The new vision at Baton is a serenade for Canadian producers long acclimatized to dealing with private broadcasters for whom Canadian drama productions seem to be little more than a licence requirement.

It's a beautifully articulated concept delivered with an energy difficult to question. But one step back, it's one hell of a leap Fecan and the Baton crew are attempting.

The seduction ­ that Canadian dramatic programming can be the axis for success of the network ­ must take place across the board, from the crtc, to the advertisers, to the viewers.

Check out the Nielsen Media Research top 20. It's almost solid CanWest-distributed American sitcoms. The Canadian blips that make the screen are industrial programming buffeted by savvy u.s. leveraged scheduling. Due South and Traders sometimes pull respectable numbers, but they don't draw big advertising attention.

Fecan says Baton's shareholders, who haven't made a profit since the '80s, are onside with the Canadian programming vision. Eventually shareholders want results, typically sooner rather than later. The pressure on Cold Squad is huge.

Traders and Due South are a long way from The Mighty Jungle, even e.n.g., but Canadian series product is seldom mainstream excellent, in part because there hasn't been any room to flex. Canada can't afford to gamble on the scale of the u.s. nets; the volume of pilots it takes to produce a winner is a too-high stakes game.

As per Baton coo Bruce Cowie, the stronger broadcasting system might eventually allow for pilots that fail, but it's going to be arguably more difficult to justify failing this season given the can-do press to the contrary.

In large part, it depends on talent. In large part, it's money, which is where the crtc comes in.

For the Canadian primetime drama vision to work, the benefits on the table from Baton and chum, although welcome in the regions, are not enough. There has to be, when the reshuffling of the broadcast landscape settles in, a standard for contribution to Canadian production triggered by distribution capacity and incorporating both a percentage of advertising revenue and a number of exhibition hours in primetime.

The time for options a or b ­ exhibition hours or the revenue formula ­ for the underrepresented programming categories is fading. On the broadcasting side, it begs inequitable contribution between players with equal access to distribution-tripped revenues. On the production side, it's unstable at best, and at worst, the either/or solution d'esn't maximize the producer's ability to capitalize on the payoff that could eventually come from two years of restructuring.

The partnering karma aside for a minute: like Maritimes Production Services Robert Bongard says, for producers, it's never enough money. For broadcasters, it's about increasing the margins on Canadian programming. To move to the next stage of dramatic programming, the crtc is needed more than ever to make some fair decisions that balance a healthy broadcasting industry and the needs of the production industry.