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Bell Canada Launches Its Own Online Video Store

Posted by Soulskill on from the pay-no-attention-to-the-isp-behind-the-curtain dept.

rsax writes "Bell Canada recently announced that it is launching a downloadable video store just as it is caught up in a government inquiry into its traffic-shaping practices. Some consider this a conflict of interest since several content providers were in the process of distributing TV shows using P2P technology before the Bell throttling issue started getting media coverage. Bell's FAQ states that it is not available for Mac users right now (and not Linux either of course) because they are using Windows Media DRM. They do, however, invite feedback on their site."

6 of 106 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Let's start our own... by taylortbb · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Just switch to TekSavvy. They're an ISP that believes in network neutrality, they've even organized a rally on parliament hill for next week. Prices beat Bell too.

    If you want to attend the rally, see http://www.netneutralityrally.ca/ .

  2. Re:Bell "Support" for Mac by SeaFox · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Here's one, Bell - strip the DRM and present the video using an open standard. Content provider doesn't like it? Well, as a big distribution channel, you might just have a bit of leverage with them to, you know, SERVE YOUR CUSTOMERS BETTER.

    The content providers ARE their customers where this service is concerned, we the consuming audience are the product BEll Canada they are selling to the provider. ;)
  3. A Future Dismal Failure... by His+Shadow · · Score: 4, Insightful

    75% percent of the portable media player market is Apple's iPod. 75%. Any online store that prevents their target demographic from transferring their videos and music to the overwhelming media player of choice is choosing failure as a business plan. Bell has chosen failure. Microsoft's business plans are not in the best interest's of consumers or even business partners. Surely the latest MSN license server fiasco and the Play For Sure Zune betrayal are painfully evident lessons in who not to partner with when setting up a media distribution shop.

    --

    Fiat Homos et Pereat Theos

  4. And the puzzle is solved... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It all makes sense now. Bell Canada is the Company that orchestrated Salem-style witch hunts against mom & pop brick & mortar satellite TV shops prior to launching their ExpressVu service. Even before they managed to lobby a dictatorship-style law forbidding foreign satellite service, they were orchestrating raids against their future competitors. The bandwidth throttling is just a modern day version of their Monopoly status abuse.

  5. Cable? Are you nuts?!? by camperdave · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Cancel your DSL and move to Cable.

    Teksavvy doesn't provide internet over cable. Rogers and Shaw have a tighter grip on their network than Bell has on the phone lines.

    --
    When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
  6. Re:Silly DRM trix are for kids by CastrTroy · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The problem with DRM on FOSS is that it's too hard to make it work in the slightest. With Linux you could easily write a video driver and a sound driver that just dumps everything to disk, thereby automatically bypassing the DRM. They could probably do some trickery by ensuring that you are only running specific drivers, but that will only go so far. The open source nature of Linux allows you to do whatever you want with the system. Thereby making DRM impossible. An actual open source library that would decrypt the DRM content would be even worse, because you could just recompile it to drop the decrypted info to the disk. No messing with drivers required.

    --

    Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.