I have to tell you how absolutely excited I am about all of your presentations. I think you have opened up exactly what we need to talk about. I liked the new media presentation, and I think the last presentation by Mr. Bensimon was a very important one.
Does Industry Canada see itself playing a role? Given that you are working in cooperation with Canadian Heritage on an ongoing basis, do you see yourself having a role in assisting CBC fiscally, and in other ways, to move into the digital media, to really expand as quickly as they can? I think that's the issue. It's not as if they can do this in five years; they need to be doing it yesterday. So I'm asking if you see a role for Industry Canada there.
Many people talked a lot, but I think it was Ms. Oreskovich who talked about a time-shifting component in the new or digital media, which I think is important. In other words, you don't have to see the program when it's on; you can see it whenever you choose to, such as on your iPod on the bus, if you wish. So I think that's a key component we should talk about.
I also was impressed by the international place for CBC. When we started in 1997 at UNESCO, Canada played an important role in moving CBC forward as an international player, using this whole concept of taking on an international role. That seems to have gone by the wayside and we have lost this innovation that we had brought forward.
What do you see as the international role for the CBC? How do you see us doing that, given that we're competing with CNN mostly, and with BBC, in terms of news coverage, etc.?
Finally, I would like you to tell me just a little bit more about how you see CBC moving away from its tendency to want to do in-house production and to be able either to partner with co-productions internationally or to take independent productions and increase its profile on the cinematic stage, on the actual full-length movie stage, in the way that the BBC has done.
Those are the three questions I'm hoping you can answer.