- Moses Znaimer was born in Kulab, Tajikistan (former Soviet Republic) in 1942. During the height of the Second World War, his family fled to Shanghai, and eventually went on to end up settling in Montréal. He was educated at McGill University in Montréal, receiving a BA in philosophy and politics. He received an MA in government from Harvard University.
After graduation he accepted a job at the CBC, directing, producing, and hosting several shows from 1965 to 1969. Znaimer quit the CBC in 1969, and launched into private broadcasting. At that time all the VHF licenses in Toronto had been taken, so he founded the city's first UHF channel, CITY, Channel 79 (later 57), in 1972. The unique programming of CITY has been Znaimer's primary contribution to the world of broadcasting, and its influence has now been felt worldwide.
The success of CITY prompted Toronto media conglomerate CHUM to purchase the station in 1981. With a much larger budget, Znaimer went on to found several other television stations starting with MuchMusic in 1984, Canada's first 24-hour music station. The idea was copied with a French-language station, MusiquePlus, based in Montréal, in 1986. Since the 1980s Znaimer has been instrumental in shaping the face of Canadian television, launching or helping to direct well over two dozen television stations in Canada and many other parts of the world. His unique style of broadcasting, the "Participatory, Interactive, Storefront, Studioless, Television Operating System", sets all CHUM-CITY stations apart from more traditional media sources. It has always been Znaimer's goal to create television that reflects those who watch it, and every station goes to great lengths to be able to include as many of the different cultural, ethnic, and diverse programs and personalities found in Toronto and all over Canada as possible.
- IMDb mini biography by: Michael Solomon (solomonmtb@hotmail.com)
- Spouse
- Founder of MZTV, Toronto's Museum of Television
- All of Znaimer's television stations are headquartered at Toronto's famous "temple of television", the historic CHUM-CITY building at the corner of Queen & John Sts. in Toronto.
- The CHUM-CITY building is renowned as the world's only television studio without any studios. Broadcasting can be done from any point within the building, meaning the offices, lobbies, and even roof of the building serve as impromptu studios.
- Founder of the following television stations: CityTV (1972), MuchMusic (1984), MusiquePlus (1986), MuchMoreMusic (1998), MusiMax (1997), Bravo! (1995), SPACE (1997), CablePulse24 (1998), Canadian Learning Television (1999), Star! (1999), FashionTelevision - The Channel (2001), BookTelevision (2001), The Law and Order Channel (2001), SexTV (2001)
- Moses Znaimer has stepped down from CHUM exec posts, but stays on in other roles.
- Anyone who's a fan of award ceremonies, particularly the red carpet segments, is treated regularly to parades - not just of celebrity but of cosmetic science. Probably at no time in history have so many people who've availed themselves of so much plastic surgery been so available for public examination. Face lifts, eye jobs, nose jobs, neck jobs, breast and buttock augmentations, filler, Botox, collagen injections, laser peels: it's all on ample display. On display too, are the relative extremes of the cosmetic continuum, from Joan Rivers at one end (the question isn't what she's had done but what she hasn't} to Meryl Streep at the other (if she's had any work done it's impossible to tell). The common motive for most of the 'work' done by and to celebrities is clear: to defeat age. And the impulse isn't restricted to Tinseltown. Today, non-celebrity Zoomers are turning to the same procedures in record numbers too.
- [on aging] Clinging to the same old way of keeping score in life is like treading water because it's the only stroke you know. In the end, it's a mug's game, about as successful as a sixty-year-old trying to dress like a sixteen-year-old. More than any stage of life, more even than infancy or adolescence, old age is a universe unto itself. 'Old age is no place for sissies', Bette Davis once said. But one thing we can do to make our stay more pleasant is to adopt a value system that's more forgiving of the new species we've become.
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