocked at the door at like 1.40. You can see I'm in disarray here. I've got the playpen thing here but I wasn't quite ready for you. But that beer is going home with you today. Great Lakes beer. And you don't drink

a lot but I guess five appearances you've had quite a bit of Great Lakes beer. Yeah, I could talk at length about all the flavors if they were listed in front of me, and I could remember which was which. Well, what's your favorite flavor? Well, which is your favorite?

Come on, everyone knows it's the octopus wants to fight. That's my favorite, and I told my buddy there that we got to get brewing that one again. That comes around like a seasonal IPA thing that disappears just when they get you addicted, but it's coming back. Octopus Wants to Fight. That's my favorite. Okay.

So, yeah, Great Lakes Brewery, the preferred beer at 1236 headquarters, if only because it's pretty much the only beer I've had in my fridge all year, thanks to coming by Toronto Mike. I'm doing the math, okay? Five visits, at least six beer each time. So, yeah, you've had at least 30 beer in 2016, which would be a new high. There you go.

We've done our job. Chef's Plate. You, my friend, are going to get yourself two free meals out of this appearance. This is why I think you've come five times. Beer and food and Ann Romer updates. Visit chefsplate.com, everybody, and use the promo code TRONOMIKE, and you get your first two plates for free. Mark, you're going to let me know your two favorite meals from the link I send you after this recording, and then we're going to ship that

off to you. Again, Chef's Plate delivers pre-portioned, locally sourced, farm-fresh ingredients and easy-to-follow recipes in refrigerated kits directly to your door. It's very, very easy. Give it a try, and you'll see for yourself. All right, we're going to start with radio. I love radio. You love radio.

Let's talk radio. We lost a local... I now want to call him a local radio legend because the outpouring of comments since I wrote about his passing has been quite impressive. But Scruff Connors

passed away. How old was Scruff when he passed away? 64 years old. And I mean, you'd say, oh, that's young. And it is young, except that it was like a decade ago it was reported he had died, right? Like in some forums. Yeah, 2008. And it turned out, no, his health was suffering at the time.

But in the same report, it mentioned that he just won $100,000 in the 649. Right. And then I know his son has entered the industry of radio since then, TJ. So TJ Connors, because I know TJ Connors was working briefly in Peterborough when Freddie P. was the program director. And I know that he was doing mornings there. And then I think there was a big upheaval there. But I think he's out in like, I want to say he's in Manitoba, but I'm not 100% sure.

Do you know where TJ is? Kamloops, BC.C., right? Close enough, right? Working as a morning host and program director of a country music station out there. But Scruff being 64, I guess you would categorize him as a middle-aged boomer. But the era in which he came to prominence in Toronto radio, I think was a whole different generation than the one that we relate to. He was on Q107 from 1980 to 85.

And that was kind of the glory days for a certain kind of raunchy, ribald, ridiculous style of morning radio with a lot of prank calls and double entendres and the whole idea of a personality on the air who would just come on and act like a buffoon, right? No real redeeming social qualities to what he had to say. He was unapologetic about that. There wasn't,

as far as I can recall, a lot of discussion of news or current events or what was happening in politics. That wasn't really his bag. He had Gene Volitis in there as a straight man, as the newscaster. But the role of somebody like Scruff was just to be that kind of circus clown. And based on the recollection that people have of him, and this is over 30 years since he left that

stint on Q107, they brought him back a couple of times later. Right, like he joined Gallagher on the Q Morning Zoo, right? This is like early 90s, am I in the wrong era? Yeah, 93, 94. He had a bit of a rough ride through those years. He ended up being recruited to Philadelphia, right? He left Q107 to go to the USA. And I'm sure it was an offer that he could not refuse. That, you know, here was an American rock station. This was everything that, you know, small town Canadian guy could

have dreamed of, that he hit the big time. And it only lasted about a year. They ended up replacing him with Howard Stern. That was the first syndication of the Stern show when it went from New York to Philadelphia. So from there, Scruff came back to this area. He worked at Hits FM in St. Catharines when that format first started going.

And Kristi Knight, by the way, left a very nice note on the same entry I'm referring to earlier on TorontoMike.com. I wrote about it. Apparently when you Google, like, Scruff Connor's dead, I'm like number one or something. So I've had a lot of people coming in and sharing their memories and everything, including Kristi Knight. And in St.

Catherine's, that was the New Kids on the Block prank. And you can read about that online. I'm pretty sure it's in his Wikipedia entry, right, where he announced on the station that the new kids were coming. And hundreds of these screaming tweenage girls all crowded outside the White House, Hits FM in St. Catharines, even though the station would never play New Kids on the Block, right? Totally different format. But all it took back at the time was him to go on the air

and repeatedly mention that the new kids were going to be at the station. And once the crowd showed up outside, a bunch of limos pulled up, and five mothers walked in with their newborns, the new kids. You see? You get it? This was a style of humor. He got fired for giving away tickets to Miami

to watch the Super Bowl. It turns out it was Miami, Manitoba. He was in Winnipeg after St. Catharines, helping launch a station over there. Yeah, same sort of joke. When you talk about this stuff in retrospect, maybe it's not as funny as it was at the time, but that was a style of humor. Right, right, right.

They brought him back to Q107. He had some personal problems. Sure. There was some criminal charges in Winnipeg, and he ended up being acquitted. But maybe the personal situation took a bit of a toll on him. And when they brought him back to Q107 to try and save the morning show in 1993, 1994, he had a problem with punctuality.

And they had a whole Q morning zoo crew in with him. And one of the recurring bits was the fact that he couldn't wake up in time. And they would sit there and do the show with him on the phone on his way into the radio station. And I mean, this is, you know, mildly amusing. But unfortunately, I think it also reflected somebody who was having a hard time and really couldn't regain the prominence that they had in the industry. regain the prominence that they had in the industry.

A lot of that had to do with the fact that his style of humor had gotten a little out of fashion. Trying to be generous about how I describe it, right? I mean, this was early 80s Toronto. There wasn't the same tolerance for our differences as there is today. If you hear the air checks that he did at the time, you know, a lot of the humor was taking cheap shots at people's accents, at their sexual orientation, that maybe they had interests that were a little bit beyond the Labatt's 50 beer and Cravenay cigarettes. I mean, the blue-collar universe that he was playing to, the suburban Toronto thing of the early 1980s, is really what people connected Scruff Connors to.

is really what people connected Scruff Connors to. So the fact that you didn't hear a lot from him or a lot about him in the 21st century was a reflection of the fact that he made his name, he made his mark, he made his impact at a certain point in time. I noticed in the comments, like I said, there's dozens and dozens of people who come in to share their memories of Scruff. I was actually surprised how many people, like, I mean, he's dozens and dozens of people who come in to share their memories of Scroff.

I was actually surprised how many people, like, I mean, he's a popular guy. I miss the early 80s stuff completely. But people just loved him, according to, you know, these comments, people who wanted to share their well wishes and stuff. And he got a lot of credit in the comments for Chicken Man and The Champ, okay? Now, Chicken Man, which I listened to some of that in the early 90s, too, when Q had syndicated, but that was like a 1960s serial that you just syndicated. It had nothing

to do with Scruff Connors, Chicken Man. These are like packaged, syndicated things you'd play on your show or whatever. And The Champ was, as discussed in great lengths, especially when Steve Anthony was on the show, The Champ was a brother Jake Edwards, who came after, I want to say he came after.

He came before and after. Right, right. So I just thought it was interesting that, hey, I loved Scruff Connors. I loved his Chicken Man and the Champ. And then at some point after like 80 of these entries, I decided to chime in delicately to say, Scruff was great, he'll be missed. But Chicken Man was these guys

and uh the champ was brother jake but but beat the baloney right that was pure scruff that was scruff beat the baloney was scruff connors and by the way people might remember him from mojo radio he was like on a day one or when mojo launched uh in 2000 maybe does that sound about right to you? Around 2000? 2001. Yeah, somebody realized he could use the work and gave him the opportunity. Look, I mean, so many people want to be recognized and known to make a creative impact. So you can't dispute that this guy, Scruff Connors, managed to do that. The fact that there is no mainstream media attention when somebody like that dies, right? The fact that there is no newspaper obituary for a character like him, maybe that's symptomatic about how much time has passed,

that the institutional memory is not what it used to be. At the same time, Toronto Mike, dozens of comments with fond memories of Scruff, and John Derringer on Q107 gave him a tribute. And one of the things that he brought up in talking about Scruff was the fact that you only meet so many people in your life who not only talk about doing outrageous things, but actually follow through on them. And here was the culture, and Derringer mentioned there were no HR departments at radio stations back then, right? There were no harassment policies. The law was a little loose when it came to a lot of different things, and he was able to exploit all of that. And now that, you know, all the radio stations have that, is that the reason?

So one of the things that struck me was everybody was honoring this guy. What a great personality and how he'll be missed that he passed away so young. But, like, he hasn't worked in 15 years, right? This is a guy, I don't, did he work post-Mojo? That was basically it for Scruff on the airwaves. Yeah, I think that was the last we heard of him because he built this reputation as this rude and raunchy character. I don't think the transition to be some kind of managerial type

was really in the cards for him. But look, he made a creative impact when he did, and certainly not the first and won't be the last personality here in Toronto to have made an impact with a whole generation. And then when it comes to the end of their life, maybe not getting the respect that people thought that they deserved. I mean, Uncle Bobby, right, from CFTO, Channel 9, he also had a rough time of it. And his style of entertainment was the polar opposite of scruff. And I don't think it ended well for him. And I don't think it ended well for him.

And you know what? It's too bad because a lot of people made a lot of money off of these personalities, these characters, right? I mean, he built up the reputation of a radio station that went on to be worth hundreds of millions of dollars, entire broadcast media empires built on the backs of personalities like these. And at a certain point, if there's no demand anymore for what you're doing, it's happened way too many times, right, that you just get kind of kicked to the curb and there's no dividend, there's no reward, there's no retirement plan under these circumstances. So an interesting life and I think a great character in the history of Toronto media, Scruff Connors. Josie Dye, a former Toronto Mic'd guest, Josie Dye is how we're supposed to introduce her. She up and quit her gig at 102.1 The Edge.

And although, and I had chats with her, like, telling her where I think she's going, and then she nicely telling me that she's not allowed to say, but is it fair to... You know, I'm playing this because Indie,

you actually tweeted a link to Indie 88's, their 88 best songs of 2016. What are you playing this for? Haven't we heard this song enough? Gosh. And this was number one to no one's surprise. And I'm surprised it wasn't number two, three, four, five, all the way down to 86, 87, 88 of the year.

They probably play this one six or seven times a day through the entire year. I looked up when it was released. The original single album was Summer 2015, and the video came out last January. So it's been in circulation for all the past 12 months,

and they just played this thing to death. I mean, this is like a radio station's theme song. Do you like this tune? Is this something you would listen to of your own volition? No, I wouldn't. But when I hear it, I don't dislike it. It's a pleasant little indie-sounding song. It sounds like it belongs on Indie 88, actually.

It's a nice little song. Nothing I would go out of my way to put on my playlist. It's a terrific anthem of white privilege, right? It's better than the Lumineers. We can blast it in Trinity, Bellwoods Park,

and celebrate our similarities. So to tie these Josie Dye and Indie 88 together, Josie Dye quit 102.1 because she's going to very soon appear on Indie 88. Yeah, you think so? As a new morning show host? If you put on Facebook, I'll see you up the dial, down the dial. Wait, did she say up or down?

That's down the dial. I guess up the dial would be correct. Baby, if you ever wondered, I'm living on the air. Yeah, up and down the aisle. Okay, yeah, so up would be like, yeah, 107's up there, but she went down the aisle to 88.1. She is dead. This ties in nicely with the next radio story that we should cover,

which is that Raina, and we're going back a bit, so it's not heartbreaking news here, but Raina quit 88.1. She was doing the mornings there. She quit because she took a job at CBC Radio 2, which was vacant because Tom Power is now the host of Q because they said goodbye

to Shad. Do I got all that right? And then Gian Gomeshi before that. The dominoes start falling with Gian Gomeshi's downfall. It's all Gomeshi before that. So the dominoes start falling with Gian Gomeshi's downfall. It's all Gomeshi, right. Denise Donlan knew nothing about the Gomeshi stuff. I put her on the hot seat.

I stared into her eyes. She said she had no clue. Okay, so they gave Reina this Indy 88 morning show. Right. And she was on the radar at the CBC. I mean, obviously she was. And she was on the radar at the CBC. I mean, obviously she was.

And they recruited her after just a few months to handle the Radio 2 Morning national show, which is a lot different from what she was doing on Indie 88. And I think I've read more than a few complaints on TorontoMike.com, maybe, about how her style is different. Right, but commenters, I should point out, not me, because I haven't actually listened yet. So you've listened. Yeah, that's the gig. What do you think? Well, I mean, I think the CBC Radio 2 style could benefit

from being a lot liver and looser than it currently is, but that's what they settled upon as a presentation approach, and as far as I can tell, she's doing a great job of it, but you And that's what they settled upon as a presentation approach. And as far as I can tell, she's doing a great job of it. But you don't hear a lot of that off-the-cuff random banter, right? We listen to the radio wanting to hear those unexpected moments.

She's quirky. Like, I remember when she sat in that seat. Raina's been on the show as well. And she's a quirky young woman. You know what I mean by quirky? It's kind of part of her allure, and she wins. Whenever you do a Now Toronto Best Radio DJ,

Reina is your go-to winner, unless you're going to do some kind of a Matt Galloway thing or whatever. Reina is your music personality. Well, they're trying to emphasize the fact that they've got this very specific music sound, right? CBC Radio 2, this goes back 10 years already, they had to go through a rebranding

process to start playing pop music, singer-songwriters in the morning show, and it was a big transition from years of light classical music, maybe some jazzy stuff in there. But here we are, like 10 years later, and I'm not sure it's where it needs to be. be. Personally, I would vote for a different type of approach in the morning with more than one voice in there. But who am I to say I'm rooting for Raina to pull this off and bring it into

directions that it hasn't been taken before? I think most Torontonians are unaware of where on the dial they would go to find, like they wouldn't know if it's up or down the dial. Like, where is CBC Radio 2 on their dial? I don't think, I don't think, I think most Torontonians would be unaware. Maybe they stream it on the internet, but I don't think they know where to find it. They've got a bigger strategy, cbcmusic.ca. Q with Tom Power is also now part of that fold. Right. And I think they generate now part of that fold. Right.

And I think they generate a lot of great stuff. And, yeah, for something that's a national public broadcaster, even by CBC standards, it has a long way to go to be recognized compared to where it could be. So I think that's a challenge for them. So bringing somebody in who had those commercial radio chops, that might have been a signal that they want to move in that direction. But right now what you're hearing there is pretty straightforward and extremely scheduled. And the opportunity for going off script

does not seem to be there. Maybe we'll see that in 2017. As we speak, Erin Davis is living by the Pacific Ocean near mountains. She's in British Columbia. Yeah, really? She called you to tell you? I saw it on Twitter.

You know what? We're almost there. I'm waiting for that phone call and Aaron Davis is on the display. But I saw her tweets about it. She's there now in BC. She had her last show from Casa Loma. We're going back maybe a couple of weeks

now. And the worst kept secret, in fact, I'm sure it's been confirmed by everybody, including CHFI, but Maureen Holloway quit her Q107 gig so she could take Aaron Davis' spot on CHFI and co-host with Darren B. Lamb. So there's a lot of interesting kind of, you know, crossing the parking lot stuff going on in Toronto radio right now. Yeah, Maureen Holloway's been around for 30 years in the Toronto Radio scene.

Is that right? Yeah, did you know that? Well, I know she used to come in, like, almost like telephone, through ISDN lines or something and appear on, like, Derringer's show and stuff. I don't think it was 30 years ago, but I know she's been doing that for quite some time. She was part of 99.9 CKFM as it served as the mix through the 1990s.

All those DJs with the wacky names. Remember the Rob Christie morning show? And guys with names like Schmilson Wilson and Griff Henderson and Punch Andrews. The late Punch Andrews. who died a few years ago. And another one who passed away, 2016, was Catfish Morgan. Remember him? I know, but I— Andre Maiseneuve. I know he went to, like, Ottawa, right?

Yeah, and he died earlier this year. So Maureen Holloway was not only part of that Mix 99.9 through the 90s. She goes back to when CKFM was basically like an easy listening station. So I don't know if this is in your memory bank. The sound of our Toronto, 99.9 CKFM. I know because my friend Humble Howard was the first person ever to say Mix 99.9 on the radio because he was doing mornings when the switch happened.

So I know that this happened in like 1990. I have no familiarity with 99.9 before 1990. Going back to the 60s, 70s, 80s, it was like a Toronto Rat Pack of on-air announcers.

Names like Carl Bannis, Russ Thompson, Don Daynard, right? He was the morning guy on this station. What happened was the station changed hands. Gary Slate, Standard Broadcasting, Slate family, ended up buying it in the mid-1980s. It was owned by Comrade Black for a few years up until then. So the station had this well-defined reputation that was really stuck in the past. And I loved listening to it. I mean, Carl Bannis, he would come on at night.

He would offer these audio sketches of things that were happening around the city. So this format started to sound a little long in the tooth by the mid-80s. They brought in a bunch of young women to make these guys sound hipper, make them start seeming a little more with it, where they brought in these side sidekicks and one of them was Maureen Holloway and the other one was Danny Elwell. And suddenly it was like they wanted to liven up the sound of the station. So you'd have all these

guys on the air who were like 55, 60 years old. Everybody sounded older back then. They might have even still been in their 40s some of them. And the whole idea was to bring in these bubbly young women who would talk about what was going on in Toronto. It was an interesting culture clash that was happening. Eventually, all the old guys got swept out of there.

They all moved over to 97.3. Right, easy ride. Easy listening, yeah. They all moved over to 97.3. Right, easy back. Easy listening, yeah. And the early days of that, the candlelight and wine style of radio, I mean, that was CHFI. But that was the thing.

The whole idea that, you know, audiophiles and connoisseurs of middle-brow culture would all converge around one radio station. CKFM used to be it in the city in Toronto. You always teach me something. I'm telling you, this is why you'll be coming back a sixth time, because I always learn something from you. So I remember hearing Maureen Holloway back then. I mean, I was like 12, 13 years old, and I was obsessed with this radio station, CKFM. So that's how far back I remember her. The fact that she's now got this big chair on CHFI, it seems like a fulfillment of everything that she was working towards for all of these years.

She's inheriting a massive audience, right? This is a very successful... I mean, Erin Davis has been the fixture there because we all know what happened when Julie Adam fired her and then she went off to do Easy Rock and then she came back because the audience wanted their Aaron Davis back. And Aaron's been there with,

you mentioned Don Daynard. She was there with Don Daynard forever and then made the transition to Mike Cooper. When she came back, she brought Mike Cooper with her and you know, that went a long time. Mike only retired last year, right?

Is that 2015 or 2016? What a year okay and then darren b lamb who came in from the uh from 104.5 chum fm because it was uh roger darren and maryland and they so it's another example of leaving there to go down the dial and then uh darren b lamb and aaron davis seemed to be you know picking up picking up where Mike Cooper and Aaron Davis left off. And then this is kind of, to me, I was surprised when Aaron Davis announced her retirement because she's relatively young and doing very well. But it makes sense in retrospective when you look at what happened in her personal life and you look at it all. It does, you know, it makes complete sense why she'd want a break from it all, if you will. a break from it all, if you will.

And that's why, actually, I personally think she, for two years, she'll recharge her batteries out west and come on and get on her horse and come back east and take over. Poor Maureen Holloway. Hopefully she still has a gig when that happens. Okay, well, look, I mean, this is a very refined style of radio. What you're allowed to get away with is maybe a little bit limited. I mean, Scruff Connors, for example,

would not have been on the short list to replace Mike Cooper at CHFI. And I think, you know, even though we live in this age of incredible media options and diversity and choices that people have out there, you know, there's still this idea that you have the old school, full service Toronto radio station that speaks to the widest demographic possible. So I think, you know, there's still a lot of Leaside Lucies who want their CHFI morning show to continue being the light entertainment that it's been all along.

They're not looking to hear anything that throws their morning for a loop, right? They're counting on the shower radio to deliver a specific product at a specific time. So it seemed like a job most likely to go to somebody who's been well-trained with a lot of experience in what it's like to speak to these people. So good for her. And then over at News Talk 1010, there's been some changes lately you can update us on.

We all know from the news about the Mike Bullard change. Do we? Do we all know about it, though? I don't know. They finally started reporting it on the newscast. He had a court date, and they made a big deal of it on the station. And I thought at the time, sure, the Toronto Star,

Kevin Donovan had a couple of stories about it. Because this is a story. I think I shared it on this podcast. I don't know, but I had this story. It was handed to me, this story. And what I do is not bad, so I wasn't going to touch this story of a 10-foot pole. But Kevin Donovan did, that's what he does, and he broke the story, and of course it involves Cynthia Mulligan and some unfortunate things and charges against Bullard, and it does help explain Bullard's sudden absence from 1010. But I think when they were reporting his last court date, and I'm pretty sure he didn't even have to appear himself, that there were a lot of listeners who hadn't heard about this before,

right? And you're wondering, maybe you recognize that Bullard wasn't around anymore, but based on how people listen, probably not. You would have, you know— He's on a vacation still. Yeah, he was on his usual time slot. You didn't really give much thought to the fact that they disappeared him. All of a sudden, you hear the top story on the CFRB newscast. Mike Bullard charged with assault.

A court date was held today. Charged with assault. A court date was held today. This was probably a dramatic revelation for a lot of people in the audience. But at the same time, I don't want to lighten the severity of the situation, but it also sounded like the kind of thing that could be negotiated out of being a criminal record situation. What do they call that, like a peace bond or whatever? Peace bond, yeah. And maybe the story in the star blew it out of proportion relative to what it was, given the fact that lawyers can figure it out and he can get on with his life. But I think also a fair bit of empathy

for Mr. Bullard. I mean, here he was saying that, you know, these charges ruined his life and left him feeling like he had nothing. And even though it was just an hour a day he was doing on News Talk 1010, he did it for something like seven years, built up an audience following. So hope for a positive resolution for everybody involved. There's other changes that, other than Mike Bullard being let go, there's other changes at 1010. What else happened? Mark Elliott. Oh, of course. Yeah, well, and I had a link to his essay.

It was on medium.com about being let go from this people helping people show that he was still doing kind of on a freelance basis on Saturday nights. nights, but a bit of backlash about the fact that Bell Media, which prides itself on caring about the mental well-being of Canada. I just saw a huge picture of Mike Landsberg on rural York. I was biking on rural York, and there's this huge billboard, just the closest up picture you could do of Michael Landsberg, and it says, Let's Talk. And Bell Let's Talk Day is my birthday this year. So I'm feeling a little bit cursed. I mean, opinions are divided about the effectiveness of this social media campaign. But the whole idea of a hashtag on Twitter, I mean, if you're somebody who's actually on Twitter all day, like I am, because it's part of my job.

Right. It's part of being a content creator here in 2017. Being confronted with all sorts of confessions about people's personal lives with a hashtag attached, which they're only- Which has Bell in it too. Yeah, which has Bell in it. And they're doing it on the notion that they're contributing a nickel to charitable causes,

right, by confessing something about themselves. Yeah, I just have to say, it's kind of made for some dark days the past few years. So that's what I have to look forward to on my birthday on January 25th, Bell Let's Talk Day. So Mark Elliott, who was doing the one and only radio show in the country dedicated to talking about addiction, to talking about addiction, threaded through his own experiences, taking phone calls and giving people some sort of advice based on what he could do

over the public airwaves and relate it to himself. And, you know, always, you know, fascinating stories about people struggling, him never hesitating to admit his own failings and faults through his life. They pulled the plug on the show. It wasn't something that they wanted to air any longer for one reason or another. They didn't find it sustainable. He's written at length about how he's had problems finding sponsors for this type of radio.

It's not a feel-good sort of thing, not synonymous with companies that want to sell products and good times. But as a public service, Bell might have left its audience down. So hopefully some framework will be there for Mark to do what he does best. He's an all-time top 40 AM radio guy. That was his arena. I mean, this was his medium. You heard him over the years. You knew his voice, how he sounded. And to me, that's where he's at his best and that's where he belongs. But reality being what it is, maybe he'll have to find a different route to doing what he does. At the same time, I think he'd be a great addition to any AM station that actually wants to do real public service, not just about hashtags and trying to put a corporate name into a cause. And the David Eddy show that was like, what was it, like Monday through Thursday or something at midnight?

Was it live for two hours at midnight? Was he doing three, four hours? I know they basically, he's got like a short Sunday show now, and he's no longer live at midnight because they're piping in a syndicated program out of Montreal or something like that. Yeah, one show called Passion. Another one is Comedy Hour with comedy albums. So the idea that they were going to return

to live, late-night, local radio. I don't know that David Eddy was the greatest guy ever to fill that kind of time slot, but the fact was that, you know, for the first time in a long time, Mark Elliott had done it 10 years before that, right? I mean, they thought, we need to have a live voice here in the studio, in the station. This is like we're here to serve the city

that we're broadcasting to. You know, not everybody turns out the light at 10, 11 o'clock anymore. So it turned out to be a really short-lived experiment. I guess the economic reality caught up to what was happening there at News Talk 1010, and that was the end of the live, local, late night show. Okay, we've got to burn through these last radio,

I realize we're at an hour, and we haven't left radio. We've got to get the TV journalism, we've got to get the digital, we can't have another Bob Elliott length episode. That's too much for the people. They can't handle all this content. They also want to get to Ann Romer.

Right, Ann Romer will lead off the TV, which is right next. So, let's just do this. AM640 has a new morning show. They shuffled the deck. I don't think anyone was let go in that process, actually. They just sort of rearranged their deck chairs and stuff, and they have a new morning show.

So Oakley's Afternoons now, and who's the new one? Matt Gurney. Matt Gurney and Supriya Dwivedi. Okay. Good. That's why I pointed to you. I wasn't sure how to say that name. one? Matt Gurney. Matt Gurney and Supriya Dwivedi. Okay, good. That's why I pointed to you. I wasn't sure how to say that name. I know Matt Gurney quit his gig at the National Post,

and he was doing some radio with Sirius XM that was related to his National Post gig, and so he left all that in order to do this. Have you heard any of this new 640 morning show? Yeah, I've started listening to it. Is it good? At least a little bit every morning. It's something different.

I will give them some credit here for bringing new voices who are in their early to mid-30s and giving them a Toronto radio morning show. Now, this might have something to do with what John Oakley wanted, right? I mean, here he was doing the 640 Morning Show for 13 years. And as far as anyone could tell, making a pretty good living to do morning radio for

a relatively small audience. But they stole him away from CFRB. Right. Because he replaced Humble and Fred, who left to go to Mix, 99.9. Yeah. So he stuck it out all this time. Great day for talk radio. Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.

Dave Burr to Rob Ford. Yeah. And now he's on Afternoon Drive, which is where he originally was when they poached him from CFRB. So with a vacancy to fill, whatever the circumstance. They decided to go after these younger people who were pretty well known as pundits, right? Talking heads on TV. And I know the two of them were also on in Montreal. They were doing an evening show from Toronto, at least in part, because Matt Gurney was always here. So credit where credit is due for a station looking to the future, not just recycling another old guard AM radio person,

but looking to bring a new spirit and identity to it. So they're only like six weeks into this new experiment, different approach. It sounds more like the CBC than maybe what you've come to expect from Chorus Canadian Talk Radio. They have a pretty good rapport that was already established in their previous incarnation. in their previous incarnation. They both seem to have that dilettante skill that you need to go from one topic to another, having worked in journalism and newspapers. And Supriya also worked as a political consultant. Do you remember when David Sukhnaki

was running for mayor of Toronto? I do. She originally handled his press side. So let's just say that there's a lot of potential here to do something different. Now, I'm not sure how you break through with an AM talk radio show to reach a different kind of audience that's not familiar with that type of radio. Can they get listeners away from FM morning shows? Yeah, well, here's my thought initially. I have not heard this 640 show.

I hope it's as good as you say. I hope one day to hear it. I didn't say it was any good. You didn't say it was good? Okay, I'm sorry. I misunderstood. But when I do listen to morning radio, it's probably Metro Morning.

Firstly, I like the show, but there's no ads i really like the lack of ads it's just it's all all killer no filler whatever the uh i just wonder like so if you're i guess you've decided to leave the older crowd to 10 10 because 10 10 has been hammering you anyways in these books like 10 10 hammers 640 typically in these books and uh maybe you're skewing you're going younger and hoping maybe some, maybe the less progressive lefty folk who aren't listening to Matt Galloway on 99.1 will be listening to some AM radio.

I don't know. Matt Gurney is a pretty old sounding guy, right? He's joked about it enough himself, right? He's one of these like, you know, 64 year old men trapped in a 34 year old's body. So he's got the chops. I think that he's not scaring away those 905ers who were listening to 640. Supriya, a different type of personality. Look, I mean, this AM talk radio, this is like the last refuge of the angry white man.

Right, I can see the dashboard pounding with the fists. This is what I think of when I think of AM talk radio. But at the same time, they're not doing a morning show about identity politics or anything like that.

It's pretty straight down the middle as far as the approach that they're taking. And yeah, I'm not sure how new people find out about it. Maybe in this multi-platform age that we're living in, there's some hope that with all the convergence going on, with Chorus now tied up with global TV,

that there's some way to get some traction that wasn't there before for an AM radio morning show. But in the end, most people would just wonder why this isn't happening on the FM dial, right? If you're trying to reach a younger audience that's flipping around. That's a good point, yeah. If they're not on the AM side, are they really going to come over for something like this? So I'm looking forward to where this can go and if they can make this approach fly

because it genuinely is something different and credit is deserved for that. All right, let's get to Ann Romer. So let's leave radio for a bit, come to television. I'm going to read a comment that was left. I woke up to this. It was left while I slept last night. It's from a Marae Lloyd. I don't know if Marae is a male or female, but I feel it's a woman. So she wrote,

oh my, I love CP24. What did we do to deserve Ann Romer to take over the last two days? She appears to be the only one there. Morning, noon, and even the 11 p.m. news. And there's a part I redacted for this because I didn't think it was fair to Anne. Although I left the comment on the site. If you're curious, you can find it. Anne, dear, get a job behind the camera. That is if CP24 can do without you. But I doubt that. I wonder what the real story is. So I get these all the time, these kind of comments like that. And I noticed this too. You and I joked about how she was,

not joked, but we talked about how she came back for this third time. Maybe she was doing summer fill-in work. Maybe that was the deal. Yeah, I had a very low-placed source at Bell Media who told me with some confidence

that Ann Romer was back doing summer fill-in shifts, right? She reappeared. Right. When was it, June or July? You know, here we think we're seeing a ghost. How is it possible that Ann Romer, who had two retirement parties at which there was cake and gift cards from the keg. Correct.

And the bay. How was it that this went from being something that you joked about on Toronto Mike? We'll see you when you're back, Ann, after you un-retire next time. Yes. To actually happening. I mean, what are the odds? What are the chances? So here we're living with the fact that Anne Romer is back as a summer fill-in.

And then it's September, and Anne Romer is still on CP24. Yes. October, Anne Romer still doing shifts, usually at night, prime time, on the channel. Business as usual. November. Okay. Maybe they're short, a little staff. People are on vacation.

It's December 14th, and I'm sitting in the bagel shop putting together my morning newsletter. And there is Ann Romer anchoring the news. Yeah, yeah. 10 o'clock, weekday morning. Right. Mid-December. Correct me if I'm wrong, Mike, but I don't think she's just filling in for the summer anymore. Your low-place source at Bell Media got this one dead wrong.

She never left. She's actually more entrenched there than ever. This commenter refers to, like, she was the only one working the last two days. Again, people on holidays or whatever. But she really did, like, I saw my mom loves CP24. I went there on Christmas Day and she had it on. There was Anne. And she went for hours and hours and hours i you know i take i take note when hands on the cp24

and people let us know which is wonderful they tweet at us you know and citing but it's become like every day there's an and citing she's working she's she's clearly fully back there's no feeling she's she's the lead anchor at this point right she? She's the go-to anchor. But does she have a set shift? See, I have to go to the bagel shop to watch the channel. I don't have live access to it at home. I don't have old-fashioned cable TV. I'm a cord cutter.

So I only know about when Anne is on camera because I hear about it on Twitter. FYI, I just... And it's not quite the same thing, but there's a cp24.com, I think. They have a new... I think you have to click something to get there,

but there's this new live feed where you can simulate what CP24 is like on your computer with the scrolls and the weather and the video footage. I discovered that the other day and I thought, that might be kind of cool for a cord cutting. That's a lot of trouble to have to go through to hear somebody

read the same stories over and over and over again. I'm trying to get Ann Romer to come on this podcast. So did we say anything in the last few minutes that is going to jeopardize that from happening? No, no, no. This is always with love and respect. We're always respectful of Ann Romer. And when I get the complaints, shut up about Ann Romer.

Literally, that's what I get from people. Like, stop talking about Anne Romer. I decide, I looked at my soul and I did some soul searching. I've decided the amount I'm going to, I find it very interesting, like the Dalton Pompei thing. And if it comes up like this organically, I'm going to talk about it. She's back again for a third time. And again, I'm very curious when she leaves again, because she will, if there is cake and gift cards. That's where, I don't know what I'm going to do, Mark. Like, it's, I'm going to be, you're going to have to shut this thing.

You're going to have to, I don't know. I don't know what I'm going to do. Like, it's going to be, my response will be enormous. I just don't know how it will, you know, take shape. Who was it on Twitter that was remarking somewhere on there, because I'm always searching Ann Romer, right? I always want to find the latest Ann Romer

sightings, so they're always appreciated. But one of your listeners, someone on there was complaining about the fact that she didn't identify herself, right? That she went on to do her news shift, and there was no title on the screen. And she didn't say, I'm I'm Ann Romer. She's so embedded.

But that's as if we didn't. Maybe that's so we don't notice that that's Ann Romer back. Is that some sort of union thing where she has to be registered under a different name? be registered under a different name. But did you hear that? That she's not allowed to say out loud that she's Ann Romer because her pension is being made out to Ann Romer. And this person we're seeing on camera who looks and sounds like Ann Romer legally isn't actually Ann Romer. Is there something like that going on?

Maybe you're onto something there. Is there something like that going on? Maybe you're onto something there. But of all things, I thought it was an odd complaint to have about the workings of a news channel. That here, Ann Romer, who's been on there for pretty much the entire history of the thing. I mean, it's coming up on, what, 18, 19 years of CP24? And she's the lead anchor, and she is not going to go quietly.

I recently had Stephanie Smythe on this show, and she was no help at all with Anne's stuff. She wasn't given an inch. She was sitting there where you are, and so I had the eye contact going, and it was clear. I got a whole bunch of Anne can do whatever she wants because Anne is a goddess. That's basically what I got, which was not helpful at all.

Okay, later we'll talk about Damien Cox. All right, well, let's do that. Another guest that you need to get in here. Oh, maybe we put him under digital since it's a Twitter thing. City TV is getting more interesting, in your opinion. Please do tell.

I want to hear this. So, well, look, last night, you told me that. Avery Haynes had this amazing story that I'm pretty sure she broke, or at least it was the first big coverage. Oh, the Nigerians. Yeah, these Canadian Kardashians

who were scamming Nigerian internet millionaires. It was terrific. That's a great headline. That is your dream headline, right? Canadian-Gardassian sisters scamming Nigerian princes or whatever. But yeah, Avery has been a big part of this. I think the past few years we mostly left city TV for dead, right? I mean, Gordon Martineau told us Modern Family was next,

and he never returned to the anchor spot again. And I think it's gotten a bad rap under the Rogers' ownership, and possibly they're just starting to realize that their reputation has taken a hit, and they're going down more interesting roads, doing more eclectic things with their news programming. So Avery Haynes had that story about meeting Richard Spencer, the alt-right guy. Who hit on her in front of her wife. Yeah, amazing story about how he started his whole website in Toronto. But the common denominator is Avery Haynes is awesome. And I'm not just saying that because I had a great time with her on this podcast or whatever.

But she's a legitimate, like for her vacation, she went down to, where did she went to? Cleveland, where the DNC or whatever. Was it DNC? No, the RNC, DNC. Yeah, Republican. Yeah, for RNC. But this was her vacation. She's such a legit newshound and curious cat with a forum.

And, you know, she just went to North Korea, for example, and she reported extensively on Twitter. There was great stuff about her trip to North Korea, which I just ate up. But that's because she's pretty freaking awesome. That's what I think. I think Avery Haynes is awesome. Okay, and they're also getting attention for Janella Massa, right?

The first hijab-wearing news anchor in Canada. And the first on a mainstream newscast, anyway, in North America. So that's gotten a lot of attention for them. So there might be somebody there who recognizes that, you know, Moses Nimer has long ago left the building. Rogers never really wanted to own this terrestrial, over-the-air television to begin with. It's lost a lot of money for them. But I'm getting the sense that they're trying to find ways to be distinct and different in the Toronto market. And that comes after years of people wondering if they were just going to shut the whole thing down. A few weeks ago at Rogers, they took down the sign at 33 Dundas East, Young Dundas Square.

The Rogers letters came down off the front. And there was speculation. Does this mean the building, the station is going to be sold? Does this mean Rogers is bailing out? Because they just shut down all their print magazines, a whole bunch of titles that got sold off, and McLean's still going, but it'll be monthly instead of weekly. So a lot of changes, a lot of turmoil. People figured these letters were coming down. It means Moses Nimer is going to move back in or something. Then I heard a hilarious story about the notion that they took the letters down because too many people were coming in to complain about their smartphone packages. Right. And they didn't know where to send them because they laid off all the receptionists and they had to somehow— Because people think it's a Rogers store, right?

Yeah, they had to discourage people from assuming that this was Rogers customer service. But it wasn't meant to be. It turned out they were just changing the style of the lettering. That's the story I thought was true, that it was because too many people thought it was a Rogers store.

And I think that's why the story got around, because it sounded so plausible. The fake news got me. See? Come on. I remember years ago, somebody tricked me around, because it sounded so plausible. So fake news got me. See? Come on. I remember years ago, somebody tricked me into thinking Margaret Thatcher was dead, and I bought it, and I pledged that was the last time I would fall for fake news. And here it is again. It got me.

So, yeah, once again, you walk to the main doors of City TV, and there's a Rogers sign greeting you. I don't think there are receptionists there anymore. They laid all of those off, but they're not hiding the fact that they're a Rogers property. All right, so good. City TV is getting more interesting. That'll benefit all of us.

Now let's talk CBC here for a bit. First of all, Norm MacDonald's brother, Neil MacDonald, is now no longer reporting. He's now like a CBC digital ranter. Is that his title? Blogger. They started up the CBC opinion vertical. It's entirely possible in the entire history of the CBC, this was the most controversial thing that they ever launched. Because the source of the controversy was the fact that as all these newspaper, magazine

publishers are starting to struggle and suffer, here was the CBC coming along, paying well above what market rates are now for this kind of writing, and telling you they were happy to take your hot takes. And they'd publish what any Canadian had to say about anything, and they'd pay you 55 cents a word in exchange for your opinion about something. So CBC opinion, it became this flashpoint. I don't know if you heard anything about it. Heritage Committee hearing where it keeps coming up and people disparaging the fact that CBC was going down this road and just the assumption that this was exactly the kind of thing that was going to lead to CBC asphyxiating all of the traditional media in Canada by doing what they used to do on the op-ed pages where they don't tend to pay people anymore for what they think about things. So I don't know if it was part of the strategy, or maybe it was something that Neil MacDonald wanted to do, but essentially he was appointed as the star of this CBC opinion vertical. So it's very unexpected that what all this fuss was really about was this veteran news reporter becoming a blogger for the CBC, that his perspective on things dominates everything

else. And they're not doing so much of that user-generated submission stuff coming in from all over the place. It's mostly about Neil McDonald and what he thinks about things. Now, does this interest you at all? point in its history, that they should be giving this personification of the old school network newscast his own place to wax about whatever's going on in the world that day and for people to leave comments on it. I don't know what I think of it, except I do know I find it interesting when they take a pretty good journalist and tell him to stop reporting.

They take him off the beat or whatever and say, now you're just an opinion guy. Because Neil was a pretty good... I don't know what you thought of Neil. Yeah, yeah. And he definitely injected a lot of his personalities into the reports. Yes, yes. And he got his wrist slapped a few times for being too opinionated. So I think there was that gray area about what constituted news reporting. And editorial. Yeah, editorializing and opinionating.

And they just put him in this category of being the CBC opinion guy. This happens at the same time that his doppelganger, his evil twin Peter Mansbridge, is now a few months into the greatest retirement tour of all time, a victory lap. He announced it on Labor Day that he'd be leaving his job as anchor of the National, not leaving the CBC, not necessarily retiring. It doesn't mean we've seen the last of him. Just no longer the National. He's not going to do the evening shift anymore. So we're now what? We're four months into the Peter Mansbridge retirement tour with six more insufferable

months left to go. Wow. And the rumor is that Ann Romer will retire from CP24 and take over the national. That's the new rumor we're going to start on this show. But what I know, Peter Mansbridge does this thing every Christmas Eve where he goes shopping, like Christmas Eve, and he tweets about it. It doesn't do much for me. I know people seem to get off on the Canadianity or whatever, but

I don't know if you follow the Peter Mansbridge Twitter account. He decided this year he would capital off with a cheap shot at Ezra Levant. Something about feeding the trolls. So maybe Petey was sort of desperate there and going for the easiest possible shot on the way out about Ezra and stating his opinion.

I mean, he's a news anchor. He's supposed to be impartial, isn't he? Yeah, he's supposed to be impartial. But here instead he's provided Ezra with fodder for dozens more viral video rants about how corrupt Peter Mansbridge is. Before we lost George Michael and Carrie Fisher, the big news was that... See, it's still loaded from my last episode. But the big news was that it's still loaded from my last episode, but the big news was Alan Thicke passed away. Canadian

hockey-loving Alan Thicke. Did you know, here's a fun fact, it's well-known, you probably do know it, but his son Robin was being babysat by Wayne Gretzky when the trade from Edmonton to L.A., the famous Wayne Gretzky when the trade from Edmonton to LA,

the famous Wayne Gretzky trade, went down. Have you heard this story? Well, it sounds entirely plausible. I mean, you know, when Alan Thicke did his CTV afternoon talk show, this thing was legend, right? Because I think

back in the day when the most creative people would gravitate to like a midday afternoon housewife kind of TV format, right? But a lot of people gave him credit for giving comedians different personalities, a platform, you know, that they couldn't find in the stodgy old CBC with this thing that he was doing on there. So I think Gretzky was a part of that, the cavalcade of stars that passed through the CTV early 80s Alan Thicke show.

They probably bonded back in the day on that set. And then he got a job in L.A? Thick of the night. This thing goes down in history as one of the biggest TV bombs to ever be produced. Johnny Carson was nearing the beginning of the end. I mean, talk about a man's bridge and his long goodbye, right? There was like 10 or 15 years when people assumed that Johnny Carson was going to call it a day. And, you know, one after another, Joan Rivers, Arsenio Hall, right, they all lined up to try and dethrone old King Carson. But Alan Thicke was seen as like a real prospect. Like he was the one that they were banking on, Thick of the Night. This guy would come out and do his dry, self-effacing Canadianity humor, and that's really all

it would take for Johnny Carson to lose half his audience, and everybody would fall in love with Alan Thicke. Didn't quite work out that way. No, it doesn't usually work out that way. It was a real terrifier of a TV show. But he must have made friends in the right places because he got the growing pains right after that. And he was sort of set for life as the Alan Thicke that we all mourned a few weeks ago. Absolutely. Absolutely. And speaking, we talked about Rogers earlier, but we no longer have Show Me that was gone at the end of November.

Show Me closed. I had Show Me because it came with my internet package. So I can speak of authority that the best part of Show Me was the fact you could actually watch things on Show Me without actually using your gigabyte bandwidth. No internet required because you can go to channel 300 on your Rogers digital box and then just play it from there. And I watched things like, I watched things like Fargo season one and I watched transparent both season three,

all three seasons, I'm sorry. And things like that. And nice to have it. I don't know if I would have paid for it, but it was nice that it was there and now it's gone. And, and you know,

we mentioned Rogers being in a bit of free fall, and even if City TV is on the rebound, they're cutting a lot at Rogers, scaling back a number of initiatives that they thought would bring them into the future. And a lot of high hopes were pinned on this show-me thing. There was an article that ran on MobileSyrup.com that was really popular, like the last days of ShowMe confessions from the inside about what was going on there. I'm not sure where all the sentimentality came from.

I mean, it was spoken about in glowing terms as far as having a a startup environment where everybody was, you know, gung-ho. Was it like a Polish grandmother or something like that? Yeah, a comparison like Rogers, the big monolithic Rogers is like an old Polish grandmother. And, you know, here, you know, these new kids come in, you know, poochy on the skateboard, you know, showing how to do things differently, and that the establishment at Rogers didn't understand what was going on. I'm not quite sure how accurate that was, because at the same time, Rogers is also working with Vice, right? They have a big deal with the Viceland Channel. I mean, by all accounts, that's not going the way that people hoped.

But Guy Lawrence, who was brought in from the U.K. to be the CEO at Rogers, he ended up getting summarily executed from his job in October. summarily executed from his job in October. And that was a bit of a shocker because this guy was presumed to be a telecom visionary who was all into this multi-platform thinking and would figure out ways to reach people with all this cord cutting going on. But whether it was cultural differences that he had with the Rogers family, or maybe a few investments that they didn't agree with, things like Show Me, you know, they cut him loose. And there's been a lot of chaos there ever since. So Show Me, which was seen as an example of how Canadian media platforms could adjust to the future, that it could be

real competitor to Netflix. I think the fact that they cut its throat and shut it down as quickly as they did seemed like a bit of a blow to what a lot of people had hopes on, that we could do these made-in-Canada responses to what was creeping in from south of the border. But what can you do? I mean, Netflix is global. An Amazon Prime video just launched internationally, maybe to a limited degree in Canada. And there were some false news, fake news rumors about when exactly it was going to start. But I think it's clear at this point that Show Me has yielded its position in the market to Amazon,

and now it's left to Bell and Crave TV. Is that healthy, or can it be? I'm not sure exactly. They got Seinfeld over there. That's all I've ever seen. Can it be? I'm not sure exactly. They got Seinfeld over there.

That's all I've ever seen. What makes people want to subscribe to a service? What does it take for them to have that loyalty to a specific platform brand? It's not a show. It's not a certain type of celebrity. a show. It's not a certain type of celebrity. It's just kind of like this thing, this service, this pipeline. Can people feel the same way about, crave that they do about Apple or Google or Netflix? I don't know if something that is exclusive to Canada can engender that kind of enthusiasm. What do you think?

I think it's content is king. And I think it, like for me, like I said, I didn't pay for Show Me. It came because I was a Rogers customer and it showed up one day and I didn't ask for it,

but it was there. So I gave it a go. Would I have paid for it? Probably not. I think this is a great question because the content is king netflix for example which i have been watching lately uh it's their original content i'm watching believe it or not it's it's the three billion dollars or whatever they dumped into things like the crown and uh what's the other one i just watched narcos and i thoroughly enjoy these series and their netflix original series like i don't think there were any show me original series. And I think Crave TV has Letter Kenny. I think that's the only one I've heard of that is like a Crave TV thing. So I don't know. I don't think I think it's whoever's got the best content. And I think trying to beat Netflix at this point might be an exercise in futility. And you can read enough people arguing about how Netflix is unsustainable

as a company unto itself, that the way of the future is for Netflix to be owned by Google or Apple or Facebook or something like that. So we'll see. I mean, the way these things work tends to be one big company swallowing another. And whether they can go it alone for the long haul, we'll have to see how things shake down. I mean, there's still so much old legacy

media out there, right? There are still so many companies operating on a business model that's now at least 20 years old. All these cable TV channels. What future do they have when people can subscribe a la carte to anything? You know, we're going to see a lot of attrition there in the coming year. That's why I always say live sports. It's like that's the thing. The only thing left, I think. At some point, the non-sports fans will be completely free and all will be cord cutters if they aren't already. And if I stopped caring about sports

tonight, I think I'd cut the cord tomorrow. This is what I think. Anyway, we need to be a little... I'm going to burn through journalism and I'm going to start with what I'm personally most interested in, which is that since your last appearance on Toronto Mic'd, whenever that was,

you appeared on Jesse Brown's Canada Land. There was an episode about Mark Weisblatt. Does that count as journalism? Gee, that's news to me. Yes, independent journalism. I'm giving it to Jesse. Please, I need to know,

what was that experience like? I need to know everything from, where did you record? How long did you record for? What was Jesse like with you? Give me the me the straight goods well he has his own studio at 401 richmond uh downtown building is it in a basement or is it actually endangered oh no no he has his own office he's got people working there with him uh producing canada land that podcast, also the Impostor podcast, which he started in the last few months. There's also a politics one that's currently on hold.

I had a lot of trouble hanging on to hosts and staffers. A whole bunch of people left him off to get a real better job somewhere else. But Jesse has his fans and his following. There's a whole Jesse nation out there. So when I went on Canada Land, it was really me putting myself on his turf with his people. And it was up to him to provide a context for what I was doing there and what I had to say. I wouldn't say that in the finished product it was all that flattering. He portrayed me as some sort of character that I'm really not, like that I'm some sort of hater, troll. I mean, he started off by saying that I'm not a troll,

but he put this idea in people's heads, right, that I represented some kind troll, but he put this idea in people's heads, right, that I represented some kind of diabolical force who was, you know, critical of him and everybody else, and I had no respect for what he was doing there, and it couldn't be further from the truth, but I guess he needed to create this adversarial situation. Somebody on Twitter described it as like Batman and the Joker, right? That I was representing the character that was bringing some sort of evil to Gotham City, and it was Jesse's job to stamp it all out. But at the same time, I am way more generous than he is to other people's creativity.

I go out of my way on Twitter, in the newsletter, places like this to highlight people that are doing interesting things. And Jesse Brown is all about Jesse Brown. There is nothing else going on there in this show than him. It's all about how he sees things. Now, I knew that going in. Look, I mean, I've had articles written about me this year and attention that I'm simply not accustomed to. And I'll admit to being kind of nervous and uncomfortable with that kind of scrutiny because I managed to always be the person on the other side. Suddenly, people were interested in writing articles about what I was doing. I guess I had to play along with it and do the best that I could.

But the bottom line across the board, you can't control what people write about you, right? I mean, you can't tell people how to frame a story or a show, a podcast where you're featured in. So I left myself to the devices of Canada Land, and it was up to him to decide how he was going to present me. And I think he could have been a little bit nicer. Now, by virtue of the fact that he was giving me this platform and this exposure, obviously there was some sort of respect there, some kind of reverence for what I was doing, what I was up to. But on the outside, I'm not sure it was that clear what I was doing on there, why he was giving me

the time of day. Some of the reactions on Twitter kind of reflected that. People saying, I don't know, what's this guy talking about? He's so narcissistic and nihilistic. It's like, where did you get that from? Well, it was in the editing. It's because I talked to him for like 70 or 80 minutes. He cut it down to 25. That's where I'm going. So when you come on and do Toronto Mike, this is your fifth time.

So let's say this episode ends up being two hours long because it might end up being two hours long. We record for two hours. So we record for two hours. Well, that also drives me nuts. But that's a different thing that I have to accept. But why does that drive you nuts? Well, because I don't know.

There's always things. You leave, you think I should have said something else. You wish I would go and edit this. Yeah, but I accept this is the way that you do it, okay? And shape you as an antagonist. I listened to you for four years

before I set foot in this place. That's true. Now, Jesse Brown, you said, how long did you record for? 75, 80 minutes. Okay, Jesse Brown, you said, how long did you record for? 75, 80 minutes. Okay. Almost an hour and a half there. And how long was your episode again? 25 minutes? 30 minutes? Yeah.

Once he got his seven different sponsor plugs out of the way and thanked everyone for responding to his panhandling on Patreon, yeah. By the time I had my say, it was like 25 minutes. Okay. So that's a lot of editing. And as we know from Survivor,

it's all in the editing, right? Yeah, and the editing made me sound better, maybe, than I would have beforehand. Nonetheless, there was a lot of editorial liberty taken with how he presented me. See, the reason I don't edit this podcast is I don't have time to do free

labor like that. If it was the real dollars coming in edit this podcast is I don't have time to do free labor like that. Like if it was the real dollars coming in for this podcast, I would make the time to edit it. I don't have time to edit. That's why we're live to tape. And at least it does give it, and I know you might not like it, but it gives it a little bit of raw authenticity. It's sort of the thing that I do that differentiates me from Jesse Brown in Canada. And yet I don't think you or any of your listeners are all that obsessed with with canada land and jesse brown i think i got 10k though coming in through patreon but i think the attention that he gets are people that assume that he's more powerful than he

actually is with what he's putting out there every week i mean look he hired a whole staff based on this crowdfunding right and and almost all of them have left him. He's got to like hire up again. He's got to build this thing from pretty much zero. He wants to have a website, you know, generating stories throughout the week. He has notions of creating a podcast empire, which I think is terrific because I don't see anybody else in this country that has the ambition that he's bringing to it. But at the same time, I think the perception of how much impact he and his show has is outsized compared to the following and the enthusiasm that's there. And these are different people than the ones I've gotten to meet by being on Toronto

Mike. They are really into this like arcane aspect of how things work at the CBC, right? I mean, a lot of conspiracy theories and, you know, the assumption that like any sort of financial interest, you know, is corrupting the messages that you're getting. I mean we're talking about not quite Alex Jones level here. This isn't like InfoWars. But very much I think the enthusiasm that he's engendered and the fans that he's developed for Canada Land, they're very much into seeing things this way. And by those standards, I'm too commercial. My idea of things is too mass mainstream media.

I mean, look, we just talked about morning show personalities on Toronto Radio. By Jesse's standards. He's not doing that, right? Yeah, this is down market stuff. This is like, these people are interesting. He's not talking about Ann Romer. And I come from the perspective that growing up in Toronto in the eighties and nineties, you know, whether it's Scruff Connors or, or, uh, Kendrick Pompey or Ann Romer, these were the celebrities in the city.

This is who was out there, right? I mean, this is what we had to work with before social media came along. So I think I've got a fondness for that that you don't see in Canada Land and the people listening to it. So I haven't lost you to Canada Land because four episodes with me and then I hear you on Canada Land and I was happy for you. But I also felt like, oh, there we go. Now I know how Jesse Brown feels when he hires somebody and they go off and work for the National Policy Committee. But I think I would be a very good friend for Jesse Brown. You know, I'm

really making this appeal here because he came into all this money, I don't know how much, but it's not nothing, from selling bit strips to Snapchat. We'll find out someday when there's an IPO. And I am not intimidated by the idea that this guy has come

into a lot of money. I'm a very good friend of people who have a lot of money, whether it's inherited wealth, whether they found it on their own. I'm not operating from a perspective that somebody who's sitting on a big seven-figure bank account is somehow lacking in ethics or credibility simply because they've come into this amount of money. So I'd like to make this appeal here that I am a perfectly acceptable friend for Jesse Brown because I don't see journalism from that perspective. I aspire to be part of the power elite. And realizing that I probably never will be, I'm happy to hang around them and be a fly on the wall to what they're doing.

And when he decides he needs somebody to cover the Scruff Connors passing and the Ann Romer reappearance, he'll know where to find me. He doesn't care. He's too busy trying to hang Joseph Boyden this week. Gotcha. He's missing out on electric circus exclusives.

That's his loss. Journalism. A lot of these post-media fired more people. I talked to Bob Elliott. He retired, and then three months later, they put out one of their voluntary packages. Voluntary separation package? Wasn't he there long enough that he would have a pension?

I don't know. You don't know. But he did miss out on additional cashola if he had taken a package three months. But Post Media has been firing away. Yeah, well, as far as I know, they approach it like this they they'll they'll put out the call if you want to buy it we'll give you a three-week salary for every year you've worked here and they try to get names and you know they see if they can reach their uh quota

of uh this time around 20 cutting their staff you Keep in mind, this is like the 17th round of trying to cut. But they set a target, and if they don't meet that quota, then they end up having conversations, right? Sort of invited into the corner office. But do they start giving you— And tell you that your job is probably not going to last. That we're not going to have a position for you.

So if you'd like to leave and take this package, we'd be happy to give it to you. So I think a lot of those discussions have been taking place. And I mean the Toronto Sun, for example, which is under the post-media umbrella now, you mentioned on Twitter, I saw you wrote the last day-wonner might be Donato.

We don't know if he's like a full-time employee or if he's on contract or whatever, but they had a couple of people write farewell columns in the last week. Christina Blizzard, a Queen's Park writer who had been there from the very beginning. She predated the son. She worked for the Toronto Telegram like as a teenage secretary and ended up being the assistant to Peter Worthington when he was the crusty old editor of The Sun and then came into her own as a journalist for decades. So she bid farewell last week, and I think that was a big deal. So you've got Andy Donato, a guy who's like tone deaf to everything that's gone on in culture and society.

I mean, you know, his his editorial cartoons are just like lambasted one after the other. Right. For me, like sexist and racist and homophobic or or whatever else. But but he keeps plugging away in there. And I'm not sure what kind of deal somebody like him has, if he's a full-time staffer there, or if he's sort of volunteering because he's on a pension arrangement or something. So he's really like the, he is literally the last of the Toronto Sun Day 1ers. So, and, you know, the sun isn't what it used to be. I know more energy goes into the sports section than other parts of the newspaper. Well, yeah, I was going to say Simmons is still going strong.

So I know Simmons isn't leaving anytime soon. But if you talk to these people, right, they'll tell you that they feel doomed. And it's really depressing because the management is not giving them enough confidence to feel that they're going to be doing this for more than a few weeks at any given time. That they haven't cracked the code to make this feel sustainable. But that's the case in newspapers everywhere. Sure. And I believe that to be true, except in the case of Steve Simmons, where I recently had

this conversation with him, and he's full of bravado right now. He's full of confidence and bravado. So he feels quite secure over there. Why? Because the Toronto Sun sports section will be the last thing standing? And everything else will fall away before they get to him. Right. And he is the hitmaster in that realm, if you will.

So he is the main draw. Love him or hate him, he gets clicks. Yeah, I take no pleasure in watching this from the outside. I mean, I did work at Post Media for a couple of years while they were in their transitional phase before they snapped up all the Sun newspapers. A lot of terrific talents working at the National Post in particular. And they've been given the challenge to keep this thing going and make something out of it. And I really admire those who go to work every day and aren't blindsided by all this drama going on. Right.

Because, you know, they're doing great work a lot of the time. And I know from my experience there, it's hard to tune it out when it's happening all around you. And, of course, it's not just, like you said, it's the whole industry because post-media is firing away. Globe and Mail buyouts are many. I mean, my next guest includes, well, one guy, James Myrtle, actually resigned, but it's Sean Fitzgerald was one of the many

young Toronto Star reporters who got packaged out non-voluntarily. Yeah, yeah. Caught in the crossfire. Right. Star touch. So the Globe and Mail buyouts, that's all happening. The Post Media is firing away, and then. Right. Star Touch. So the Globe and Mail buyouts, that's all happening. The post media is firing away. And then Star Touch, is Star Touch on its last legs?

I think so, yeah. They budgeted for the fall because they bought a bunch of ads in the subway. But I think they've spent the last marketing dollar on trying to make the tablet app happen. I don't know what comes next. I mean, you've got the Globe and Mail, David Thompson, his family privately held things so they don't answer to shareholders. And Thompson seems to want to continue to be a player in the media.

It's good for ego and vanity and prestige and everything. And he could buy other things with the position that he's in. So we might see even more consolidation that centers around the globe. They just moved into this new office, right? Like a few steps away from where the sun used to be, King Street East, the new Globe and Mail Center. So they've got this facility to make the magic happen. It will be interesting to see if they take on any other properties and integrate them into the Globe and Mail. Let's get to digital while we have a little time on the clock here. Now, let's start with, you mentioned Damien Cox earlier, and I don't want that to be one

of those, like, don't forget to talk about Damien, and we Cox earlier, and I don't want that to be one of those, like, don't forget to talk about Damien, and we forget, and then I don't. Well, I declared Damien Cox's tweet as the single absolute greatest Toronto media tweet of 2016. Quote, unquote.

12.36. Have you got it memorized? Because I could paraphrase it but i don't have it memorized give it your best shot a selfie will do no no no okay okay yeah that's why you're doing it go okay period a selfie will do for now am i doing okay give it another try i i know you're very that's your dalton pompey, I think, the Damien Cox tweet. But what's important is it looks like a DM that he tweets by mistake,

and right away, he goes protected. Like, this was, like, I guess, almost right away, he goes into protected tweets where you have people have to be... You can't see it unless you're following him. And he's got 70,000 followers, so it's not like he's tweeting in obscurity. It's not like these are his private

thoughts, right? He's looking for reactions to what he has to say about things. But he's still there. It's not like it was a temporary measure and then he went back to the regular public profile, whatever. He's still in the protected realm there. And he's trying to plug a book and his

Twitter account is still locked six months later. Okay, okay. But, see, I is still locked. Right. Six months later. Okay. Okay. But, but see, I forgot the butt. Yes.

But if you'd rather not, that's cool. Period. Okay. Just a selfie from right now is good. Yeah. It sounds bad. It sounds bad. It sounds bad. Like I would have difficulty explaining that one to my wife upstairs. Now, uh, what I will say in Damien Cox, who's been here, he, I have talked to him since that tweet and he says, anytime I want him back, he's happy to come again and do another

episode. So really it's, we, we, we will make this happen in early 2017, but I'll need more than just, what the hell is that tweet about? I need more than that. We had this conversation at the beginning of the summer, and you never got him in here. Yeah, because he was going to come in, and I was going to have him come in with David Schultz,

and it was going to be this whole thing, and then I decided not to be Jerry Springer, and I didn't do that, but I will have Damien Cox on. Okay, so we're still waiting for what might be. It's really, I got to kind of step it up with him and just say, hey, let's do this, and he will. He'll jump off the gardener and come on. What you got to do is give him the ultimatum.

It's like, we're talking about you anyway, dude. But he, to his credit, though. You better come in and correct the record. To his credit, he's eager to come back on. He's not avoiding me at all. It's all on me right now. So I will make that happen. Okay, do you remember now that we went over it?

Is it committed to memory, the tweet? Let's go. Try it, Mike. Okay. That's it for now. But, okay, period. But, if you'd rather not, that's cool, period. Just a selfie from right now is good.

Has he ever explained it, or did he just go private and not? Did he ever explain that? The context of what he was saying? No and not like did he ever explain that as what he what the context not only did he not explain it but after i made my newsletter about it one day he blocked me and i've never interacted with him before right okay so that's what i've got as a souvenir of my coverage of damien cox's twitter account At least you did something he could perceive as negative. I've never done a negative thing to that Jeff Blair over there at 590. What's so negative about it?

I never speculated about what it was. I simply projected why other people would think that there was something weird about it. I'll find out, Abby. I never drew any conclusions from what I assume was a misdirected direct message. I mean, Twitter has gotten a lot better technologically. I mean, Twitter is a dumpster fire in general, right? But you see fewer of these direct message fields.

I think without a doubt that was meant to be a DM. It's just a question of us to speculate. Because it looks bad. It looks bad. I promise I will find out. This is easier because he's eager to come on and answer that question. So when he comes in here and he says, there's one thing I'm not going to talk about in that tweet, will you

not talk about it? Dave Hodge wouldn't talk about the pen flip and he talked at lengths about the pen flip. Don't worry. I have a way of relaxing my guests. How long ago, how much time went by between the pen flip and your podcast discussing the pen flip? What was that, 29 years? Yeah, 86, I think.

30 years? Okay, so we might be into the 2040s before Damien Cox comes clean. Early 2017, it's happening. Is there any other dumb Twitter moments of 2016 you can share? Joe Warmington, right? Trying to figure out how to use Firefox. Does Google work on...

Yeah, the Firefox browser was on these specific settings and he thought, how do I use Google on this thing? Can you use Google on Firefox with something, which is just precious. Like that's a grandma tweet or whatever. Well, when I asked for nominations,

I think it was one of your crowd who said that like the Scrawler could have his own category, right? Of infamous Twitter moments of 2016. And he's still bringing it today. I see he's all into the conspiracy theories about where Justin Trudeau is hiding during the holiday season. I don't see any

selfies on his account. He retweets me often. I'm going to say, I often will see, oh, Warmington just retweeted my tweet. I mean, I've never met him. I don't talk about him that much or whatever, but he seems to follow me and seems to retweet my things often. I'm in met him. I don't talk about him that much or whatever, but he seems to follow me and seems to retweet my things often.

I'm in his club. And we discussed this here before. It's all a repeat. Because his phone is always buzzing, I think. Oh, yeah, that's right. It's so disorienting to him. He doesn't know what to do. He doesn't have the wiring you need to tweet all the time.

He's an old- old school gumshoe, shoe leather wearing out kind of reporter. This is all new to him. So I think for our entertainment, we're seeing Joel Warmington like the most disoriented Twitter user and I wouldn't have it any other way. He better not change a thing.

Before I close out, 1236, I'm hoping that everyone listening has subscribed at 1236.ca. I mean, you heard all of it. That was legit. He doesn't care about you. He legit, sincerely enjoys getting that newsletter every weekday at 1236.

He's so happy. He doesn't know what you sound like. I hope he listens to you at some point on this podcast. But he loves that newsletter. In 2016, with this experience, is there anything you'd like to share before I put on some lowest of the low here that you learned?

Anything in plan for 2017? I think one of the amazing experiences was the fact that I got to do this one thing from beginning to end in a calendar year. I'd been involved in so many projects before that fizzled out. Things got canceled. Money got pulled. Some sort of trauma happened, and I wasn't able to see my ambitions through. So yeah, a lot of credit is due to St. Joseph Media and the marvelous people I work with there because they really wanted to make this happen. And it meant from getting from January to December

inside of one calendar, and we pulled that off. And since then, a lot of other developments have happened with St. Joseph, with Toronto Life in particular. They've launched a whole suite of newsletters. They're into this newsletter format. It's a big thing, a big deal. They've got one about real estate and things that are happening in Toronto that week. If you go to Toronto Life newsletter section, you can see what's going on. So I think we might be turning a corner and see some different developments with how the email newsletter becomes a content delivery system.

So I'm excited about the fact that we've gotten it to this point. We'll see what comes next. And how many different podcasts did you do in 2016? Because I know you did Canada Land and I know you did Toronto Mic'd. And you did more than that, right? Well, that doesn't mean I want to tell people about them five timers club

I made the five timers club any chance 2017 brings us a 1236 podcast is this at all on the whiteboard somewhere in St. Joseph media in the words of our new MPP Sam Oosterhof Doogie Howser MPP,

that's for me to know and you to find out. And that brings us to the end of our 210th show. You can follow me on Twitter, at Toronto Mike, and Mark is at 1236. That's 1-2-3-6. And our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer, and Mark is at 1236. That's 1-2-3-6. And our friends at Great Lakes Brewery are at Great Lakes Beer and Chef's Plate is at Chef's Plate CA. See you next week with James Myrtle

and Sean Fitzgerald from The Athletic. Yeah, the wind is cold, but the snow wants me today And your smile is fine, and it's just like mine And it won't go away Cause everything is rosy and green