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The Canada Media Fund’s business policies are now available. This document, Appendix B: Business Policies (PDF), includes the following information:

Default Policy
Accounting and Reporting Requirements
Producer’s Fees and Corporate Overhead Policy
Completion Protection Policy
Production Insurance Policy
Standard Recoupment Policy
Treatment of Tax Credits

The Montreal International Game Summit has unveiled its web site for 2010. Although much of the content is still focused on last year’s conference, more information will be available soon for the November 8 & 9th event.

Since the launch of Implode XL’s latest update which brought the level editor to the iPhone on May 11, 2010 (a little over a week ago), new levels have exploded into the game. IUGO is happy to share some exciting stats about the accumulating user-generated content:

There is now over 10x the amount of content for users to play. IUGO has done updates providing users with 170 levels to play, and there are now over 550 levels are being downloaded and played every day. In total over 100,000 levels have been downloaded and played to-date and over 2,300 levels have been rated by players.

“We are beyond pleased with the reception and engagement that our users have had with the newly launched level editor for Implode XL,” beams Sarah Thomson, IUGO’s Director of BD. “There are some incredibly challenging and creative levels being built and we’re excited that Implode XL fans now have fresh puzzles to solve all the time. We will continue to create games with compelling features that encourage user interactivity and a meaningful social layer. We’re just getting started!”

Implode XL featuring the new level editor for all iDevices is available on the App Store for $2.99 US.

Eidos Montreal is recruiting playtesters for its new PlayTest facility. If you live in or near Montreal, this could be a great opportunity for you to put all those hours of gameplay experience to good use. For those looking for other employment in the game development industry, Eidos Montreal also has a number of career positions open.

This morning on Twitter, Team Need For Speed announced a new build project with Vaughn Gittin Jr. This project involves a 1969 Mustang which Vaughn has been working on since December 2009. Team NFS unveiled a first look at the classic muscle car, which will be unveiled at SEMA 2010 as well as making an appearance in a future Need For Speed title. Check out the details and picture on the Team NFS blog.

MaRS, a Toronto-based not-for-profit innovation centre, is the newest addition to the Canadian Digital Media Network (CDMN). The collaboration will enhance levels of technology commercialization and help develop successful companies in the digital media sector. The announcement follows on the Canada 3.0 2010 digital media forum in Stratford held May 10-11 where Industry Minister Tony Clement emphasized the importance of digital media to Canada’s economy.

“Bringing together MaRS and the collaboration network of the CDMN will enable powerful progress for digital media in Canada,” said Kevin Tuer, Managing Director of the CDMN. “Helping more start-up digital companies bring products to market and creating opportunities for growth in the Information and Communications Technology field is critical both for Ontario and all of Canada.”

MaRS advisors have been helping tech companies with advice, education, market insight and access to capital since 2006.

“At MaRS we are dedicated to furthering growth in the ICT sector by enabling the success of emerging technology companies,” said advisor Krista Jones, ICT Practice Lead. “We’re located in the heart of Toronto and have worked with hundreds of early-stage companies across Ontario to help them build their ventures into global successes.”

Together MaRS and the CDMN, which is headquartered in Waterloo Region and now connects nodes throughout Canada, will share and develop knowledge through surveys, data-mining and reports; develop programs to enhance entrepreneurial skills; promote the capabilities of digital media industries in Canada; and more. The CDMN was the organizer, with the University of Waterloo Stratford Campus, of the Canada 3.0 2010 forum.

Wavefront and SFU Present Developing Apps for Symbian. This seminar is targeted at developers who would like to learn the basics about developing apps on the Symbian platform. According to ABI Research, more than 330 million cell phones run Symbian OS with a 48% global market share for smartphones. Developers will learn how to leverage the Symbian Horizon Program, an application-publishing platform that allows developers to write an application once and publish it in dozens of Symbian app stores worldwide, and how to port apps from other platforms to Symbian. This seminar will take place on the morning of May 28th at Discovery Parks in Vancouver. Attendance is free, but registration is required.

Curious about how to use Facebook, Twitter, and other social media to enhance your business? Wondering what your competitors, customers, and prospects are talking about? Or unsure of how to tell what’s working and what isn’t? Join the Social Media Club Vancouver at Social Media 101 where the answers to all of these questions will be explored.

With three light-speed presentations: 20 minutes for lecture, 10 minutes for Q&A, join Guacira Naves, Kemp Edmonds, and Tris Hussey, the clutter will be cleared and you will gain the critical information you need to advance your social media plans.

1. Social Media Strategy: integrating social media into your existing online outreach (Guacira Naves)
2. Twitter for business intelligence: how to use Twitter for your business while ignoring Britney Spears and her ilk. (Tris Hussey)
3. Mad for metrics: Tricks and tips to track everything (Kemp Edmonds)

Social Media 101 will be held on May 27th at The Coworking Gallery at Building Opportunities with Business, 163 East Pender Street in Vancouver. Tickets are $15.00 each, which will cover food, beverages, and venue.

The National Film Board of Canada (NFB) announced today in Cannes the winner of the 6th NFB Online Short Film Contest: Crash! Bang! Wallow? by Jon Dunleavy and Keith Wilson-Singer of the United Kingdom. The award ceremony was held this afternoon at the Short Film Corner in the presence of Claude Joli-Cœur, Assistant Commissioner of the NFB.

This year, the 10 shortlisted films generated more than 2 million views in 14 days – an increase of over 1000 percent compared to last year – on the NFB’s English and French YouTube channels. This sixth edition was organized by the NFB in collaboration with the Short Film Corner, the meeting place in Cannes for short filmmakers from around the world, and in association with YouTube, the world’s most popular video sharing site. In partnering the contest, the NFB continues to encourage the creators of bold and innovative shorts.

The public had 14 days to vote online for their favourite short film on the YouTube site, which recorded more than 20,000 votes from all over the globe. The contest attracted the attention of a large number of subscribers to the NFB Twitter accounts, reaching close to 16,000 short film lovers. Numerous blogs aired the videos on their sites.

The winning short, Crash! Bang! Wallow?, is an animated film that tells the tale of ex-Hollywood stuntman Larry LeTan and his fight to find a place in the modern world. Filmmakers Jon Dunleavy and Keith Wilson-Singer will receive a digital camera/HD video camera and a laptop computer from the NFB. The winning film can be viewed until June 20, 2010, at or . The short films that came in second, third and fourth place are Love and Theft by Andreas Hykade (Germany), The Technician by Simon-Olivier Fecteau (Canada) and The Story of My Life by Pierre Ferrière (France). The ten short films of this 2010 edition were selected by Danny Lennon from the many entries submitted to the Cannes Film Festival Short Film Corner by filmmakers from around the world.

The other finalists were Mother of Many by Emma Lazenby (United Kingdom), Forbidden Tree by Banafsheh Modaressi (Iran), Annie Goes Boating by Noel Paul (United States), Awake by Thaid Dhi (Czech Republic), The Last Passenger by Mounes Khammar (Algeria) and The Report Card by Alessandro Celli (Italy).

Congratulations are also due to the digital media award winners at the recent Rosie Awards, hosted by the Alberta Motion Picture Industries Association.  The award for Best Digital Program or Project went to Playing It Safe, a video project for the Web created by at-risk youth.

Since March 2008, the North West Centre has been working with at-risk youth who have been creating and telling episodic stories (webisodes) about staying healthy and alive. The community partners in the project include the youth-serving agencies YouthCo Aids Society in Vancouver and iHuman and the Youth Restorative Action Program (YRAP) in Edmonton. These agencies recruited and supported the youth who participated in training sessions to learn the basic crafts of camera, storytelling, and editing. Filmmaking teams, made up of an at-risk youth filmmaker and a peer filmmaker, worked closely with director Terri Wynnyk to write, shoot, and edit the short episodic stories on this website. All the videos went through a small post production process: in Vancouver with filmmaker Lisa Nielsen and in Edmonton with Terri and editor, Brenda Terning.

The AMPIA Award for Best Animator(s) or Motion Picture Graphic Artist(s) went to Robb Thompson, Steve Seeley, Calvin Sun and Shelley Cornies of Studio Dialog for their work on the Shaw Digital Phone “Cool” piece. Studio Dialog also won the Best Visual Effects Award for their work on Freevi. Taking home the Rosie for best Digital Cross-Platform Project was Shaw Snailskis – Find Seth –
John Cameron & John Lawson, Producers, White Iron Digital.

IGLOO Software has added integrated Group Space functionality for team collaboration. Group Spaces allow employees to instantly self-organize around specific projects, teams and even departments within their online business community. With the addition of Group Spaces, community members can now seamlessly move between group and corporate driven conversations, content and collaborations – quickly and easily.

“It’s an accepted maxim that working in teams makes us more creative and productive – that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts,” said Dan Latendre, CEO of IGLOO Software. “Our new Group Space functionality gives our community members the ability to quickly form groups and begin sharing experiences, resources and intelligence almost automatically.”

“The value of self-organizing into Group Spaces increases as the community grows,” remarked Stephanie Sawyer, Product Manager for IGLOO Software. “Now, users can better manage the information flow and increase the relevancy of activity streams by easily creating a secure, dedicated team space.”

The new release enables the creation of sub-communities within a community by introducing these team collaboration features:

* Customization: configure and brand the space to align with the purpose and function of the team (ex. boardroom, department or project space).
* Applications: enable only the social applications that are needed – blogs, calendars, documents & folders, forum discussions, galleries and wiki pages.
* Permissions: create public or private Group Spaces, as well as control which members have access to the space, following the same permission model as the rest of the community.
* Activity Streams: set up a group space pulse or daily digest which keeps members up to date on the most recent contributions (ex. blog articles, document uploads or online discussions).
* Navigation: customize each Group Spaces’ navigation depending on which applications are most important to the members.

The winners of the 2010 CATAAlliance Innovation Awards were announced Wednesday night at a sold out Gala Dinner, emceed by CTV Ottawa TechNow Host Paul Brent. For more than two decades, the CATAAlliance Innovation Awards Gala Dinner has been celebrating the best in Canadian advanced technology. Awards were presented in the following areas:

* Community Leadership Award: Dean Micheal Kelly, Telfer School of Management, University of Ottawa
* Telfer School of Management Private Sector Leadership Award: David Ross, CEO, Ross Video
* CATAAlliance Public Sector Innovation and/or Leadership Award: Tony Rahilly, Director General, NRC-IRAP
* The Peter Brojde Award for Next Generation Executive Leadership: Jason Flick, Co-founder and President, YOU iLabs
* ICTC Information Technology Strategic HR Leadership Award: Human Resource Systems Group (HRSG)
* KPMG CIO Leadership Award: John Hill, SaskTel
* Gowlings Outstanding Product Achievement in Clean Technology Award: NIMTech
* Celestica Award for Technology Commercialization: Cavet Technologies
* Ericsson Award for Outstanding Product Achievement in the Content and Application Mobility Industry (MoCo): Clevest Solutions Inc.
* TSX Emerging Technology Award: Platform Computing Corp
* CAMSC Innovation Through Diversity Award: Pascale Legros, HP
* Wellington West Capital Award: Spartan Bioscience Inc.
* High Road Communications Award for Science and Technology Reporting: Tyler Hamilton, Toronto Star
* Quebec Media Award – Prix de l’innovation pour l’Excellence dans le journalisme scientifique et technique medias du Quebec: Alain McKenna, Les Affaires
* Sara Kirke Award for Canada’s Leading Woman High Tech Entrepreneur: sponsored by Carleton University: Carol Leaman, CEO, PostRank Inc.
* QNX Mobile Platform Award: Alcatel-Lucent
* KINSA Innovation Award: Dave Templeton, Quiettouch Inc.

The Canadian information technology industry met recently in Toronto for the IT360° Conference & Expo, where business and technology professionals converge to stay ahead of the technology curve, gain insight and better adapt to a constantly changing industry. Attendees experienced a 360 view of information through the multi-sectored forum which focused on Unified Communications, Security, Data Centres, VoIP, Cloud Computing, IT Business and Asterisk.

Keynote speaker Gary Warner filled the room past capacity and captivated the audience. Warner’s experience with the U.S. Homeland Security, the FBI and conducting work with large corporations like Walmart, provided ample discussion on his topic Universal Threat Awareness.

IT360°, a unique event in Canada, expanded its reach by hosting two concurrent conferences within the event. The Cloud Computing Conference: An IT Paradigm Shift, which opened the evening before with CloudCamp Toronto, focused on the increasing importance of the cloud. The Asterisk & Open Telephony Conference, sponsored by Digium Inc. and the Toronto Asterisk User Group (TAUG), brought together Asterisk and VoIP professionals. Both conferences ran throughout the day and incorporating these additional agendas provided members of the IT community with a unique in-depth event. There were over 1000 delegates at IT360° 2010.

Education continued to be top-priority at IT360° through the 30-session conference. Bruce Cole, president of Plum Communications Inc. and producer of IT360°, says, “We continue to deliver an excellent one day conference and trade show. This format was well received by both delegates and exhibitors. Our live face-to-face event allowed for personal networking and closer relationships to take place. We look forward to April 5, 2011.”

The trade show was a highly charged hands-on environment that featured high profile experts from leading vendor companies providing timely facts, future developments and live demonstrations.

Tricon Films & Television, one of North America’s fastest growing production and distribution companies, has announced exclusive long-term agreements with two production companies for their programming. These agreements include lifestyle-based brands from Peace Point Entertainment Group and five new sport adventure series from Water Productions.

With today’s announcement, Tricon has added 10 new series to their existing catalogue, solidifying the company’s commitment to offering programming that is internationally relevant and commercially accessible.

“We are looking forward to representing both of these producers who have the track record of consistently delivering fresh and internationally exploitable product,” said Andrea Gorfolova, President, Tricon Films & Television.

Peace Point Entertainment Group’s catalogue of lifestyle-based programming acquired by Tricon, includes:

Tanlines – 39 x 30 PLUS 4 x 60 – White sand. Huge waves. Hot sun. Beautiful people. Escape from the ordinary and explore the ‘hotter and wetter’ side of our planet as Tanlines takes you to the best surf, sand and sun locations the globe has to offer. Paradise has never been so accessible!

Urban Nites – 13 x 30 – Hustlers. Street Performers. Vampires. Follow this racy docu-series as it reveals the nocturnal characters that populate the great urban outdoors and are out on the prowl way past our bedtimes.

The Outhouse – 6 x 60 – This series takes a decidedly comical point-of-view to the ‘seriousness’ of home renovation. Through self-deprecating revelations and hysterical situations, two teams must somehow work toward big changes with a small budget.

Camp’N Out – 13 x 30 – Outdoor enthusiasts, unite! CAMP’N OUT takes viewers on an exploration of the world of camping. The series covers all facets of the camping lifestyle as we visit campsites and parks in some of the most beautiful locations in the country, showcasing the latest in innovative camping gear and products, providing important first aid and survival advice, as well as helpful cookout recipes and exciting activities to keep your mind and body working in the depths of nature.

Fanatical – 26 x 30 – Fanatical is a television series that explores the minds of the most devoted television show fans. They keep tabs on actors, characters, story plots and conspiracy theories, visit filming locations, collect memorabilia, create and wear costumes, connect with other like-minded fans and attend festivals and conferences.

Water Production’s five new sport and adventure series’ acquired by Tricon, include:

GRRtv – 44 x 30 – The world of motor-sports isn’t just for adults anymore. GRRtv is the world’s first motor-sports show aimed at kids between 4-16 years old who are willing and able to race anything that utilizes a helmet and a motor.

The Motorhead Traveler – 26 x 30 – This series will open your eyes to an entire new concept in motorsport adventure travel. Follow Motorhead Traveler Kevin Cullen as he takes you on a motorized journey around the globe exposing you to magnificent viewpoints, local culture, geology, history, local art and outdoor cooking.

PWCtv – 130 x 30 – PWCtv is one part travel show, one part action/sports show, all combining together to create the world’s foremost authority on personal watercraft use and adventure. From Germany to Alaska to Spain – the series travels the globe to showcase how other countries utilize their personal watercrafts for every day and recreational use. PWCtv is your best source for everything related to the personal watercraft lifestyle!

Sledsense – 34 x 30 – The ultimate winter motorsport adventure travel show! At the heart of every episode is an absolute love of snowmobiling and a total thirst for great adventures. Follow Kevin Cullen and co-host Brian Koster on their quest to find the best in snowmobile sport adventure and travel to the best snowmobiling destinations on the planet. From the Rocky Mountains to the great riding trails in Iceland – SLEDSENSE examines safety tips, provides expert advice and showcases some of the more picturesque trails the world has to offer!

MXCulture – 13 x 30 – The exploding sport of Motocross is blown up on MXCulture, and we are going behind the scenes with the biggest names in the sport to see how they live, train and practice.