ABSTRACT
The late communications scholar Dallas Smythe argued decades ago, that if Canadian policymakers had been serious about fostering a continentally independent broadcasting system then they would have adopted a different broadcasting standard from that of the American NTSC model. This would have effectively created a transmission barrier to American cultural influence.1 The failure to do so, in his eyes, resulted in a situation whereby Canada became a cultural colony, or branch plant, of the American media industries. Although I certainly do not subscribe to such an isolationist prescription, and its basis within the cultural imperialism thesis, it is difficult to argue for a more effective method of escaping the power of the Hollywood juggernaut than to batten down the hatches and close the virtual border to the influence of American popular culture.
