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Take a look at https://teksavvy.com/en/reside... and put in your postal code. Switching to BC shows me that they are offering cable internet there.

Have you tried any of the other ISPs? TekSavvy has been really good. You will continue to use the wires you already have. The difference is that from the first opportunity your data moves onto TekSavvy's network and off of Bell's or Rogers' (or whatever cable company it is). Worst cast is that you might save some money.

The lowest DSL they offer is 6Mbps down/ 800 Kbps up, 200GB / month, modem included, $30/month for 12 months and then $35.

Next up is 15/1-10 Unlimited for $40 going up to to $46.

Agreed. Our internet provider (Shaw Canada) has been shamelessly begging for us to bundle cable with our internet for years now.

You might save some bucks switching to https://start.ca/ or https://teksavvy.com/ for your internet service - they resell the "bug guy's" intenet service. Here are some comparisons for Ontario pricing - similar savings are likely available elsewhere:

http://compare.wikia.com/wiki/...

Are these units mostly sold in the US?

US, Canada, Europe. I can't speak for US or Euro ISP's but Rogers, Cogeco, and a couple of small ISP's(because of certification for Third Party Internet Acces-TPIA aka companies that buy last mile support) require this modem(or one of several others usually) for new customers. Last year for example on Rogers the SB6141 wasn't approved, this year it's approved. Though my SB6121 made ~4 years ago was approved, then unapproved 6mo later by Rogers.

Does Tech Savvy even do this?

I don't know. Why don't you ask TekSavvy?

They have a similar name. Perhaps they have a similar policy.

Does Tech Savvy even do this?

I don't know. Why don't you ask TekSavvy?

They have a similar name. Perhaps they have a similar policy.

I've already received a notice and my ISP did exactly that. Here's the full text of the message I received:

Hello,

TekSavvy has received what the Copyright Act calls a "notice of claimed infringement". It listed an IP address and time. Our systems indicate that the IP address listed in the notice was likely assigned to your account at the specified time. We are therefore legally required to forward the notice to you. The notice is reproduced, unaltered, below.

First, though, there are some things you should know:

(a) We haven't told the sender who you are. Your privacy is paramount to us. We don't track, or know, what you do. We do know what IP address we assigned to you within the last 30 days. But we don't provide personal information like that to anyone unless a court orders us to -- and we have not done so here. The notice was simply received by us, and we have forwarded it electronically on to you.

(b) We are an intermediary that is required to forward this notice to you. We do not, and cannot, verify its contents or its sender. However, a private party's notice does not mean there has been any legal ruling. Only a court can do that.

(c) It is good practice to make sure you secure your account. Your wireless router should be password-protected; the password should be changed regularly; and those who have the password should maintain good virus protection. Your MyAccount allows you to check your bandwidth usage: do so regularly, and make sure what is happening and what you think is happening line up.

(d) We retain IP address information for 30 days. If your modem has not been powered off during that period, then we may have IP address information going back to the last time you did. In addition to requiring us to forward this notice, the Copyright Act also requires us to retain the records matching the IP address and time to your account for six months. If the people who sent the notice apply to a court, they can require us to hold it for longer.

We have provided some links below. The notice, which we are required to forward unaltered, follows.

Copyright Act (see, especially, sections 41.25-26):
http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca...

TekSavvy:
http://teksavvy.com/en/why-tek...
https://myaccount.teksavvy.com...

Automated translation (you may need to copy and paste):
https://translate.google.com/?...
http://www.bing.com/translator...

--- Forwarded Notice of Infringement follows:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Notice ID: XX-XXXXXXXXX
Notice Date: 04 Jan 2015 03:52:22 GMT

TekSavvy Solutions, Inc.

Dear Sir or Madam:

Irdeto USA, Inc. (hereinafter referred to as "Irdeto") swears under penalty of perjury that Paramount Pictures Corporation ("Paramount") has authorized Irdeto to act as its non-exclusive agent for copyright infringement notification. Irdeto's search of the protocol listed below has detected infringements of Paramount's copyright interests on your IP addresses as detailed in the below report.

Irdeto has reasonable good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of in the below report is not authorized by Paramount, its agents, or the law. The information provided herein is accurate to the best of our knowledge. Therefore, this letter is an official notification to effect removal of the detected infringement listed in the below report. The below documentation specifies the exact location of the infringement.

We hereby request that you immediately remove or block access to the infringing material, as specified in the copyright laws, and insure the user refrains from using or sharing with others unauthorized Paramount's materials in the future (see, 17 U.

I've already received a notice and my ISP did exactly that. Here's the full text of the message I received:

Hello,

TekSavvy has received what the Copyright Act calls a "notice of claimed infringement". It listed an IP address and time. Our systems indicate that the IP address listed in the notice was likely assigned to your account at the specified time. We are therefore legally required to forward the notice to you. The notice is reproduced, unaltered, below.

First, though, there are some things you should know:

(a) We haven't told the sender who you are. Your privacy is paramount to us. We don't track, or know, what you do. We do know what IP address we assigned to you within the last 30 days. But we don't provide personal information like that to anyone unless a court orders us to -- and we have not done so here. The notice was simply received by us, and we have forwarded it electronically on to you.

(b) We are an intermediary that is required to forward this notice to you. We do not, and cannot, verify its contents or its sender. However, a private party's notice does not mean there has been any legal ruling. Only a court can do that.

(c) It is good practice to make sure you secure your account. Your wireless router should be password-protected; the password should be changed regularly; and those who have the password should maintain good virus protection. Your MyAccount allows you to check your bandwidth usage: do so regularly, and make sure what is happening and what you think is happening line up.

(d) We retain IP address information for 30 days. If your modem has not been powered off during that period, then we may have IP address information going back to the last time you did. In addition to requiring us to forward this notice, the Copyright Act also requires us to retain the records matching the IP address and time to your account for six months. If the people who sent the notice apply to a court, they can require us to hold it for longer.

We have provided some links below. The notice, which we are required to forward unaltered, follows.

Copyright Act (see, especially, sections 41.25-26):
http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca...

TekSavvy:
http://teksavvy.com/en/why-tek...
https://myaccount.teksavvy.com...

Automated translation (you may need to copy and paste):
https://translate.google.com/?...
http://www.bing.com/translator...

--- Forwarded Notice of Infringement follows:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Notice ID: XX-XXXXXXXXX
Notice Date: 04 Jan 2015 03:52:22 GMT

TekSavvy Solutions, Inc.

Dear Sir or Madam:

Irdeto USA, Inc. (hereinafter referred to as "Irdeto") swears under penalty of perjury that Paramount Pictures Corporation ("Paramount") has authorized Irdeto to act as its non-exclusive agent for copyright infringement notification. Irdeto's search of the protocol listed below has detected infringements of Paramount's copyright interests on your IP addresses as detailed in the below report.

Irdeto has reasonable good faith belief that use of the material in the manner complained of in the below report is not authorized by Paramount, its agents, or the law. The information provided herein is accurate to the best of our knowledge. Therefore, this letter is an official notification to effect removal of the detected infringement listed in the below report. The below documentation specifies the exact location of the infringement.

We hereby request that you immediately remove or block access to the infringing material, as specified in the copyright laws, and insure the user refrains from using or sharing with others unauthorized Paramount's materials in the future (see, 17 U.

In all fairness, why should you get 2TB of bandwidth for the same price as the other 90% who are using 500GB? That's a significant difference. You should pay more.

Simple answer? Because I have an ISP that knows how to manage traffic responsibly. Sadly you guys in the US don't, see up here in Canadaland Teksavvy has this program called ZTC or Zap The Cap. What happens is, between 8pm to 12am you get a reduction in download speed and the rest of the time you can download as much as you want. But if you don't want to use it, you can always schedule your downloads for 2am-6am I think the time frame is, and there's no cap then during that period anyway.

See this isn't rocket surgery. And really I *am* getting 2TB of bandwidth for that 90% who are using 500GB, I'm simply voluntarily restricting my usage during peak.

In all fairness, why should you get 2TB of bandwidth for the same price as the other 90% who are using 500GB? That's a significant difference. You should pay more.

Simple answer? Because I have an ISP that knows how to manage traffic responsibly. Sadly you guys in the US don't, see up here in Canadaland Teksavvy has this program called ZTC or Zap The Cap. What happens is, between 8pm to 12am you get a reduction in download speed and the rest of the time you can download as much as you want. But if you don't want to use it, you can always schedule your downloads for 2am-6am I think the time frame is, and there's no cap then during that period anyway.

See this isn't rocket surgery. And really I *am* getting 2TB of bandwidth for that 90% who are using 500GB, I'm simply voluntarily restricting my usage during peak.

not sure if Montreal qualifies, but check out Teksavvy. Minimum offer is 300 GB limit, can upgrade to unlimited.

send a notice making unfounded claims

that's the point... the claims aren't unfounded, at least not to the best of their knowledge. They have evidence (which has yet to be accepted/proven in court) which links the IP address in question to an infringement that is illegal under Canadian law. They're seeking to have the information which links the IP address to a real person so that they can sue.

Whether they actually intend to sue, or simply send threatening letters, has nothing to do with it. The whole point of the case is that the validity of IP address evidence itself needs to be tested in court before the subscriber information is released, not after.

The CIPPIC briefs in this case are particularly interesting/important reading... you can find them, along with all of the other court documents, here: http://www.teksavvy.com/en/why-teksavvy/in-the-news/teksavvy-customer-notices/legal-documents-for-request-for-customer-information

Canada is as bad or worse than the us when it comes to ISP competition.

I can pick between 20MBPS down 2 up or 20/20 capped at 250GB. two providers. When i threatedn to switxh, the offical stance is "why bother? Theyre just as bad"

Theres faster, but any faster (up to200 GBPS) is capped at 250GBPS. This is in a major city.

Check with Teksavvy, they use Rogers/Bell/Shaw/Telus for the last mile and are very competitive.

(posting anon since I modded this story already)

If it's available in your area, consider Teksavvy. They offer unlimited plans for a reasonable amount. Non-unlimited usage is capped at 300 GB which is still decent. I use Netflix almost every day (SD on the Wii) and I never ever reached near 300 GB/month.

JigJag

1Mb/s down, unlimited bandwidth. I know that I could upgrade to a better speed, but that would mean loosing the "unlimited" part. As it is, Netflix, at the highest quality setting, works just fine. What more could I ask?

A couple thoughts:

1) You could check out TekSavvy (not affiliated, just happy customer), and you could fund a small, agile company instead of a humongous, predatory one.

2) You might have unlimited bandwidth, but it's limited by your speed*time_in_month. You could likely get faster speeds from TekSavvy with a cap that you couldn't bump up against without downloading constantly.

Example from http://teksavvy.com/en/res-internet.asp:

DSL (Ontario):
Premium : Up to 5M/800k : 300 GB/month : $31.95/Month

Not sure what you're paying now, but 5Mbps download with cap of 300 GB/month is a pretty good DSL plan. Especially if you're paying > $20 or $25 per month for your 1Mbps current plan.

Food for thought...

http://teksavvy.com/en/res-internet.asp#cable

I've downloaded well over 1 TB this month (of Linux distros!) on the unlimited package with no throttling or caps so far.

I was going to second the recommendation for TekSavvy, but wait, what, 1 TB / month?

That's > 1,000 Linux images.

  I don't believe the internet has that much data. /joke

Man, that's a lot of downloading.

That's why I'm on TekSavvy. They offer the same speeds at slightly lower prices but with a 300GB cap. They even have a 5M/unlimited plan.

http://teksavvy.com/en/res-internet.asp#cable

I've downloaded well over 1 TB this month (of Linux distros!) on the unlimited package with no throttling or caps so far.

Spell TekSavvy right and link to it so others can bask in its awesomeness!

Add the stupidly low monthly caps forced on us by the ISPs (my download+upload cap is 35GB) and Netflix isn't an attractive alternative*.

I recommend seeing if teksavvy is available in your area:

http://teksavvy.com/en/residential.asp
Click 'cable' then click the 'order now' link beside one of the 15Mbps packages. That'll bring you to a page where you can check availability. If the 15Mbps w. unlimited cap or 300GB cap aren't available, check the DSL packages. If you're not from southern Ontario, then you might have other options but I wouldn't be familiar with them.

Note about teksavvy: They don't lure you in with package deals or bundles, and they seem expensive at first because you have to pay a setup fee and maybe buy a modem. But they offer good service (I usually get an actual 15Mbps on my cable modem), have good tech support, and even if you don't care about the larger bandwidth caps their per-month prices are cheaper than similar speeds from the big competitors like Rogers.

I've been with them for 9 or 10 months now, and am quite happy with them. I didn't like Rogers or Bell. They would lure me in with cheap introductory offers, but then their service was poor and their speeds weren't as advertised.

I wrote this blog post yesterday and planned to send an edited version to my MP as well, before I read the news that the decision is going to be repealed. I think I'll still send the letter to my MP as an encouragement to make sure his party leader comes through on his promise.

The fox guarding the henhouse

Many other people have written articles and commentary about the CRTC's decision to allow Bell to force its wholesale customers to accept usage-based billing (UBB). This is my take on it.

I've been a very happy customer of Teksavvy for the past few years. Teksavvy's prices and policies are fair and reasonable. Teksavvy provides jobs to Canadians. Teksavvy has been one of the companies leading the charge to protect customers Bell's dishonest and anticompetitive practices. Currently I pay $32 per month for DSL from Teksavvy, which gives me 200GB per month of data use.

Thanks to the CRTC's decision in line with Bell Canada and against Canadians, my monthly cap is going to be reduced to 25GB. In Ontario, the cost per gigabyte of overage is going to be $1.90. Fortunately, my base rate will also be decreasing in acknowledgement of the fact that my bandwidth allotment is being reduced by 87.5 percent. No wait, I lied. Of course it's not. This is just a cash grab by Bell, sanctioned by the CRTC, at the expense of Canadians.

How much is this extra bandwidth going to cost? Bandwidth needs for HD movies range from about 1.5-2 GB per hour. Therefore a two hour movie will cost about $6.70 to stream in overage charges. Put another way, if you stream one hour of HD TV a day, you'll use about 53GB of data a month, just in video streaming. That's before you've done things like check your email or the weather. You'll be looking at about $52 in overage charges. That pays for a reasonable cable or satellite TV plan. I use this comparison because, of course, Bell also provides satellite television and does not want you to stop paying them $50+ per month for that in order to watch your TV online. I'm reminded of Roger's announcement last year of a reduction in bandwidth that they publicized the day after Netflix announced they were coming to Canada. An interesting coincidence.

Back to that $6.70 in streaming charges. If you rent a movie on iTunes, you'll pay $6 to rent the movie. That means if (when) you're over your bandwidth cap, to actually watch a movie, you'll be spending $12.70. That's completely ridiculous!

I read somewhere, I think in a post from Teksavvy, that this is over one thousand times the actual incremental cost that Bell incurs. In other words, Bell pays less than one fifth of one cent per GB, yet the CRTC thinks it's fair to charge consumers almost two dollars. To use another comparison, it costs Netflix at most about $0.03 per GB to stream videos. If the owners of the network between Netflix and me are able to make money off Netflix by charging them $0.03 per GB, how is it even remotely approaching fair that Bell is allowed to charge me $1.90 for that same data?

I'll admit, I'm a heavy user. I'm not sure exactly how much bandwidth I use, but it's a lot. I'm a self-employed e-commerce consultant and I work at home. My job involves me regularly uploading and downloading very large files of several gigabytes each. We have two children and probably watch about an hour of TV per day that's been streamed or downloaded off the internet. We cancelled our satellite service as we found we were paying about $15 per hour of TV actually watched, and all our video entertainment comes from the internet. We subscribe to Netflix and rent movies from iTunes. Of course Bell doesn't like people like me, as I've given up on paying for their last-century business model of paying huge monthly fees for television to be broadcast to me on the network's ag

http://teksavvy.com/en/res-internet.asp
You can get a 5M/800k DSL with an unlimited bandwidth cap for $40/mo (though you might be better off going with the 200GB package). I wouldn't say the speed is blazing or anything, but I've never noticed my netflix quality being impacted.
You can get faster cable modems if you need faster, but something I should point out is that what determines your real speed is more of a function of how oversold the line is, not how fast your cable modem is. A 5 megabit connection should be capable of roughly 500 to 600k per second, which should be plenty to run netflix, if you get it all.
I don't exactly run a meter on my DSL so I don't know how fast my data is really coming down, but at a guess I'd say I usually have at least 400k/sec.

Anyhow, my experience with teksavvy is that they're not cheap to sign up with but they have good caps and actually deliver the bandwidth you're expecting. Rogers and Bell (and presumably Shaw, though I have no experience with them) will entice you in with cheap "special offers" with free signups, but as you've noticed their overage fees are overboard and the caps are tiny.

They have an unlimited option, but they also have other cable options with a 200 GB cap, which is the same as their DSL tiers. Info is here. Unfortunately, the cable offering doesn't list MLPPP support, which means you won't be getting around Rogers throttling that way. I have heard that Rogers doesn't throttle nearly as bad as Bell though, so maybe MLPPP isn't necessary for the cable option. I should look into that, because we're using MLPPP on their DSL package. The service is great and reliable, but I could definitely stand having more than 5 Mbps down if I can for not much more money.

Mark Goldberg has a nice analysis of the decision. Note that Bell must first apply this usage based billing for all their existing retail customers before they are able to do so for third party ISPs leasing lines from them. This means they risk losing existing retail customers who have legacy unlimited plans, i.e. the ones who have been around the longest. In addition, their tariffs are actually being lowered, which will improve the profit margin of the independent ISPs. In other words, this isn't happening in the short term.

Side note: If you're a Teksavvy customer like me, they are also launching a cable-based service through leasing lines from Rogers as well. The details are up on their site, however I believe it's limited to the GTA only right now. You can get faster speeds, but lower caps. However, if the Bell usage-based plan eventually goes through, the caps will actually be about the same. I'm not affiliated with Teksavvy, I just happen to use them for Internet and home phone service and think they're awesome.

Amusing anecdote about how awesome they are: I have a Linksys WRT54GL router and flashed it with the Tomato/MLPPP firmware in order to bypass Bell's throttling when we signed up for Teksavvy. Eight months later, I convince my wife's parents to switch over (from Rogers, ironically) and they can now actually buy this same router along with the modem when they sign up for the service. So they do this, and I come over to set everything up along with the Tomato/MLPPP firmware on my USB stick so I can flash the router. After setting everything up, I discovered that they've already done exactly this. They've put the Tomato firmware on their, configured the modem for passthrough mode, set up all the login info on the router, and turned on single-link MLPPP to get around Bell's throttling. I literally had to do nothing but plug the wires in. Now that is what I call good customer service!

It's in Canada, and they still have to rely on monopoly-owned (but regulated) cables, but they exist

Here in Toronto, Ontario, that costs $30/month, except it's 5M/800 instead of 3M/512.

http://www.teksavvy.com/

You're welcome. Unfortunately... a crtc decision will soon doom these companies. Go here to complain: http://www.consumersforinternetcompetition.com/

I'm in Canada. I pay $30/mo for 3mbit/512kbit ADSL, with a 200GB cap. The cap came in really handy when one of my HDDs died, and I had to re-download a lot of steam games.

Canada has had such a law for a long time. After all - the major backbones were funded by the government, and therefore taxpayers, so why should we be locked in to monopolies? Unfortunately for us, just as the US is considering such a law, Canada is considering revoking it.

Sure I can get 30MB access for $65, but that's like buying a 40 seat bus to carry your family of 4. More than you need is great if you don't have to pay for the extra.

Right now you can get 3-6mbit ADSL for $30/mo without a contract. With a contract, $40/mo will give you ADSL speeds of up to 15mbit. $45-$55/mo will give you the same speed with cable.

Considering that we have less population density than the US (and therefore higher upkeep costs per subscriber), I think the law is doing its job quite effectively.

Links/proof:

http://www.teksavvy.com/en/abc_resdsl.asp?ID=2&mID=1
http://www.teksavvy.com/en/resdsl.asp?ID=7&mID=1
http://www.bell.ca/shopping/internet.portal;GEMSESSIONID=vMQVKY3XsKBv1cQyx2xmKTJn322pxDn1LNp2yfw84xGM2wpQNg2n!1182660780?_nfpb=true&_windowLabel=PrsShpInt_NewAccess_internetBrowse_portlet&PrsShpInt_NewAccess_internetBrowse_portlet_actionOverride=%2Fportlets%2Fpersonal%2Finternet%2Fbrowse%2FgetDetailPage&_pageLabel=PrsShpInt_NewAccess
http://www.telus.com/portalWeb/inlineLink/CP_SCS/General/Internet/High_Speed/General/Compare_Plans/?_region=BC
http://www.shaw.ca/en-ca/ProductsServices/Internet/High-Speed/

I'm in Canada. I pay $30/mo for 3mbit/512kbit ADSL, with a 200GB cap. The cap came in really handy when one of my HDDs died, and I had to re-download a lot of steam games.

Canada has had such a law for a long time. After all - the major backbones were funded by the government, and therefore taxpayers, so why should we be locked in to monopolies? Unfortunately for us, just as the US is considering such a law, Canada is considering revoking it.

Sure I can get 30MB access for $65, but that's like buying a 40 seat bus to carry your family of 4. More than you need is great if you don't have to pay for the extra.

Right now you can get 3-6mbit ADSL for $30/mo without a contract. With a contract, $40/mo will give you ADSL speeds of up to 15mbit. $45-$55/mo will give you the same speed with cable.

Considering that we have less population density than the US (and therefore higher upkeep costs per subscriber), I think the law is doing its job quite effectively.

Links/proof:

http://www.teksavvy.com/en/abc_resdsl.asp?ID=2&mID=1
http://www.teksavvy.com/en/resdsl.asp?ID=7&mID=1
http://www.bell.ca/shopping/internet.portal;GEMSESSIONID=vMQVKY3XsKBv1cQyx2xmKTJn322pxDn1LNp2yfw84xGM2wpQNg2n!1182660780?_nfpb=true&_windowLabel=PrsShpInt_NewAccess_internetBrowse_portlet&PrsShpInt_NewAccess_internetBrowse_portlet_actionOverride=%2Fportlets%2Fpersonal%2Finternet%2Fbrowse%2FgetDetailPage&_pageLabel=PrsShpInt_NewAccess
http://www.telus.com/portalWeb/inlineLink/CP_SCS/General/Internet/High_Speed/General/Compare_Plans/?_region=BC
http://www.shaw.ca/en-ca/ProductsServices/Internet/High-Speed/

TekSavvy (the best DSL provider I've ever worked with, Google for reviews, you'll understand) is still around, but this decision will probably kill them. It's a real shame.

Good call. And TekSavvy, for those fortunate enough to be in their coverage area.

Throttling is very lame. My ISP has a no-throttling policy, and no-ports-blocked policy. I like them a lot. :)

The unfortunate thing with Teksavvy is they go through the lines of bigger backbones. Similar to BT in the UK, they have to deal with Bell (in Canada), which throttles and blocks ports. It's been a nightmare for them fighting it and getting around it.

The only thing that should cause you to be capped is passing your bandwidth limit - and yours is "unlimited", so that should never happen, especially since you were downloading legal content. I believe my ISP rolls the month over early if you use all your bandwidth up - or you can pre-purchase another 200GB for $10; both of which is better than throttling, IMO.

If you can get Ma Bell's service, then you can likely get Teksavvy's service. 5M/800 with 200gb/month cap for $29.95/mo, unlimited for $39.95/mo. Excellent service, linux friendly.

Gotta nit with your correction, the GP was right. The >200GB/month service IS $40, the capped (200GB) service is $29.95.

http://www.teksavvy.com/en/resdsl.asp?ID=7&mID=1

$1 per GB is a little steep, isn't it?

These guys only charge $0.10/GB.

Your suggestion seems like the best way to go. Up here, Telus(big ISP) has caps at 10GB, 60GB, 100GB per month based on how much you're paying.

Sadly, bell got the right to slow down their resellers lines when they detected p2p stuff on it.

If you're with TekSavvy, all you need to do is set up a Multilink (also known as Multipath) PPPoE connection, which fools Bell's equipment and defeats their throttle.

(Obviously, this is a temporary solution, but I doubt that Bell will spend much effort to plug that hole in the near future.)

My ISP isn't on their block list. The big ones like Telus, Shaw, and Bell are, but apparently smaller ones aren't? :P

I'm with Teksavvy.

Rogers may not be your only option. I was previously under the impression that either Bell or Rogers were my only options for internet. Then I found out about Teksavvy, and switched over to them. Significantly less bullshit, and WAY WAY WAY cheaper.
Before I was getting nailed with $70-$80 bills every month from Bell and they'd just put 'bandwidth usage' with the added cost of all the gigs I went over my 50 gig limit (not being terribly specific in that regard mind you). Plus the bastards were throttling my connection.

Nice thing with Teksavvy is they have an unlimited bandwidth option and it's cheaper than Rogers.

http://www.teksavvy.com/

Canada does not have any ISPs with unlimited plans. In fact, of all my many choices of ISPs in my area, all of them have *lower* caps than USA's nefarious Comcast.

Wrong.
There are many places with unlimited plans.

Teksavvy
$30 for 200GB/month
$40 unlimited
http://www.teksavvy.com/en/resdsl.asp?ID=7&mID=1

Execulink
$30 (without modem rental) Unlimited
http://www.execulink.ca/residential/internet/dsl.php

Those are just 2 examples of service available in my area. There are many more. Please don't spread lies.

http://teksavvy.com/en/resdsl.asp?ID=7&mID=1

Much better than Bell Sympatico's service.

real degradation of patch-download time if you tried.

Why the Upstream is still there, sitting unused in AT&T's cabling... they can just sell the upstream to Blizzard... problem solved they make so much money!

AT some point upstream becomes downstream so the two are equal (in specific instances there are compromises but for the vast majority...)

So how come we get less upstream? I have NEVER heard a good answer to this question.

Example: These guys will UPLOAD 20,000GB of data for $5.95 a month. (one of?)The best Canadian ISP(s) can only offer 200 GB of up/down for $29.95.

Where does this division of upstream and downstream take place?

The only thing that's clear is net neutrality is mythical, there is a system in place to stop non-commercial users being content hosts and has been since dialup.

Switch to teksavvy.com. I did so after Bell started crippling bittorrent (about 3 months ago). While they have also started tampering with teksavvy's users' traffic (surely illegal; we'll see), at least the spare change at teksavvy is going to something useful: they're leading a charge for Net Neutrality, and supporting them is my way of fighting back.

Aside from that, their customer service, performance, competence and business processes are second to none.

Bell management, if you're reading this: go to hell. Seriously. I was your dedicated customer for seven years, and this outrage has prompted me to terminate my business relationship with you (phone, cell, and Internet). It will be a very long time before you profit from me again.

In fact Teksavvy even gives its customers a choice of which routing they would prefer, unlimited over Cogent or 100gb/month over Peer 1 (lower latency)!

http://www.teksavvy.com/en/resdsl.asp?ID=7&mID=1

Actually, that's exactly what Teksavvy (the ISP mentioned in the summary) already does (though they don't have as many levels as you suggest, but they add in the twist of additional per gigabyte charges once you exceed your monthly limit).

http://teksavvy.com/en/resdsl.asp?ID=7&mID=1

Though I don't know if the graduated pricing is shared with the wholesaler.

...depending on where you live, like Teksavvy: 50-60% of the price, great non-outsourced tech support, no throttles, no hidden caps, no excess-bandwidth gouging, no b.s. Highest user-rated ISP in North America at dslreports' "Good Bad Ugly" A to A+ vs. C+ to B- for the twin Borgs.

Small ISPs are technically free to choose whatever bandwidth provider to the internet they want for ADSL at least. Teksavvy uses Peer1 or Cogent bandwidth, Sympatico/Bell only provides the connection from the home to the DSLAM. Thus, Sympatico's traffic shaping/throttling/outages/etc does not affect Teksavvy's operations.

Have you taken a look at TekSavvy? They're really cheap, good quality, high speed 5M DSL, with excellent customer service (almost every time I've called in, I've gotten an agent right away without any hold time). As I've mentioned below, I'm in the position of having to switch away from them for reasons beyond their or my control, but if you can get Bell at good quality where you are, I'd suggest taking a look.

No, I don't work for them or receive anything for this.

The problem with the current ISP model is it is like an all you can eat buffet, where one in 10 customers eats all the food, one in 100 takes his chair home too, and one in 1,000 unscrews all the fixtures and fittings and loads them into a van as well.

Nobody suggested any restrictions on who could unlock it other than the implicit test of being able to visit your ISP's web site and click fill in a form that says "unblock ports 1-1024". I think that'd be a pretty decent compromise. It's certainly better than flat-out blocking that many do now and could be seen as just another firewall that helps protect the rest of us from your idiot neighbours. A firewall that I configure is better than the current firewall that the ISP configures for me since today there's nobody in tech support there that can unblock a specific port for me.

Alternatively, if you have a plan with actionable steps for removing the idiots from the train then please get started on it.

Fwiw my ISP teksavvy is small enough to be helpful and doesn't do any of the evil stuff afaik.

Speaking of Toronto, Teksavvy provides ADSL up to 5 megabits, with 2 options

Unlimited (yes really) for $39.95/month for peering via Cogent

Premium for $29.95/month for peering via Peer1, with 200 gigs/month, and excess usage at 25 cents/gig
Ping times are 5 to 10 ms faster on Premium
Your choice.

I normally use under 5 gigs/month. If their basic DSL (actually SDSL) was 512 down / 288 up rather than 288 down / 288 up, I'd switch over to that. Even with the 10 gig cap I'd be comfortable.