First they came for Netflix and YouTube...
This sounds like the thin edge of the wedge for a downward spiral of caps in the future. At least half of the webpages that I visit already have colorful ads. I wonder what percentage of a webpage's data is made of ads? Will we be paying to see ads that are pushed on us in the future?
Telcos and cable companies could be regulated a lot more. NTT DoCoMo was ordered by the government of Japan some time ago to simply build out telecom infrastructure in that country. There were no excuses with referring to market bullshit. They just did it. Our corporate stooges in Ottawa could do it, too. It's planned and enforced impotence. The stoogery in Ottawa is breathtaking.
[url=http://www.ndp.ca/ubb-twitter-rally][IMG]http://img.photobucket.com/albu...
I nevertheless believe internet access in 2011 is as basic to our needs today as the telephone was in the previous century.Well, that argument would be a wee bit stronger if the current debate were centred around users downloading massive datasets, or enriched learning materials, or pretty much anything other than [i]The Love Guru[/i].
And what about the public telephone system? Did telcos use the same excuse when Canadians wanted all that new infrastructure to make voice calls? If first rate countries can provide public switched telephone network to most of their citizens decades ago, then what's the hold-up with decent internet access for all Canadians? There are only 33 million of us not 127 million. With public telephone networks, telcos always built-out capacity over and above anticipated loads on the system. Why can't they do it now? Why are they crying poor mouth in Canada and not in other countries providing the same service and better for less cost to customers?
Exactly, Fidel. This country is being screwed with regard to Internet access, provision, and affordability. And the Cons don't give a fig.
Just in from Charlie Angus: Clement says the tories will reverse crtc on ubb.
And it's not like Canada is short of just telecom infrastructure since they handed off powers of resource allocation to the big six banks and currency manipulating money speculators around the world. The City of Vancouver has 80 year old water and sewer works than need replacing. No money and we will just have to endure through this $100 billion dollar infrastructure deficit across Canada while the Harpers feign spending on stimulus in a recession. No money for a world class subway system in Toronto either. I guess with all this dregulation over the last 30 years, Canadian cities aren't required to be world class anymore. At least not with big business running the show. Less is more, and we are free as long as we pay.
It's like Doctor-Professor Michael Hudson says about it. If toll booth junk economics is so good, then our politicians should shove it up their asses. Sideways!
Viva la [email protected]!
They're rilly good guys offering to back off on their threat to give carriers and cable companies a green light to clobber Canadians with UBB. And it didn't cost them a dime. Our idiots are very good at achieving exactly nothing after all is said and done.
What would we do without them? Imagine...
The CRTC must reverse its decision that ends unlimited internet access plans offered by smaller internet providers or the federal government will intervene, Industry Minister Tony Clement says.
Asked by the CBC's Rosemary Barton through Twitter whether it's true that Clement would overturn that decision if the CRTC does not back down, the industry minister replied: "True. CRTC must go back to drawing board."
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2011/02/03/crtc-internet-clement.html#ixzz1CtluxK8F
I know pretty much zero about this apart from what I overheard at ideas meetings in Victoria. First of all, when shaw measures your download speed it is to their prefered link. So it is not really such a great measure, is it?
some of the ideas people are interested in developing a tool (many of them are into software development) which you can use to check your connection speed and at the same time send this info to a central info center run by one of the legal teams which works against the shaw telus bell rogers group. (Most of the people in those groups are lawyers).
One of the ideas victoria people is in one of those advocacy groups which is really helpful.
Their big problem is data. The internet providers have a "you can ask but we will never tell" policy. so nobody can check if there is internet congestion or not.
There probably isn't internet congestion. Some of the cable is not being used at all! The cables can now handle multiplex signals so they are many times more efficient than when they were laid. (I forget the figure 100 times maybe?)
I also brought up the figure for digital tv but so far nobody responded. Shaw digital tv pipes signals to your tv. How much bandwidth is it?
This is extremely important. Because they want to charge you and 3rd party internet providers based on bandwidth. Why should they be allowed to charge couch potatoes less so that their core business is protected? I have not been able to get this point across.
I guess people fear that their tv will get pricier too? If we let shaw do this, it WILL get pricier for tv. They will say, well it is digital and there is congestion so you have to pay more for your tv signal otherwise internet service will suffer. It uses the same "pipes" so if the internet is congested then tv signals should be congested too, eh?
The facts seem to be different. There is lots of bandwidth. They just want to charge the earth for it and keep netflics and everyone else out.
I am sure Harper fixed the crtc so that he would get the result he wanted. So now he has to backtrack. Nobody should doubt that.
The CRTC people are just his stooges. If anyone is working on a tool to measure and colate internet conection speed, perhaps they should get in touch with the ideas victoria people and work together. I think they did a "hackiton" on it last saturday.
Cable companies do what's known as tree and leaf type of networks. And there will most definitely be contention for bandwidth. Sometimes they promise certain average access speeds, but I can't see how they can guarantee anything in writing. Because with tree and leaf networks, there will be contention for bandwidth. As they add more customers to their tree-leaf networks, contention goes up, and that has to degrade performance for users somewhere in the network. My cable's usually pretty quick and no complaints here. Of course, I'm not downloading movies over the net or anything though and mostly surfing and email.
I think most of the caps per customer they are talking about for Canadian ISPs are something like 30 Gigabytes on average. Then they wanted to charge $1-$4 per GB over and above the cap. That's ridiculous when it only costs them anywhere from 1 cent to 3 cents per Gig to transmit. That's gouging and especially when you realize Comcast in the States sets caps for Americans at somewhere around 250 Gigabytes before extra charges factor in.
Comcast has a 300 GB limit before the extra charge kicks in.
Comcast has a 300 GB limit before the extra charge kicks in.
And it's not like decent internet service is a luxury anymore. Internet is worldwide and considered to be part of the modern globalizing economy. This is just a modern version of the public telephone system.
I think that telcos lobbying the feds for a licence to gouge us also happen to be owners of broadcast TV spectrum. They don't want to compete with Netflix and whatever. The writing is on the wall for broadcast TV I think.
Does anybody know how much bandwidth shaw uses per tv channel?
Because if we get them to back down on internet rates, we should be able to get cheaper tv too!
Shock and AWE! Lets make them eat shit and die.
Use the public anger to put the cable monsters in cages.
Do it!
Is there nobody who knows on babble?
I use satellite TV (Bell ExpressVu) myself. $80/month, over 125 channels, including 7 dedicated movie channels. Extra charges apply only to PPV channels, which I almost never use. Why isn't everyone using satellite?
heh, you can buy [url=http://reviews.cnet.com/internal-hard-drives/ocz-vertex-2-series/4014-99... GB solid state drive for $310 bucks.[/url]
That's about $1.72/Gigabyte.
Internet capitalists would charge $2/GB transmission over their stuff according to our internet feds in Ottawa.
It might cost $10 dollars to ship your hard drive cross country.
Conclusion?: It would be cheaper to [url=http://www.canadapost.ca/tools/pg/manual/pgservstds-e.asp#1795572]mail[/... your hard drive from Halifax to Vancouver travelling about 0.23 MB/second over nine days, and then throw the drive away, than it would cost to transmit the same amount of data over their goddamned network.
[url=http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2011/02/03/tech-crtc-internet-service.html... reversal may not improve internet service[/url]
Translation: We will wait for the coveted phony majority before alowing telcos to clobber Canadians with UBB. In the mean time, the Reformed Tories will ride it out while doing nothing to improve the situation.
Hey I didn't know that these countries all have faster upload access speeds to the inet than Canada ranked 64th:
Mozambique, ranked 62nd, at 1.41Mbps.
Swaziland, ranked 61st, at 1.43Mbps.
Kenya, ranked 58th, at 1.52 Mbps.
Kazakhstan, ranked 40th, at 2.10Mbps
Where are those Canada Action Plan guys? They must be goldbricking again. I've never caught one of them at work actually doing anything.
The CRTC guy said he is protecting the little guy who doesn't use the internet much from subsidizing the heavy users. Does that ring true at all?
I love the CRTC. And the feds would surely find replacements for them, if they could ever figure out what it is they do.
I've never had a problem with Bell ExpressVu, been using the same satellite dish for ten years, same receiver, etc... UBB would have no effect as it is not an internet service.
It would be cheaper to mail your hard drive from Halifax to Vancouver travelling about 0.23 MB/second over nine days
Looking at Canada Post's rates guide, it would appear that they too practice UBB, with larger packages costing more to mail than smaller ones.
Why can I not get away from being charged for what I use????
Shall we compare apples to apples in terms of costs?
As I understand it, Canada Post runs at pretty much break-even these days. I'm certain we'd all be happy to deal with our internet service providers on the same basis, paying less than a half-cent per GB during off-hours, and up to 3 pennies per GB at peak.
That would net Bell and Rogers about one-fiftieth of what they're currently being allowed to gouge us for.
The primary problem is that Paul Martin allowed 'convergence', permitting these players into the content market. Now they use our infrastructure (yes, ours, built entirely with public subsidy from day one) as a weapon to defend their other interests.
Let's remove the temptation. Nationalize it!
.
The CRTC guy said he is protecting the little guy who doesn't use the internet much from subsidizing the heavy users. Does that ring true at all?
No!
We've been using about 40-60gb a month in a house of 5. Well under my 200gb limit from teksavvy. So it's probably true lot's of people don't need 200gb a month. The fine point which makes the crtc argument seem silly is that the small isps pay for their bandwidth. Teksavvy is able to offer me 200gb and better customer service for the same price at which bell is only able to offer 25gb. I agree those who use less should pay less but this decision is all about leaving us in the hands of a ruthless poorly run monopoly and not the least bit about protecting the little guy. Prices should be lowered not raised.
It would be cheaper to mail your hard drive from Halifax to Vancouver travelling about 0.23 MB/second over nine days
Looking at Canada Post's rates guide, it would appear that they too practice UBB, with larger packages costing more to mail than smaller ones.
Why can I not get away from being charged for what I use????
And if Bell or Rogers want to offer me a free SSD and $40 dollars off the cost of every 180 GB, I might think more of the basterds.
A group of capitalist dogs rarely gather together under one roof without conspiring to crook and gouge the public. - Adam Schmidt, The Wealth of Friends in Low Places
From Charlie Angus:
The fix is in: James Moore has just appointed failed ADQ candidate Tom Pentefountas as the Vice Chair of the CRTC. He's a political crony of Dimitri Soudas and Housakos.
Where do they get these guys, Anyway?
In the G&M: Friend of Harper's communications director named vice-chair of broadcast regulator
CRTC appointment smacks of cronyism, NDP says
excerpt:
"There is a sort of glazed over effect that Canadians have with the outrageous behaviour of Harper but I this one pretty much takes it," NDP heritage critic Charlie Angus said.
from Boom Boom's link:
“We see their intense interest in Fox-style news. Mr. Harper has already asked for personal updates on the process at the CRTC,” the New Democrat charged. “His former communications director [Kory Teneycke] suddenly leaves and then announces that he is going to lead up the run for Sun TV. Then the CRTC announces well maybe we don’t need any broadcast standards.”On the eve of that decision there will be someone with ties to the Conservative Party with no broadcast experience who is sitting as the vice-chair, Mr. Angus said.
“It’s a $60 billion industry,” he said. “You have to have credible people who have are seen as transparent and accountable. You can’t have the Prime Minister deciding he’s going to put political friends on there.”
Yup, they get them from anywhere and especially if well connected to the party.
[i]some of the ideas people are interested in developing a tool (many of them are into software development) which you can use to check your connection speed and at the same time send this info to a central info center run by one of the legal teams which works against the shaw telus bell rogers group. (Most of the people in those groups are lawyers).[/i]
Do you have link to this lecture?
This sounds about the right direction that is needed to me that will help direct perspective on download and upload speeds in the determination of the pricing system that is used and is faulty. Anything over a "faulty figure" cannot be justified to a value above?
http://www.ideasmeetings.org/wiki/Feb02,2011 is the minutes of a recent one. It is not a lecture. More of an open meeting and they often discuss ways of achieving what they want.
I think they did one 2 weeks ago too. So check the minutes for that too.
They had "awesome shit club" the previous week so no ideas meeting then.
Was the whole point of this to appoint that guy? Basically, I see the CRTC as Harpers way of getting his will done, without it seeming like he was doing it. He has it at "arms length" just in case he gets in shitty doo doo.
So he had buddy set up the net metering thing on his orders. Buddy keeps defending net meterings even though he is clearly the fall guy and harper just dropped him in the shit. I guess he is too thick to know? (well maybe he got orders, etc. from Rodgers too) because he sure does not sound impartial. But all this makes Harper out to be the good guy even as he gets closer to bringing in fox north.
In a couple of years, Flanigan will have a spot doing "assasination squad" and calling for the heads of separatists and socalists every week on his show. Baird will have a show on how to growl at pit bulls and harper will do a remake of the piano.
From Charlie Angus: The fix is in: James Moore has just appointed failed ADQ candidate Tom Pentefountas as the Vice Chair of the CRTC. He's a political crony of Dimitri Soudas and Housakos.
Gettin hosed in the Northern Puerto Rico. Gouging Canadians is like shooting fish in a barrel.
[url=http://www.torontolife.com/daily/informer/my-name-is-lucre/2011/02/04/me...
[url=http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/07/australia-begs-residents... is trying a pretty radical solution[/url] to this sad state of affairs, which we expect Canada to dismiss and then adopt in half-measures about 20 years from now.
DAY-O!
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