Category C services

A Category C service is the former term for a Canadian discretionary specialty channel which, as defined by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, operates under the conditions of license for "competitive Canadian specialty services operating in the genres of mainstream sports and national news".

This article is about a former classification system of Canadian cable TV. For the modern classification, see Discretionary service.

Under previous policies, these services were intentionally unprotected from competition by other Category B services of the same genre (as per the now-discontinued genre protection policy), but are still "protected" from competition by other discretionary services. In other words, if someone wants to launch a competing service, they must do so by committing to the same obligations, including common requirements for the exhibition and funding of Canadian-produced programming, as others. Discretionary services, by contrast, may not devote more than 10% of their monthly programming to live professional sports.

Channels licensed as mainstream news services must be offered on a packaged or standalone basis, but not necessarily on the lowest tier of service, by all Canadian television providers. Mainstream sports services are not subject to must-offer rules, and distributors must negotiate directly with their operators for carriage as with all other discretionary services.

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