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Bell Proposing Usage-Based Billing
Idiomatick writes "Bell Canada is attempting to impose UBB on its wholesale customers. As Bell was given a last-mile monopoly in much of Canada by the government, they are required to follow rules set up by the CRTC; this includes leasing their lines to competitive ISPs. And they are given a directive by the CRTC to provide competitive speeds to said ISPs. Teksavvy has informed its customers that were this to go through, the current monthly cap would be quartered and the cost for exceeding it would be 'multiple times more than our current per Gigabyte rate of $0.25/GB on overages.' They have also helpfully included a link where you can send your comments/concerns to the CRTC directly."
How much would it cost to rip up the ground and lay down more fiber? It seems like in most cases, a (natural?) monopoly results. When things get this bad, is there any chance that a new generation of telecommunications companies can spring up (perhaps with government subsidies to get them going)?
I'm moving to.. oh. Well fuck them!
No wholesale provider here in Australia could impose such charges on 3rd party ISPs in this way, if they did, the ACCC would put a stop to that. (at least as far as fixed line DSL goes)
The CRTC requires Bell to resell its lines for fixed rates. Bell must offer service that's at least as good as what it provides to its own customers. As the regulated rate is below Bell's own rate of return from an actual Bell customer, Bell has no incentive to provide better service that what it provides to its own customers. If the CRTC allowed for other arrangements, Bell could strike a deal with a wholesaler to offer unlimited service at a higher price. As it stands, it can't. Nothing here is surprising.
Where I pay around 60 times what Americans pay per gig (at a whopping 384kb/s) and I have a really cheap service provider :)
Everything these days are done on the internet from entertainment to doing taxes.
In some countries the goverment are even investing money in internet connectivity to provide better connections to more people.
But when you then start to charge by usage then you'll see people stop using it and development slows down.
One would think it was better for the country as a whole to have people to embrace the technology rather than do bean counting on their internet traffic.
Maybe being outspoken, vocal, and whiney, is the only way to get what you want. Sometimes if you let people take an inch, they go all the fucking way because they want to make money. You should try it sometime, maybe you'll get what you want. :)
If this had been the model from the very start (when modems ruled the earth), it would be taken as normal. It's only because the data volumes of users have been low, that it's not worth billing per megabyte. However now we have the "power users" (read: bandwidth hogs) bleating on, as if someone's taking away their candy.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Ultimately I think Internet access may well be another utility like water or electricity. It sort of makes sense to pay for what you use, so to speak.
But the charge should be so low that you need to really strain your connection a lot to feel it, and at the same time normal monthly fees need to go away.
I don't like the idea, but it makes sense economically. It costs energy to move packets around and keep networks running. The more you use the more you should pay.
But having some crazy base fee and then some punitive extra usage fee on top of that... No thanks.
.: Max Romantschuk
- That means charge a very low initial access fee. Say $5-$10 max per month
- Don't force customers to pay for 20GB/month if they're not using it
- Don't force customers to predict how much they'll be using period then take their money anyway if they don't use it
- Do not charge a ridiculous amount beyond the cap. Charge a fixed rate per GB and keep it reasonable
ISPs and phone companies have had it too good for too long oversubscribing and overcharging for people using way under their quota. This move isn't to make things fair - it's to gouge heavy users. I don't pay $10 for my first 5 litres of petrol then $400 for my next 5 litres. One reason is that I could go to the competition. ISPs typically have monopoly, near monopoly or at best duopoly. They are NOT playing fair.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
> If I switch to Rogers, Bell will lose me as a phone customer. I'll have no
> reason to not subscribe to a digital phone service from Rogers.
Make sure your port your number. When you port your number away from Bell, it triggers some magic retention-department panic. They'll call you several times asking how they can get your business back. Make sure you tell them exactly why you're no longer a Bell customer, maybe if enough people shout loud enough they'll eventually listen.
In my case, there was no DSLAM in the nearest CO; they suggested I get Bell WiMax. After I finished laughing at them, I explained that my new phone company had their own ADSL2+ DSLAM in that same CO, and that I was pleased-beyond-belief with the service I was receiving. The bits... they torrent!!
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
As I understand it, the deadline for filing comments on the UBB passed on midnight April 14th, 2009.
If you nevertheness wish to file (and high volume of comments, albeit late, may nevertheless be of interest to the CRTC), the commentary ought to fall under "Tariff", and an appropriate subject might be File Number #8740-B2-200904989 - Bell Canada - TN7181.
Keep in mind that this is DSLAM bandwidth (i.e. the "last mile" copper wire) that Bell proposes to impose this tariff on. It is not network bandwidth from an ISP to the backbone. Bell is obliged to sell DSLAM access on a wholesale basis to competitor ISPs. For interesting statistics, consider reading this: http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r20690166-The-Bell-Disclosure -- the statistics read, if I understand it (and there's a pretty decent chance I don't) the risk to a customer of having less than 100% bandwidth available at any one point is exceedingly low (i.e. less than 1% of it occurring for less than five minutes on any given day).
Interestingly, Bell has not disclosed how much money it has paid for Arbour Networks' deep packet inspection and bandwidth limiting hardware. I understand, informally and anecdotally (and, again, there's a decent chance I'm wrong), that the amount spent on the bandwidth limiting hardware greatly exceeds the cost of upgrading the DSLAMs to eliminate any risk of the above mentioned rare less-than-complete bandwidth. I would quite like to see more information on the cost of Arbour Networks' bandwidth limiting hardware, and the cost of upgrading DSLAMS. Hopefully the CRTC board does, too.
I think cost of doing the same in Canada would be astronomical. But then again, US national debt is more than the number of stars in the Universe, so astronomical is not what it used to be.
Because here they can charge people until they cry. The market currently supports it, so it will continue.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
If ending the ponzi scheme you were roped into, screwed you worse than the procrastination keeping the ponzi scheme going - would you take the losses?
If you could prolong it beyond your lifetime would you take the loss?
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You may want to re-think that.
Its not a monopoly as the article suggests, but rather a duopoly. Rogers is just as bad. Its sort of like peoples complains about oil companies and price fixing. Bell and Rogers are *supposed* to be in competition with each other, but really both are happy with the way things are and they pretty much just mirror each other as far as it goes.
Case in point, Rogers recently changed the way I look at my bandwidth usage a week or so ago. They made a new web page under your user account... Guess what I noticed when I checked it?
Your monthly usage limit is: 60 GB (61,440 MB)
Additional usage costs:$ 1.50 per GB (1 GB = 1024 MB)
You have to love their EULA that basically states, "we can change this whenever the hell we damn feel like it. Too frickin' bad!"
A) When I first got my account there was no limit.
B) Currently or maybe I should say previously if you exceeded your limit you were given a warning and then disconnected.
C) Now or in the future it looks like they plan to charge you 1.50$ per GB extra. Isn't that nice. Also note that it is 6 TIMES the price of what Teksavvy is charging now for the same service.
Complete bullshit. This is how I find out also, on some obscure web page that no one really checks, which they just created. So underhanded.
I HATE telecommunications in Canada. The CRTC really needs to grow some balls for a change.
...from the Slashdot readership. Now can we do something about it?
Let's do something in the style of the Beagleboard. Design and build a bare board for ultra wide band radio, aimed squarely at establishing a mesh network. That is, design from the beginning for every node to simultaneously "connect" to multiple other nodes. Design for as much range as we can squeeze out of it, while still maintaining the ability to ramp up to as much usable bandwidth as possible as nodes get closer together.
I thought about suggesting a Beagledaughterboard. The Beagleboard has lots of pins available on its expansion header, and even more pins available on its LCD header that can be repurposed in software. Making it a Beagledaughterboard would mean there would be very few inquiries from random people wanting to know why the board they bought from Digikey doesn't work when they plug it into their Windows XP machine.
On the other hand, designing it as a USB2.0 highspeed client device would mean that it would work practically anywhere, given software support. The chips and parts required to speak USB2.0 are dirt cheap and trivially available. I'll volunteer to write the software drivers, if somebody will design the hardware.
So... where are the hardware people? I know damn well that lots of you read /. Anybody want to kick the phone company in the nuts? Anybody? Anybody? Bueller?