Stop Usage Based Billing
Canadian Internet rates are currently among the highest in the world. That is about to change. The CRTC's appproval of Bell Canada's request for Usage Based Billing will ensure that Canadian consumers will pay the highest internet costs in the world.
Usage Based Billing (or UBB) will be applied in addition to the rates currently paid by Canadians. The CRTC has allowed 90 days for implementation. The first most Canadians will find out about this will be when they receive their first Usage Based Billing bill.
In April the first leak about Usage Based Billing happened on the last day the CRTC was to accept submissions. Even so, many Canadians submitted complaints to the CRTC. In making their ruling in August the CRTC dismissed the "individual" submissions out of hand.
Usage Based Billing means Canadians will be paying Bell Canada for everything we do online, including (but not limited to) the privilege of receiving spam, advertising banners on websites, and Windows updates.
Usage Based Billing charges will not just apply to Bell Canada (Sympatico) users, these charges will be applied to all Canadians who access the internet through dsl, even if they are not Bell Canada customers.
Probably because so much of the news media is controlled by mega-corporation Bell Canada, the only major media coverage seems to have been the CBC online coverage triggered by an online petition with the objective of dissolving the CRTC.
The petition has garnered over six thousand signatures even though there has been virtually no news media coverage.
The Independent Internet Service Providers will at best be hard hit. This government interference will wreak havock with service contracts. If allowed to stand, Usage Based Billing will likely sound the death knell for competition with the Canadian internet service sector.
More important, by doubling the costs of moderate internet users, this ruling will put Canada at a huge disadvantage in the global economy due to this artificially inflated expense. Internet users in the rest of the world will have an edge over Canadians who are likely to curb their online use due to cost.
You can sign the petition at http://dissolvethecrtc.ca/
For more information check out my dedicated blog Stop Usage Based Billing
The news media has neglected to share this information with Canadians, so its up to us to spread the word about Usage Based Billing.
signed.
me too
Dissolve the CRTC?
I'm all for dissolving the CRTC with H2SO4.
I signed the petition but am unsure about the dissolving part. I'll have to do some research on the consequences first.
Well, from books I've read, there'd be a film of undissolved fat floating on top, and perhaps things like gallstones, and any stainless steel prosthetics or screws from old accidents or injuries.
Hahahaha. Gross.
Dissolve the CRTC?
Yeah. Fuck em. Its just turned into another patronage trough.
I would support the CRTC if it did it's job instead of blocking al jazeera(sp) instead of fox...that just says how BS the system is...nevermind how they alow us to get screwed on everything telecommunications wise.
Hmm. Like Stargazer, I'd have to think about that more.
Squeemish bunch.
While we're at it, how about stopping usage-based billing on cell phones? Why shouldn't they be billed the same way as landlines?
How about Bell is the sole provider of land lines used for ADSL internet. At least there is some competition among cell phone companies. Now of course Bell is obligated to shop out its infrastructure to support 3rd party bulk bandwidth providers, and those providers have been doing so a extremely competative rates. The point of UBB is allowing Bell to charge those 3rd party bulk providers for bandwidth usage, and so make them less competative.
I don't know where this puts us in terms of how much profit Bell is making of internet usage, but I am highly suspicious because we have the among highest cost/bandwidth ratio among all the OECD countries. To me it looks like the primary internet backbone providers are already gauging consumers at astronimical rates, and intend do use their monopoly status to continue to do so. In fact you can get cheaper and faster bandwidth in places like Hungary and Poland. The CRTC is the public regulatory body they use to enforce their monopoly and squeeze consumers.
The third party providers have been proving that they can deliver cheaper service just as efficiently, often with better support, and now Bell wants to kill them in the market.
No. Its not at all like cell phones, at all.
Ihave to pay Rogers 90 bucks a month to get rates advertised at 1 Meg. upload. In fact, due to throttling upload is sometimes as low as 3K. It's a rip off, and Bell is no better.
Is Bell really the sole provider? Does Telus not dominate in the West as a last mile provider, or is Bell their carrier for DSL as well?
Wow... thank you all for reading and commenting. I'm not used to this... the Stop UBB blog I started to raise awareness of the UBB horror has given me almost no feedback. There are readers but without feedback its hard to know what anyone is thinking.
Spector: The problem isn't JUST that it's usage based billing. Usage Based Billing will not be instead it will be IN ADDITION to what we are already paying. Without giving us anything for doubling the cost. So its different from cel phones. Cel phone stuff can surely be included in the CRTC doing bad stuff category. Along with allowing the big 3 to control the national media.
Making internet more expensive will harm websites like this one. This kind of "rabble rousing" is most probably one of the things CRTC & Bell Canada wants UBB to stop. And the existing government perhaps? Its much easier to tread on people in the dark.
Jaberwock, as far as I know, Bell Canada owns the telephone cable on the Eastern side of Canada, and Telus owns the telephone cable on the western side. I believe Telus was originally BCTel and may well still be. I'm not sure where the demarkation line would be.
As far as internet goes, the two Bells plus Rogers cover Canada, and I've heard them called "The Big Three". Bell Canada along with another company with Bell in their name are who have applied and been granted permission from CRTC for UBB.
There have been heaps of bad things CRTC has been allowing for decades. Either they are crooked or they're incompetent, it does not matter because the result is the same. If ten thousand people sign the online petition, the people running the http://dissolvethecrtc.ca/ will present the petition to the minister in charge of the CRTC, and possibly have a march or rally in Ottawa or something. As of this minute there are 6486 signatures.
Ten thousand online signatures, even with email adddress verifications would probably not be enough to dissolve the CRTC, (unless we keep the acid bath going on a back room... if nothing else we might end the practice of slimy back room deals right quick). Hopefully the petition will force the CRTC and the politicians to realize that people are watching BEFORE Bell Canada starts billing people extortionaltely. They know some of us are watching, because between April 14th and now over 6.000 complained direct to CRTC specifically about UBB (You can read them at CRTC - Bell Canada - TN 7181 - General Tariff - Gateway Access Service - COMMENTS
I am especially hopeful that enough noise will force the big media outlets to cover Usage Based Billing. The more people who speak up, the more people on the record, the harder it will be for the news people to ignore.
At this point I'm starting to think there has been enough of a flurry online that if we had any real reporters they would be covering it. Apparently what we've been led to think of as news media is really just a home shopping network.
The CRTC should not consist solely of ex-Bell Canada staffers. Maybe one from each industry, but the rest should be consumers. And Cueball is right, even before UBB Canada is either second or 3rd highest internet rates in the world. Usage Based Billing will make us a world leader.
Canada also pays the highest mobile rates in the world as well. It's outrageous what they pay in the UK for mobile service compared to Canada. About 3/4 less then we do.
It's definately out of control and the CRTC is doing nothing, well not yet. Bell has even admitted that their "Internet billing monitor" is bogus and doesn't work properly and did shut it down for a while in February.
I have been writing about this since last year that Bell is just gouging us and we need to stand up and be counted, and not take it any longer. My sister lives in Michigan, and when I asked her how much bandwidth she gets she said, "I've never heard of such a thing."
She checked into it and they get 250GB of bandwidth every month and DirectTV has no limits per month and we get a measly 25GB?
It'slike a hotel charging extra for local phone calls, it doesn't cost them anything they are just generating some revenue where they can get it, because they already have phone lines and it's just a money grab.
Does it cost us extra to go to Bell's bandwidth usage monitor to see how much bandwidth we are using? Check out what others are saying.
Daniel .. Toronto, CANADA
My take on everything
According to a statement, Bell Canada has opted to pull its plan to impose a usage-based billing scheme on its wholesale Internet clients and instead has presented the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission with a proposal for a different pricing model known as "aggregated volume pricing," or AVP. Bell has withdrawn its wholesale UBB proposal.
"The model provides wholesale (Internet service providers) with complete pricing flexibility on a per-customer basis," Bell said in a statement.
"It offers wholesale ISPs the flexibility to develop their own pricing approaches, while supporting the fundamental principle that those who use less network capacity do not subsidize those that use the most. By enabling wholesale ISPs to purchase network capacity based on overall volume of usage, rather than on a per-customer basis, the new model gives wholesale ISPs greater flexibility to offer service packages based on their own business objectives and requirements."
While Bell characterized its new proposal as a compromise, one that will allow it to reinvest billions of dollars in its broadband network, critics of Bell's initial usage-based billing proposal claimed victory.
WFP
Ya Bell is likely be regrouping for a counter attack. They haven't lowered their rates just agreed not to screw-over customers. For now that is. They'll be back with caps in hand for a handout from the feds/taxpayers for some lame reason or other. They'll prolly complain to the feds that they couldn't afford to pay for reupholstering cracked leather seats in their lear jets in time to fly all their friends to the super bowl or something. And the jerks in Ottawa will have all kinds of pity for them.
Fidel - They will be...I don't expect them to take the route we want. I've kinda commented on other forums, but Bell's reasoning behind UBB isn't really a cash grab (it's a happy side-effect for them I guess). Ultimately comes to them asking the question "Whats the cheapest quickest way we ca provide IPTV". IP technologies side with reliability before real time as we learned with VOIP implementations. VOIP is tiny bandwidth and the issue can be solved by throwing more bandwidth at it. IPTV on the other hand needs a really large amount of real time bandwidth in order to succeed so just throwing more bandwidth isn't possible. Option A...invest in their network. Option B...traffic control. UBB is the attempt to attach price per unit to bits and prioritize as such, allowing them to give priority to IPTV signals and 'paid traffic'.
Curious what they'll attempt next. I really don't expect them to make the needed investments in their networks (Since Bell went IPO, they've been all about dividends now, fuck network investment. In UBB proposals they had to specifically state plans to invest into the network as UBB does promote the opposite). I'd almost expect Bell to try other traffic control technique (UBB ultimately requires reading data on the network to figure out if it's paid traffic, which has reaching net nuetrality implications), but I'm not sure how far they'll push these issues now that the CRTC is on pretty shakey ground. Guess time will tell. CRTC needs to be disbanded anyway...it's horribly infiltrated by ex-Bell employees that readily bend to Bell's will.
FYI - part of the phone price of canada compared to UK relates to the size of canada. CRTC regulates telco's can't charge more money for the same service based on location...and it costs alot less per unit to serve an apartment building than it does trying to serve someone living on a rural farm. Basically means Urban canada subsidizes rural canada's phone services.
testing
... please ignore.
thanks
testing
... please ignore.
thanks
That testing, if you have Bell, just cost you $.004 cents in bandwidth, better be careful, it all adds up. Even if you check your "Bandwidth Monitor" on Bell you are probably charged bandwidth, to check your bandwidth, but will they ever admit to it?
Don't give up, fight for your rights, and don't become "Sheeple" don't let them wear you down and give up fight for the right to use the internet without these monitors, which is just a money grab on the part of Bell.
Daniel .. Toronto
Another UBB protest/petition site here > http://openmedia.ca/meter
I had signed that one after getting a nudge from a Facebook friend, so no offense eh?
Dissolving the CRTC is one way to disrupt the corruption in Canadian media... And when the NDP gets a majority in parliament there will be a lot of purging!!
I'm not sure I agree.
Obviously, if we have big corporations making massive profits, and this is just one more charge - then sure let's stop it.
But if the goal is to shift the burden so that people who don't use as much bandwidth don't have to pay as much as the people who are using 300GB/month to download TV shows/movies, livestream, and play onine games, I have to think that makes sense.
If they propose usage-based billing in a way that is revenue neutral, I would have to support that.
People like me who use 200GB a month should pay more than people who use 1GB a month. We slow everyone down, and make the networks incur higher costs.
It might be of some interrest that campaign contributions by Bell to the Progressive party for Tony Clement was 20,000 in 2004.
Telus was 5000.
Rogers Communication Inc. was 12,500.
You'd would think there would be conflict of interest here for any decision made by Clements. What influence and attempt would/could he have over CRTC? It would be a faint hearten one for sure wouldn't it?
Bell Canada took a step back from its aggressive and much-derided stance on usage-based billing (UBB) recently when it announced it would drop efforts to impose an exorbitantly priced UBB model on independent Internet service providers (IISPs) such as TekSavvy Solutions Inc.
Instead, purportedly acceding to IISPs’ requests, it would supply bandwidth to IISPs through an aggregated volume pricing (AVP) model, allowing IISPs to allocate bandwidth as they wished among their customers. Bell would still price bandwidth based on usage; the cost would be 19.5¢ per gigabyte when purchased in a package of one terabyte (1,000 GB), and 29.5¢ per GB for any overage.
On the surface this appears to be a generous concession by Bell, an improvement on a severely restrictive supply model and otherworldly pricing far beyond that seen anywhere else in the industrialized world (its previous UBB plan sought up to $2.50/GB).
See: Internet Billing Debate: Too little, too late by Rocky Gaudrault
The poor state of all Telecom Services AND its high prices was spurred by the Conservative governments 2006 policy direction. The major telecoms have been in a profitering feeding frenzy ever since. While prices in the rest of the world or telecom services have been dropping, The prices in Canada have only increased.***
Comment by Bill Hillier:
It is time for Canadians to stand together and put a stop to this!
What TRUE competition and "Market Forces" brings to the consumer.
UK, Orange, 20Mbps , Unlimited, $23.48 CAD.
France, Orange, 8Mbps, Unlimited, 28.42 CAD.
France, SFR, 20Mbps, Unlimited, 21.68 CAD.
Romania, Adnet telecom, 10Mbps, Unlimited, 29.13 CAD.
Italy, Libero, 7 MMbps, unlimited, 26.99 CAD.
Japan, OCN, 12Mbs, Unlimited, 25.22 CAD.
Russia, AKADO-Stolitsa JSC), 20Mbps, Unlimited, 25.00 CAD.
Netherlands, Online, 4Mbps, Unlimited, $24,04 CAD.
Netherlands, Online, 20Mbps, Unlimited, $30.88 CAD.
Netherlands, KPN, 8Mbps, Unlimited, $34.33 CAD.
Netherlands, XS4ALL, 8Mbps, Unlimited, $41.13 CAD.
Romania 50 Mbps, Unlimited, $9.56 100 Mbps, Unlimited, $12.86 (incl. VAT) CAD
The UBB deception
The Digital Debate
To watch the original full-length version go to the CBC: http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/News/Canada_Votes_2011/1857462143/ID=1871321854
OpenMedia.ca has obtained a conference call between Shaw executives and shareholders. The call reveals that the telecom giant will go ahead with a metered Internet pricing scheme after the election.
http://youtu.be/x8Jzj9SYaiA?hd=1
We need all the major political parties to make a commitment to fix the growing problem of out-of-control Internet fees.
That’s why OpenMedia.ca asked each of the parties to outline their plan of action in our all-party Digital Future Survey. We received answers from every major federal party...with the exception of the Conservative Party of Canada.
Please tell Stephen Harper and your local Conservative candidate you want a response to OpenMedia.ca’s digital future survey now.
The Internet is elemental to our economy, jobs and social progress - you deserve to know where all the parties stand so you can make an informed voting decision. Don’t let the Conservatives leave you in the dark.
I believe that this is one of the motivating factors driving the youth vote. Youth of today live online, it is their home, their diary,& their meeting place.
Perhaps a lot of youth don't have the life experience to look behind the cold malamute eyes of Stevie and figure out what might be coming at them if he should ever get his majority, but they know what to do when someone threatens to take away their iphone.
Change comes about with knowledge and to have limits applied to what the population can do in regards to it's potential then why limit informed decisions about the way our societies can grow? Access to knowledge? Access to sharing points of view?
The Middle east was a prime example. All that was needed in Egypt, in regard to the opposition materializing in action, was a culmination of work for tens years. All it needed, was a connection between the people.
This is not to say that you supplant human contact as a electronic substitute, for contact and collaboration. Just that you provide for the probability of information to come forward for growth from different perspectives.
well said
Steve Wozniak - Steve Wozniak is a computer engineer who co-founded Apple Computer, Inc. with Steve Jobs. He created the Apple I and Apple II series computers in the mid-1970s. After earning the National Medal of Technology in 1985, Wozniak left Apple to work on various business and philanthropic ventures.
The early Internet was so accidental, it also was free and open in this sense. The Internet has become as important as anything man has ever created. But those freedoms are being chipped away. Please, I beg you, open your senses to the will of the people to keep the Internet as free as possible. Local ISP's should provide connection to the Internet but then it should be treated as though you own those wires and can choose what to do with them when and how you want to, as long as you don't destruct them. I don't want to feel that whichever content supplier had the best government connections or paid the most money determined what I can watch and for how much. This is the monopolistic approach and not representative of a truly free market in the case of today's Internet.Steve Wozniak to the FCC: Keep the Internet Free
***
An Open letter Concerning a Not-So-Open Internet LETTER START
As I turn on my computer to begin this letter, I log into Windows and receive a notification that an update is available for Java. Something I’ve seen a hundred times before and never really given much thought to. But this time something else crosses my mind; how big is the update? How much data will be downloaded to my computer? I read each of the prompts that come up on my screen, a little more closely than previously, looking for some indication of file size, but I see nothing. I go ahead with the update, but not without some concern. The issue? Something as simple as a software update on my computer may actually end up costing me money.
The new Usage Based Billing systems coming into place with the big Internet Providers in Canada will mean a lot more restriction and monitoring of the things we do every day. Products we have already paid for, services we have already subscribed to (along with their monthly or annual bills) will now be subject to overage fees, adding more cost onto what we already pay. Where we could once pay a single monthly bill for our internet, we will now be paying not only the bill, but also the extra fees for having used more data than the Internet Service Providers think we should be using.
I have a few internet connected devices in my home aside from just a computer. Most Canadians would agree that a household with a single computer used simply for checking email and doing online banking is no longer the norm in our society. When most people hear talk of “large downloads” and Internet Providers cracking down on “excessive users”, to most this brings up thoughts of people using file sharing, or peer-to-peer programs to share music and movies across the internet. But with the prevalence of so many internet connected devices found in almost every home, and with legitimate online video and music streaming services being introduced, “large downloads” is something that now applies to everyone, whether they fully realize it or not.
I have an Xbox360. I use it to watch videos, play online multiplayer games with friends, download game demos, and to purchase and download full games through Microsoft’s Xbox Live service. As my monthly bandwidth allotment from my Internet Provider disappears, I will simply stop using it. I have already paid for my Xbox, the use of the online service through my Xbox Live Gold account, the games themselves, and for my internet access. With Usage Based Billing I will be expected to pay yet again if I don’t monitor my usage closely enough.
I should not be paying more for services that I already pay for.
This does not only apply to people with Xbox 360’s, but also to anyone with a Sony Playstation or a Nintendo Wii in their home. It would be safe to assume that the majority of people in this country that have an internet connection have at least one of these gaming devices in their home. Even if it’s in your son’s or daughter’s room and you never actually use it yourself, it’s the same as any other computer connected to your home network. We paid for them, in some cases we pay extra for the fuller online experience, and now we will be expected to pay yet again, each month, due to these new bandwidth restrictions. Higher monthly bills will result in people placing more restrictions on usage, watching their bandwidth meter, making sure they’ll be able to afford their internet bill for the month.
I don’t use it myself, but I know there are a number of people that purchase music, movies and television shows through Apple’s iTunes. Having paid for your videos, perhaps in High Definition format, downloading them, and then being charged again at the end of the month due to the size of the videos themselves, is completely unfair.
I subscribe to Netflix. I have been using it on both my home computers and my Xbox. Although now with the new changes coming into effect, when I find a movie on Netflix I want to watch, I’ll be checking to see how much more, on top of the fee I have already paid to Netflix, the movie might end up costing me. Again, paying more for services that I already pay for.
I use an online backup service called Crashplan. All of my computer files are backed up daily to their secure servers, leaving me the peace of mind that if our home was broken into or anything was destroyed in a fire, all of my files and programs would be safe. Already paying an annual fee for the service, I may well have to give up this peace of mind in order to keep my internet bill at an affordable level.
As an addition to this full online backup service, I also use a service called Dropbox. This enables me to keep certain files in sync across all of my computers, as well as my Smartphone. A very handy and reliable service, but also one that uses data over my home internet connection. Again, I pay an annual fee for this service, but may end up being charged even more on top of that as a result of the new Usage Based Billing.
I use Last.fm. This is an online radio service that customizes radio stations for me based on my listening habits. I sometime have it playing for most of the day as I do things around the house, but this will have to stop, as I can’t risk the constant data stream pushing my internet bill up and up.
I have friends that use VoIP services; Voice over IP (internet telephone, as opposed to the normal telephones most are familiar with). These services, such as Vonage and Skype, eliminate the need for an extra telephone bill in their homes, and provide long distance savings. But with the overage fees charged by the Internet Providers, they will no longer be the money saving services they were meant to be.
In addition to the PC’s, laptops, and the Xbox I have in my house, I also have a Smartphone. I recently made the switch to an Android based phone, but this will also apply to anyone who has an iPhone, Blackberry, or any other internet enabled phone that can connect to a Wi-Fi network. When at home I keep my phone connected to my home Wi-Fi. Anyone who has a Smartphone knows that these devices transmit a fair amount of data; keeping email, calendar and contacts in sync, various Apps that update in the background at set intervals, downloading new Apps, and, as with most Smartphone’s today, the majority are more than capable of streaming video from YouTube and a number of other online services. With the new Usage Based Billing, my phone is one more device connected to my network when at home, using up the limited bandwidth, and eventually costing me even more by the end of the month.
There are also certain things that are harder to control in our online world when it comes to data consumption; Windows Update is a perfect example. These are the fixes issued by Microsoft for their Windows Operating System that, in most people’s cases, download and install automatically in the background. The only User intervention required is after the updates are finished installing, you get that familiar prompt that your system needs to be restarted. And so the questions: how much data was downloaded during this process? If you were already very close to your monthly bandwidth allowance, did this push you over? Did these updates actually end up costing you more money? The last time I installed my copy of Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook), I remember a number of updates being required through Windows Update, and they were not small in size. Having already purchased the software, I don’t believe I should be charged again for installing the necessary upgrades.
As careful as you might be in regards to the data being transferred in your household, making sure the next bill to come in is within the affordable range, things like background updates for your Operating System, as well as any Anti-Virus and Spyware programs you may be using (on each of the PC’s in your home, mind you), and other updates for any of the software installed on your computer, will also be added to your total data consumption. I’ll admit, these software updates, each on their own, are usually not very large, and so it would be easy to dismiss them. But when added together with the web surfing, online banking and shopping, emailing, Youtubing, Facebooking, video/audio streaming, online gaming (on PC or console), and all the other random data transfer that we have never really had to think too much about in the past, this adds up. And the higher the data consumption climbs, the higher the bill will be at the end of the month.
I certainly don’t like the idea, nor do I think it’s fair, that at the end of any given month, I might find myself very close to the bandwidth allotment given to me, and having to decide if uploading that new video to Facebook is worth an extra dollar or two on my internet bill, or having to weigh the cost of emailing the photos I took at Christmas to my family. Why should my Internet Provider get to cash in on things that are supposed to be free? I already pay for my internet access, as I always have, but now that will not be enough. In order to keep my bill at a reasonable level I will be expected to monitor the usage of every internet connected device in my home (including friends that might stop by with their laptop, netbook or Smartphone), and in some cases will be forced to eliminate certain things and cancel certain services altogether.
It is not too late to change this. As with this letter, there are ways of making sure people are informed about this issue and how, in the end, it will affect their daily lives. The companies and service providers, like the ones I mentioned above, should also be made aware, that if things continue down this road they will in fact be losing customers, as a lot of us will simply not be able to afford their services due to the extra fees being charged by our Internet Providers.
Our society is evolving. Online services and connected devices have become an integral part of our daily lives, for both work and pleasure. The cost of these devices and services is something we weigh at the time of purchase, but now there will be an additional factor to consider; how much more will I have to pay each month to my Internet Provider in order to use them?If you're looking for a way to make this issue known, and to show your support, sign the Stop The Meter petition and encourage your contacts/customers to do the same.
Sign here:http://StopTheMeter.ca
If you are a part of an organization please endorse and otherwise support the Stop The Media campaign. You can reach OpenMedia.ca, the organization running the campaign, by emailing: contact@openmedia.ca
D. Scott...we need a new interdisciplinary field that we call Web Science.
The Web Science Research Initiative brings together academics, scientists, sociologists, entrepreneurs and decision makers from around the world. These people will create the first multidisciplinary research body to examine the World Wide Web and offer the practical solutions needed to help guide its future use and design.
Tim Berners-Lee Speech before Knight Foundation-14 September 2008
Advancing the Web to Empower People: Challenges and Solutions from Web Foundation on Vimeo.
This video summarizes the vision of the World Wide Web Foundation and provides one example of the work we are doing in Africa to empower farmers through the Web. Many thanks to our funder and partner, VU University, Amsterdam, and our other partners in W4RA, for their support in this particular initiative.The Web Foundation is a new international non-profit organization founded by the inventor of the Web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee. The mission of the Foundation is to "advance the Web to empower people".
Why a "Web Foundation"? Communication, collaboration and creativity are critical to social and economic empowerment. The Web is the most powerful means for communication, collaboration and creativity in history. However, the Web is only being used by 1/4 of the Earth's population. The continued growth and advancement of a free and open Web are not guaranteed. There is much work to be done.
The Web Foundation works to catalyze global support for the Web, build local capacity to create accessible content, and promote research that accelerates the ability for individuals and organizations to harness the Web to address major societal challenges.
In this video, the work of the Foundation is illustrated with the story of how we are working to empower farmers in the Sahel region of sub-Saharan Africa. Through Web applications on mobile phones, community radio, ingeniously-simple agricultural techniques developed by a small number of local farmers can be quickly shared with the vast majority of farmers who need this knowledge to grow crops in arid environments.
See: Advancing the Web to Empower People: Challenges and Solutions
Digital Future Survey: The Parties RespondSo ask yourselves where did the money go from the wireless auction that drew in 4 billion dollars. Add up what the NDP proposed and ask why we cannot expect the new Harper Government to fund the network to rural Canadians as the NDP proposed?
It's time to get to work.