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Bell Wants to Dump Third-Party ISP's Entirely
phorm writes "Not only is Bell interfering with third-party traffic, but — according to CBC — they want third-party ISP and phone carriers off their network entirely. Bell is lobbying to have lease-conditions on their networks removed, stating that enough competition exists that they should not longer be required to lease infrastructure to third-parties. Perhaps throttling is just the beginning?"
to the Sherman Anti Trust Act in Canada? Not that it has helped much in the US lately.
Rhymes that keep their secrets will unfold behind the clouds.There upon the rainbow is the answer to a neverending story
Why shouldn't they be forced by the government to lease their last mile? The infrastructure that Bell uses for delivery of their service was paid for by Canadian tax dollars, and supported by a government provided monopoly.
Free means no restrictions, ironic the FSF's GPL forces restrictions, isn't it? What's your definition of free?
Wow. Not only is the apostrophe erroneously used in the title, but the description is written poorly.
Additionally, what is up with Slashcode lately? It sucks. Comments don't fully load. It is time to fork the older version without this BS. Even Digg's comment system works better than the latest Slashdot comment system. Kevin Rose is still gay, though.
Sincerely,
Angry Sunflower
Throttling is at the other end of the pipe, where they have you by the short and curlies. This is the latest salvo in another volley of lawsuits. This is the beginning of the end of teh internets. Soon you will have a public utility running a subsidized feed of advertisements and surveilance kit to your boxen, call it TV++.
Whatever we get, it is double-plus ungood. It is increasingly clear to me that the www, at least, has been dead for about a decade.
illegitimii non ingravare
I've thought for quite a while that forcing telecoms to lease bandwidth to 3rd party providers has been a bad idea. Look at Qwest's leasing options with MSN. MSN has a contract that states they MUST be the lowest-priced Qwest-backed ISP! This is, of course, only BAD for competition. It's just supporting the huge MS monopoly.
Enlightenment is the elimination of that which is unnecessary.
Can't play well, eh? Dump them-- DSL and landlines-- and go to VoIP. And take Rogers with.
Truly: they don't understand the Internet, only monopolistic revenues. They're never spanked, so hit them in the wallet, where they'll feel it as that's where their hearts and souls are.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
Google is so happy about all that openness. That they keep talking about. Why not just come out and admit that they took a beating? Now that Verizon got the spectrum (and doesn't have to fear last-mile competition) they are trying to consolidate all access. And Google is trying to claim that possession of the spectrum doesn't give them complete control. Right.... It's only a matter of time until the Bells re-consolidate. Google loss was a huge loss for everyone. No matter how many "don't panic, we are happy" press releases they put out.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
... but they put up that big barricade to make it impossible. They tested it quite thoroughly by having Cletus attempt to circumvent the anti-dumping device and he was unable to. It's foolproof.s
OK, so an early flaw was that you could ram the barricade with your car allowing you to dump a silo full of pig manure, but they learned their lesson and fixed that.
So good luck Bell with dumping your "third-party ISPs" (whatever that is). There is simply no way you will be able to.
Essentially the tax payers are the ones who created and funded the company. It has served its purpose.
As with any government agency, once the services it provided are done by private industry, it is time to cut out the public funding. The government should sell back all the hardware to all the companies involved and use the funds generated to cut taxes.
Doubtless this seems unfair to Bell, but the government was unfair to everyone when it created an intentional monopoly. When they whine, and they will whine, they should be told to join the competition that they felt was healthy enough.
B) Eliminate all the stupid users. This is frowned upon by society.
It didn't work in the US, there seem to be problems in the UK, and now Canada. Retrofitting open access into networks and companies that weren't built for it just doesn't work politically or financially, because the telcos always find ways to screw it up (aka loopholes, regulatory capture).
If we want an open access infrastructure, I am forced to conclude that we need to build it.
The "infrastructure" business seems like a hell of a niche to get in to. Rather then being a provider yourself, you provide the copper/fiber/whatever and lease it out to whoever. If you agree to a few monopoly stipulations (like not competing with your third party vendors), you could probably suck on the government tit for generations to come. Someone get me a VC on the line, I think I can take over Manhattan by Monday.
Here's the issue: Bell and the other Stentor consortium members were essentially granted a monopoly--and were given government support--to build the telecommunications network in Canada.
When high-speed internet came to the forefront, Bell utterly failed to deliver a competitive product and was basically going to fall back a the "gentleman's agreement" with the cable- and phone companies that would have allowed a maximum amount of profit for the providers with a minimum amount of service on lines that we, the consumer, subsidized.
The CRTC, deciding that the existing Bell/Stentor cartel had done little except gouge customers and that forcing leased lines had done wonders for the long-distance market, hit Bell with the same thing. The result is that Canada has one of the best broadband adoption rates in the world, despite a fairly unfriendly geography.
Yes, they own the last mile, yes, and pay for it, but it's not like they didn't get a free ride from the CRTC and the Canadian public for years. Revoking this will result in a broadband market that looks like the Canadian wireless market: something like the "gentleman's agreement" mentioned above that keeps prices uncompetitively high.
On that note, I personally think the CRTC hasn't gone far enough: they need to force the incumbent providers to open their wireless networks ("System Access fee" my ass) as well. The wireless market in this country is abysmal (as in "worse than the US, by a large margin") and the reason is that the incumbents maintain a cartel and buy or destroy competition.
Heck, Canadian content rules have actually kept foriegn competition out of the market, which means that all Bell et al have had to compete with are small fish and bottom-feeders, which is what Bell wants to squash. I don't like T-Mobile or Verizon much, but I'd like to see them slap some respect into Bell, Telus and Rogers
--srj/mmv
Prediction: The real iPhone killer is going to be sex robots from Japan. Think about it.
Sincerely,
Grammar Nazi.
Ma Bell is alive and well, and living under the name "AT&T" these days, which is technically what she was known as before the whole "Ma Bell" thing...but the current company is technically SBC (Southwest Bell), which happened to be the nastiest and most voracious of the little bells. They switched their name to AT&T inc after they bought the "original" AT&T co which was the chunk of the original company that was allowed to keep the name after the divesture.
(I know the preceding paragraph is nearly incoherent. The business relationships are completely incestuous.)
Half of the original Bells are owned by AT&T these days, and with buyouts like Cingular, it's arguably nastier than before.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I know this is about Bell Canada, but I thought the situation was pretty much the same there as here in the US; that is - very little competition.
The first thing I thought when I read "there is plenty of competition" was "Bahahahaha, yeah right! Good one!".
Most places you get one or maybe two choices (and no, satellite doesn't count).
And hey, more choice would be good, but the opposite wouldn't be bad either: municipal fiber being more common. As far as I'm concerned, broadband is a utility.
Why, yes I have been touched by His noodly appendage. And I plan to sue.
I can't believe they could actually get away with this. There goes VoIP. This basically leaves us with Rogers and Bell to choose from. Period. Since Bell is still mainly a telephone company, I can't imagine Bell being too happy with customers switching to VoIP providers either (same with Rogers, they also offer a home phone service. ). If they can get away with throttling their internet provider competition or flat out lobby against their existence, what's to say they won't plain out choke out VoIP as well? Or Skype? Or "Youtube" - because they "compete" against their sat service. Where does this stop.
We, citizens, need to light a fire up the government's ass to step in on this one.
[alk]
Oh yeah, and there would be SO much competition if all the 3rd party ISPs had to lay their own cables! Either it'd be basically a monopoly or they'd get crushed when the 3rd partiers band together and actually do lay their own cable and it's fiber.
Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
Also, what the hell is up with these huge, ugly reply and parent buttons? I liked the simple links better. Also, it is harder to view comments that have been censored by the majority with the new Slashcode. That slide bar is very annoying.
We don't have the option of Rogers in Quebec. Bell is a huge ass monopoly here and if these laws are rescinded we will go back to the dark days of Bell versus Videotron, both of which are monopolies. Both provide overpriced service and poor customer service.
I absolutely love some of the smaller ISPs that resell Bell infrastructure. Their prices and service is way better but they are the mercy of Bell.
The government should nationalize the infrastructure components of Bell and Videotron and the remaining companies should only deal with selling services on top of that infrastructure. This would put Bell, Videotron and resellers on equal footing. They have something similar in Israel and it led to a very versatile marketplace.
If I was in government, I'd say yes to Bell, but with the caveat that they would now to have rent the right-of-ways they were effectively given all those years ago.
The Telcos have forgotten that their networks, both in Canada and the US, were built, one way or the other, with the good graces and money of the taxpayers. Those right-of-ways were essentially a gift, with the understanding that they would be used to make communications near-universal.
If the Telcos want to end that universality, then I think their automatic right to those right-of-ways should be removed. We can either go to an open bid, or we can do annual leases, the rates dependent on how nicely the Telcos behave. If they don't like it, they can go buy their own right-of-ways. Might be a bit problematic in major cities, but oh well, I don't think these bastards deserve an ounce of consideration any more.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
I think, in those early days, it was a wise investment on the part of government. Within a few decades, phones reached just about every house in the US and Canada. The government (really the people) knew that no company could raise the capital required for such a massive infrastructure program, so they popped in the right-of-ways and the like and granted the companies an effective monopoly, but with some rather important understandings.
What's happened is that the telcos have forgotten that the taxpayer subsidized and continues to subsidize their networks.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
There is no government imposed system access fee. Every provider in Canada that I've seen charges it, and nobody has to. It was originally intorduced to help expand the network but that day has passed, and now there are no requirements for it, but that didn't stop anybody (including Rogers) from charging it.
I'd be surprised if the Bells in the USA didn't start making this same argument here soon. After all, they have to compete with cable and satellite. Why would anyone need more choices than that?
Most people don't have a choice, either for landline phone service or broadband net access. The only substantial choice people in the US have is with cellphone service, however it's not setup for broadband yet. Now though businesses could use the newly available 700 MHz bands to offer wireless broadband.
But back to the question, simply the more choices the more competition.
FalconShould there be a Law?
It really bites. Example: lest night, 8.30 pm. I fire up my computer (MacBookPro) click connect, and suddenly the DSL light goes out. Then it comes back on. Then it goes out. when it finally links up I've got a DL speed of something like 42kbps.
It's ridiculous. So, I disconnect, turn off the modem, fix myself a martini, and when I get back I turn on the DSL modem, and wait a minute for it to go through its motions. Then I click to connect and bingo - same little soap opera.
So, I give up, and in the morning, I fire everything up, and I get online with 1.2mbps DL speed - thing is ROCKIN.
It really pisses me off. I had totally crap service in San Francisco from SBC/ATT, but this is MUCH worse. Although, when it works, it's way better than what I had in SF.
RS
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
The amount of regulation should be proportianal to the barrier of entry in a market. $1 trillion to enter? Regulate the fsck out of the one or maybe two entities that can afford that. Capitalism only works when healthy competition exists, otherwise the market must be regulated simply because the feedback mechanisms that make capitalism so wonderful just break down with monopolies. Also, monopolies are natural features: they emerge every once in a while and need to be broken up when they do - they are a symptom of our incomplete understanding of capitalism. If we fully understood capitalism we would not let monopolies emerge in the first place.
Shh.
You're correct. The problem with the System Access fee is that the providers and their resellers have implicitly (and occasionally explicitly) said that it's government mandated. The CRTC has expressed some interest in forcing them to clarify it, which, of course, they're fighting.
I've personally had a "discussion" with a Rogers Enterprise Wireless rep (and his sales engineer) on this point when negotiating our contract. He and several of his colleagues were under the impression that it was CRTC-mandated.
--srj/mmv
In 1996 my family signed up as beta-testers for cable internet with Videotron. We were given a 5/5 connection, as beta-testers at the time it was free but once the service was mainline it was only 40 dollars a month. Not bad, keep in mind that Telus wasn't even offering DSL at this point... Shaw then buys out Videotron in Alberta and creates the "powersurfr" brand... prices go up and speeds fall to 2/768! Now, for a lovely 60 dollars a month I can get a 10/1 connection that has a cap... it used to be unlimited! Oh, did I mention that anything meaningful is throttled? I think the Canadian telecoms saw Australia's clusterfuck and wanted to be just like them. Okay, maybe not. Even though Telstra may be a constant thorn in the side of every Aussie, there are a lot of third party providers leasing their lines. The ACCC requires Telstra to lease the last-mile out and I doubt this will ever change.If Bell gets their way, the caps that Rogers are starting to put into place out East are going to look like amazing deals in mere hours. I can't tell you how much I hate to side with the CRTC but they'd be morons to let this happen (that said they've done everything they can to prop up CTV and ExpressVu).
However, I don't think that the government should force them to lease infrastructure to competitors.
When the government gives businesses billions of dollars, taxpayer dollars, in subsidies the government better attach strings to the money. Such as open access. And actually building the infrastructure the money was given to them to do.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Would someone please tell me where I can an ISP in Ottawa (Canada's Capital of all places) that doesn't have a downstream cap, or throttling/traffic shaping and has (god formid) decent customer service.
I'm looking for a new ISP because just this week I got a notice from Rogers that they've decided to change the definition of 'unlimited' to 95Gigs + $1.50/Gig after that. While I understand that Rogers is utterly incompetent, once my services and billing were properly set up, they required very little maintenance once they were up and running (it took me almost two years for their 'system' to properly bill me automatically and send me a paper invoice). Because of this I haven't had a reason to switch. ***Attention Shareholders*** Now I do.
I've been looking at CIA.com (www.cia.com) recently as they come highly recommended, but I'm waiting until I can get some more concrete numbers before signing up.
And yes, I will be cancelling my Rogers account now (After nine years), and have no plans to switch over to Bell.
I think that's starting to change. Rogers says it relatively clearly on their site when you're looking at plans "A $6.95 monthly System Access Fee (non-government fee), ", and I believe others do as well.
That's one of the reasons I do prepaid service. Its about the only way to avoid these fees. We'll be getting a second phone soon and doing the same thing. I was thinking about a couples' package for ~$35/month, until you realize that its actually over $50/month once you total up all the extra fees.
Except this is Bell Canada we're talking about, which was split off from the whole bunch about 60 or 70 years ago. They have nothing to do with AT&T or any of the Bells you mention, except that they share a common name, and that's because they were all incorporated by Alexander Graham Bell.
Not nearly as much as they can make by enforcing a monopoly.
I work for a CLEC & we just went to the PUC regarding this kind of issue - they are literally selling residential service at below wholesale cost.
Here in the Yukon, we have NorthWesTel... owned by Bell Canada. That's it for land lines. No options.
For internet, we used to have 4 ISP's, NWTel's pricing to those ISP's (same idea as the leased services that Bell is trying to kill) crushed two ISP's and NWTel bought the 3rd. So... NWTel is the only option. Oh, wait, there's Navigo as well. hmm it's crappy and ultimately owned by NWTel as well.
Cellular services. We have Latitude wireless (owned by NWTel) and Bell (which, once again, owns NWTel).
NWTel is really great at lobbying the CRTC to expand and extend their monopoly in the north, to the detriment of northerners.
I've thought for quite a while that forcing telecoms to lease bandwidth to 3rd party providers has been a bad idea.
What's bad are taxpayer supported monopolies. These companies, telcos and cablecos, have been given monopolies then they've been given taxpayer money to buildout a broadband infrastructure. Which they didn't do.
FalconShould there be a Law?
I can only imagine that Bell's public relations director is out-sick today. He'll walk in Monday, see his 1,046 new voicemails, go in the corner and cry.
Those who believe the Internet is private,
find their privates are on the Internet.
I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume that you genuinely don't know what's wrong with your suggestion.
There's plenty of competition in high speed internet, but there is *NOT* plenty of competition in terms of technologies in use. Bell Nexxia owns 100% of the copper to the house. Likewise for cable TV lines... in Ottawa, where I live, for example, 100% of the cable TV lines (and that includes cable Internet) are owned by either Rogers (on the Ontario side), or Videotron (on the Quebec side). There is exactly one provider of wireless Internet services.
That means that if Bell's argument is accepted by the CRTC, the Ottawa market will go from having about 50 options for high speed Internet to having exactly 3, each with a monopoly on their respective technology.
To make matters worse, not one of those three providers offers a service that is suitable for technologies like VPN, or running your own server. All three of them filter access on those ports, and won't allow their users any incoming connections. It's also in their service agreements that they can terminate your service if they catch you running a server.
In other words... not only will the variety of consumer-level services be cut down to 3 monopolies, the quality of services available to consumers will fall into the shitter. It's already fairly well known that if you need to run a VPN, you don't go with Bell, Rogers, or Storm in this city... you go with one of the 3rd parties that's leasing time through one of those three, to get unfettered access. If you want decent access to the Internet, you have to buy a corporate connection from these people... Bell's cheapest runs about $80/month, Rogers is the same, and Storm is $195/month. Just for the privilege of actually having a connection to the 'net which you can use for more than surfing and e-mail.
What's more, tax dollars paid for the establishment of Bell Nexxia. We paid for that copper which they own. So no. They should absolutely be required to continue leasing service. Actually, the Government should acquire Bell Nexxia and turn it back into a crown corporation, and make BCE, the phone/Internet company, lease time from Nexxia as well.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
and the sooner they pay back the differential between the monopolistic prices they received to subsidize their phone infrastructure for 100 years, and competitive prices, the better.
Those funds can be used to subsidize third party "last mile" networks, if Bell Canada is so suddenly keen on bringing competition to the market! And while we are at it, the cable carriers can do the same thing (albiet for a shorter time period). Lets see how they like it when there is more than a duopoly involved in the "last mile"
What's an "entirely" and what's wrong with ISPs having one?
Property is theft.
When they are not, there is a conflict of interest.
The same thing applies to the electrical grid, and to cable.
The maintenance of the infrastructure should be separate from the product delivered using the infrastructure, shouldn't it ?
Absolute statements are never true
On the contrary. As with any government agency, private industry should be free to compete. Once no one uses the government agency, it can be scaled back/eliminated. But until then, what's wrong with the government supplying a little socially conscious competition?
Your ad here. Ask me how!
SBC is the original "goatsie".
Seriously.
When they bought Pac*Bell, they integrated the "*" into the middle of "SBC". Turn the B* on it's side and you know what you've got.
When the merger was announced, this logo went out to managers on bronze medallions (I've got one in safe keeping, for future sale on ebay). Once it was realized, it was quickly changed. SBC did their best to get it off the internet, but I see some remain (get it while you can): http://www.lunarchallenge.com/images/SBC90.jpg, http://www.clpproductions.com/Images/Logos/sbc-logo.gif. If anyone knows of a large version still up, I'd love to get the link.
I'm pretty this wasn't a slight goof, but rather a from a pissed graphics arts employee that managed to slip it by the board.
...but where does Taco Bell fit in?
Python coder | PyQt Applications | Writer
who ever i am , let them do that , and you will see HACK++TV.1.0 broadcasting to the public about freedom about the corporate facist oligarchy that is trying to take over not just canada but the world in general. I htink the SAC 5$ proposal now should be killed look at warner brothers other day getitng the greed on wiht "20billion to isp liscence" WOA screw them. The crap they spew isnt worth it and i swaer on my grandmothers grave , you just try and take over my countries internet, and you will learn who WE are. DOne is being nice DoNE is being polite. hackers of te world unite.
And cellphones can do broadband?
Consider: connectivity that doesn't use 'landlines' or tip-and-ring technology, rather, symmetrical fibre and local digital infrastructure (not DSL).
Fiber isn't landline? It may be glass instead of copper but it still requires the same right of way and even more labour to install.
Get rid of the monopolies and governmental sanctioned phone-mafias.
Agreed, however the problem is in the details. For instance someone has to pay to build then maintain and own the infrastructure. What might work is to separate the ownership of the infrastructure from offering the services it is capable of delivering. Such an approach is being implemented as part of A Broadband Utopia in northeastern Utah, here's an update abet almost a year old. One person in the article says it is operated like an airport, airliners don't build their own, instead usually the airport is built and owned by the government who then leases gates to the airlines.
FalconShould there be a Law?
The most disconcerting message in the story is the interview Nowak had with Paul Geist. In it is mention of the fact that Minister of Industry Jim Prentice is AWOL on the issue. I mean, who would dare ask the Minister in charge of investigating anti-competitive offences - and they are serious offences - to look into what has to be one of the worst companies to do business with in Canada. I won't even mention that one of the most recent former Ministers of Industry had just been previously employed as ::cough:: head of regulatory affairs at ::cough:: Bell Canada.
While you might think that the CRTC is an old antequated fossil that needs to be put out of its misery, the Minsitry of Industry is on life support. What's left of it is being run by gutless bureaucrats more interested in their career path in private business post-federal brothel than protecting Canadians from scheming corporate predators, marketing fraud, advertising scams, artificially high gas prices, the list goes on and on...
Bell Canada is the least of our worries.
-- Karma whore? You betcha. --
The impression I got from Bell's argument is something like this:
What they said: The market was opened up for competition, but now there's enough competition so we shouldn't have to still hold their hands.
What they mean: People are competing with us, despite the fact that we own the network and fuck around so badly with our wholesale clients that their problems never get solved in a reasonable amoutn of time, and instead of fixing our ludicrously broken processes or continuing to lose out to people who use our network better than we do, we want our monopoly back.
Bell does have a point; a lot of companies (like one ISP I worked for for almost a week after my training ended) just keep reselling Bell's and Telus's services (despite getting dicked around all the time); they have essentially the same prices, plans, and service as Bell, but it takes longer to get anything done because you're one more step removed from the technicians.
An ISP a friend worked for, however, took the other route. After selling Bell's service in Montreal, they hired my friend to do their ADSL rollout. They bought their own bandwidth, installed their own DSLAMs, and started moving customers over, and you know what? Paying for bandwidth directly was cheaper for them than leasing an essentially unlimited line from Bell.
As a result, they started moving all of their customers over from Bell's per-customer charges to their third-party's per-megabit rates, and they're saving tons of money - enough to use to buy the new ADSL2+ equipment and move even more people over.
The lesson is: Don't wait for Bell to stop being dicks; do things right yourself and it pays off.
Bring back Sirius Punk!
Project Utopia in Utah is a good example of what can be done when you get people to make it happen.
Yea, though as a libertarian I believe in small government I like Utopia. A system like it doesn't require the government to own the infrastructure though, all it requires is to require the owner of the infrastructure to allow open access to it and bar them from compeating with anyone who wants to offer any services it can deliver. I like the idea of having a coop own it, as it is now utility coops already deliver electricity and phone service. Actually I'd expand the separation and open access requirements to power lines as well, a utility company would own the powerlines but would be required to allow access to the lines to power generation companies. And any other utility that requires right of way access. Then allow consumers to choose who will provide the electricity they use. A coal fired power plant, nuclear power plant, solar, and wind farms could be hooked up to the same lines then the user would sign up with whichever provider they wanted. For those who are considered mostly with low prices, they could sign up with the coal company. Those who are concerned about greenhouse gases and believe in nuclear power can sign up with them. And those who care about GHGs and nuclear can go with solar and or wind.
And no, landlines refer to tip-and-ring technology of the old phone companies. Fiber is in lots of places, thanks to the Rolling '90s.
As fiber needs the same, or similar, rights of way as copper does, as does coaxial cable I consider them all landlines. The only thing different once the lines are lain is the equipment needed to use them.
FalconShould there be a Law?
utopia.
I see one big problem with TFA. It talks about how Utah taxpayers subsidized Utopia yet it does not acknowledge the billions of taxpayer dollars government already gave to the telcos and cablecos to buildout a broadband infrastructure the companies never built. Question, would you also like airlines to build and pay for their own airports as well? Here's an appropriate quote from Paul Morris, Utopia's executive director:
"It would be absurd for each airline to build its own airport," he says. "But that's just what we've been doing for telecommunications. Qwest has its set of wires in the ground, and Comcast"--the dominant cable provider in the region--"has its own. We think it makes sense for a city or a region to build the airport, have someone operate it, and let as many airlines provide service as want to."
FalconShould there be a Law?
(1) How does your government-run program ensure that resources aren't being wasted providing a level of service which is less urgently demanded than the other things those resources could have been expended on? In private industry this is accomplished by the profit motive, which government organizations don't have.
(2) How, exactly, do you expect private industry to compete with an organization that trivially get laws passed in its favor (see also: the USPS's monopoly on first-class letter delivery), which can get unlimited "risk-free" loans by virtue of being backed by taxation, and which has no obligation to pay back even the principle, much less the interest, on its start-up costs? Much less if the government chooses to run it at a loss, making up the balance in taxes or inflation.
The only way you can reasonably talk about a government spin-off organization actually competing against private industry is if that organization receives no support from the government at all, whether in start-up costs, operational costs, special laws, loan backing (risk) -- anything which transfers cost or risk to the taxpayers, or legally differentiates the organization from its private competitors. At that point you might as well just privatize it completely.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
If you're already in an "unlimited" plan with Rogers, aren't they required to uphold the existing definition? Did you have a contract with them or just month-to-month? If the former, then they should be able to add such new limitations.
There's one difference in between your sense of cupric vs fiber.
I'm not the only one who considers fiber as landlines: "Pyxis Broadband offers a wholesale alternative to landline fiber via a carrier-grade, wireless backbone operating in a secure, FCC licensed frequency environment." Senior Network Technician ... "Resolved leased landline fiber". "BSNL Land lines (Fiber optics) and Mobile phones".
Co-ops are good ideas... but take common standards and funding methods to do. There's hope.
I don't see any problems of common standards, as both electrical and phone companies worked out any connection problem. As for funding, though on a much larger scale, they can be funded much the same way as coops are funded now, membership fees. I'm a member of 2 coops and when I joined each one I paid a fee. The coops are eligible for loans so they can raise more funds. Now each year depending on how much I spend at them I receive a check from them. And if I ever decide I want to leave the coops I get a refund of the member fee I paid joining as well as another refund check depending on how much I spent there.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Yes everyone, Verizon is just a figment of your imagination.
It needn't be complex.
Ma Bell was broken up into regional bells, including Verizon and SBC. AT&T was allowed to continue as a long-distance (non-local) service.
SBC cheated and stole well enough that they ended up with enough money to buy a large number of other regional bells when the regulations were lifted (Verizon did the same thing, though not nearly as bad behaving as SBC). SBC didn't have any cross-country links of its own, which was costing them quite a bit, so they bought AT&T, and decided to take the unsoiled name for themselves and try to make people forget they're still the same "SBC" that's been screwing them over for decades. Simple.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
I've used both Rogers and Bell.
They both have shitty service and behave like monopolies.
I finally switched to uniserve (ca.inter.net) a company based out of Montreal (I think).
I can highly recommend them. I was totally floored by their excellent service. $5 cheaper per month the first year (then the same price with modem rental), tech guys that speak English, support Mac OS X, windows, and even linux! Helpful friendly and polite.
They even walked me through how to configure my ADSL modem as a bridge so I could use my router behind it (its default configuration was as a router).
After every tech call to them, I received a follow up call 23-48 hrs later with them checking that the problem had been resolved to my satisfaction!
The only two problems I had were caused by Bell:
One was on start up. Bell "forgot" to activate the line. Uniserve explained honestly to me that their hands were tied for any Bell issue Bell "requires" 48hrs to fix it.
The second problem was an outage caused by Bell (Bell claimed a "snow storm" damaged system... which ironically happened two days earlier on the Saturday and my internet was fine the day after on Sunday. Monday it died. Personally I think Bell throttled my ISP to almost zero since the error was a time out error (modem live lights worked) so they could give Bell business customers access while I waited for them to fix other lines that had failed on the weekend and Bell had not bothered to fix them.
I take uniserve's word over Bell, their service an support any other time has been consistent and outstanding.
Where as all previous experiences with Bell have been well... lets say leaving a lot to be desired.
If the CRTC reinstates Bells monopoly ISP service will go to crap.
Rogers vs Bell. What kind of competition is that?
The truth is if Bell or Rogers actually listened to their customers and gave them the service they want then they wouldn't have to worry about competition.
I will be writing my MP.
Note: I do not work for uniserve, and no I wasn't halucinating they actually called me back!
----- "Profanity is the one language that all programmers understand."
.... If I just take an axe to that pole out front in MY yard? That should solve the problem of these pesky no good thieves who don't pay the toll for using my property!
First, it is clearly demonstrable that the profit motive is in no way the magical panacia you imply it is. Second, why does the government not have a profit motive? For some reason, you assume government will not care. I'll get more into that in discussing the USPS.
The second problem with your assertion is you claim that somehow the prices that would be commanded in the free market are relevent. Rural electification, for instance, is money losing, but vital.
Intersetingly, it is you who is advocating utilities/companies that can pay their start up costs with private funds, and then assume ownership. The USPS doesn't take 'risk-free' loans from the US government. In fact, the surpluses of the late 90's were only due to the USPS being treated as a profit center. In reality, the USPS had raised rates to save money for a few years to upgrade. So, by counting the money as profit back then, you may have been mislead into thinking they ran a deficit recently. And the USPS doesn't have any legal monopoly. They do happen to own everyone's mailbox, so no one else is allowed to use them. That may be the concept of which you were thinking. I worry far less about the government favoring its own programs compared to big private companies.
The last assumption you make is that I care if the competition is on an even playing field. While that is important if all private companies are competing, why do we care if the government is doing it? Ideally, the government would supply some services (ultilites, etc.) up to the point when marginal cost equaled marginal utility. And sometimes lose money. So?
Bringing up the USPS is hilarious. Because FedEx and UPS do compete against that. Private schools compete. Private security forces. Private additional unemployment insurance. Private arrays of microwave transmitters to move information around. Private housing options. In fact, that's why I don't understand why people oppose socialized medicine. Private alternatives to pretty much any government program exist. Unless they'd be impossible anyway. I suppose that's the crux of the problem with your arguement. What's an industry where government supplying that service made it impossible for the market to do so? It would help if that example was not one where equity is clearly a superior concern (courts, etc.) or market volitility would be devestating (police, etc.).
Your ad here. Ask me how!
There is growing competition for last-mile connections in the core of the major cities -- well, there is in Vancouver, I have to assume other large cities in Canada and the US are similar. It's easy. A few miles of cabling can serve tens of thousands of workers (and people, if there are condos downtown). It's possible to see a return on investment.
But in the much less dense areas, no company will ever be able to roll out a last mile wired connection. It just costs too much. We've got cable and phone, that's it. That's probably all that we'll ever have in the wired world. I expect to have wireless options, i.e. WiMax, someday.
What's my point? We're years away from having competive last-mile options - two options are not enough for real competition.
Oh, and yes, the fact that the incumbent phone companies built their network under a regulated monopoly for decades doesn't help Bell's case. Maybe we should force the incumbents to split off their old infrastructure and run those independently, like the way we used to split banking from insurance and home mortgages. Ok, that's not likely.
Didnt they built the network on PUBLICLY OWNED LAND with PUBLIC SUBSIDIES ?
how the f@ck they are able to come up and say "our network" and bar competition out of it ?
Read radical news here
Wouldn't that be the last 1.6 kilometers?
Nah, Canadians are bilingual when it comes to measurement systems.
Someone please explain to me why incumbent carriers like this need to exist. A government that can build and maintain a network of roads surely can build and maintain a network of wire.
It's time for governments to build out networks and let companies provide services over those wires - much like roads. Government can either use its own employees to maintain the wires, or hire companies to do that work (exactly like the way roads and bridges are built and maintained).
-ted
I had a nice long reply almost ready, but Firefox crashed before I could submit it. Rather than re-write it, I'm just going to say that I believe that (a) an unfettered free market[1] tends toward the optimum possible allocation of resources[2]; and (b) the unfettered free market is, more importantly, the only system which does not itself depend on the presence of aggression[3] to function. For whatever reasons you probably disagree with (a) and don't care about (b), so really the gulf between our basic principles is much too great for there to be any purpose in debating our respective conclusions at such a high level. I will address this point, however:
because it is clearly incorrect. "The USPS holds a statutory monopoly on non-urgent First Class Mail, outbound U.S. international letters as well [as] the exclusive right to put mail in private mailboxes, as described in the Private Express Statutes" (Source). More information is available on the Private Express Statutes.
[1] A market system in which no aggression[3] is tolerated.
[2] Not a perfect allocation, which is only possible given perfect knowledge of the present and future, but no other system could guarantee better.
[3] Aggression is the use of force, or threat thereof, against a non-aggressor.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
I have a solution for you.
Hmmm... that is interesting. I knew about the mailbox (as I alluded to earlier), but not about the anti-competitive statues. Lately, people on slashdot have been correcting my facts with information as opposed to disagreeing with assertions. I just wanted to tell you that I appreciate it.
I do understand their point: that by making extra money via their monopoly can be sunk into equitable distribution. It's certainly a different arguement than what I thought it was.
I think you mischaracterize our disagreement. I think some utilities, including telecommunications, should be available at a reasonable cost to every citizen, at some level. So, the efficacy is sort of irrelevent.
So, I don't particularly care about efficency in that vein. Conversly, what you believe I don't care about, freedom from aggression (or rather coersion), is very important to me. While I do not claim that other systems are free of coersion, I'll claim that free market theorists fail to recognize several types of coersion that applies to the free market.
Namely, you leave out the coercive effects:
Sorry if I'm getting incoherent, but I've had quite a bit to drink since I started typing this post...
to the A truly unfettered free market between infinitely powerful, dispassionate and well-informed agents would lead to an optimum allocation of resources (or at least a local maximum.) However, free market theorists tend to discount the cost of obtaining and processing information (with the exception of obtaining proprietary information). They also fail to recognize certain types of aggression.I disagree with your second point, not by claiming that other systems are free of aggression, but that your definition is far too narrow.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
heh, funny enough as soon as you mentioned ISP based from Montreal, I knew who you meant. I used to be with them (or the co. they bought) when they were accent.net back in 96-97 and total.net later on. Great service but changed to Shaw Wave as soon as it came out. Glad to hear they're still around.
[alk]
+1
illegitimii non ingravare
That would be ColbaNET. The downside (since I no longer work for them) Is that bell only gives access to the CO but not remote CO.
This gives a very narrow range of access and at some distances Bell's standard adsl is faster than Adsl2.
So even with your own equipment you can't free from Bell's resold ADSL service.