I'll bet there's a huge consulting wing at McKinsey, waiting to help you redesign your data center.
While it's true that cost savings aren't being seen because data center/NOC design is state-of-the-art 1995, there's lots being done to achieve better savings. Virtualization (while not green, still a good performance/watt idea) works wonders. SaaS is in its infancy. Higher storage/watt is here, today, as well. Until we find the end of Moore's Law, we'll continue to be more efficient, if only because energy==money.
The whole thing smells of consultants wanting money, rather than citation of methods that pursue more efficiency. Maybe Iceland still needs to be the data center of the earth (think geothermal, and they have mindless amounts), but TFA is largely specious.
Without a doubt, you should use safe practices, but a homeowner/lessee have a lot of latitude. While UL equipment is the norm, there are many safe home-brew systems that can save money depending vastly on what you do with them.
The conventional wisdom of pubs like HomePowerNews and The Mother Earth News seem to advocate understanding battery technology and inverters, and also where you're consuming juice where those consuming devices can be better used (unplugged when not in use) or replaced with more cost-effective devices.
Low-voltage devices might be able to be used but may be actually more expensive to both buy and power over the long term with a shorter usage life.
Driving the power company's meter backwards may or may not even be legal in some states/areas, so you need to consider running dual systems (not as tough as it sounds) to get genuine savings over the investment life of what you do.
Solar may not work in some regions or areas; windmills may be restricted, and other generating schemes may have additional implications. Every site is different and needs to be treated that way. That said, the more we can save initially (and rationally) the better. Generating your own juice needs some thought because there's a varying amount of wisdom about what works in different applications. But by all means, DO IT. Permits aren't often required, but it's municipally defined, or thru state laws, or by the National Electrical Code and whatever your insurance company agrees with.
Liability for 'curing' the problem is a great question. I don't want to see the 'cure' become another infection vector. Do we know that the cure is going to disable this network, but not enable a subsequent one?
It's a lead-pipe cinch that law enforcement people will and can do nothing to disable the network, and it-- like others-- represents a huge security hole and a big problem in terms of potential misuses of the existing botnet.
The 'authority' to even legally disable botnets is onerous. What's a botnet-- is p2p a botnet? Is every torrent site a botnet? Is every Skype user enabling a botnet?
Some Van Damme coder that goes over the line to disable them might be a hero. He/she might also be the unwitting infection vector for a subsequent botnet if they don't get their own code right.
Mandatory machine cleansers might be nice, the 'system health' check that Microsoft uselessly tried to employ with Windows 2008 server. There's no leadership to vet how this might be done, and how it's kept up to date, and what constitutes potential botnet user software found and what might be useful in terms of gateways to monitor traffic.
So botnets are going to continue to be a problem until wise people decide how to first cleanse the problem, then how to design operating systems (this means you) to prevent botnet infection, and be able to distinguish botnets from p2p/etc. apps that have legitimate use-- and what constitutes 'legitimate' use.
Bottom line: nothing changes soon, because there are too many issues surrounding the question(s).
Ah, you've been hoodwinked. Or your a propagandist/apologist for Sun. I'm lucky enough to have been around when SunOS was just a pup, and I had grey hair, then.
Yes, Sun has pushed for open standards, but not for their own software components, rather RPCs/IPCs/APIs. When I did Connectathons, I watched how Sun worked, then the evolution of Solaris, along with the evolution of Sun workstations and servers and their tough migration to a services model to emulate the success of IBM and others.
As I'm not a Linux zealot, rather I understand the orthodox nature of FOSS (and subscribe to some of its tenets), I've watched the half-assed 'open source' passive/aggressive behavior they've managed over the past dozen years. Java was a great environment. And I once fixed James Gosling's laptop, which at the time, ran Windows. I'm not orthodox, and neither was James.
McNealy was very interested in fighting the big battles against his perceptions of the giants in his way. Like other big egos like Ellison, he found that wishing ain't making, and clever slogans don't make good products. Sun's otherwise very good engineering has been well-received.
But their hardware is sold by their software, for it if it stood alone, there would be no hardware sales. No one rushes to write new operating systems for UltraSparc III 8-cores. No one. Solaris helps sell their servers, and the combos help sell services, and that's plainly where their revenue comes from. Zealotry exists in the FOSS community, but Stallman's principles are well-stated and whatever zeal goes behind them is plainly missing from Sun's dribble of open source support.
Linux drivers, sucky as they can be, are still chugging along because there are hackers that want to make things work. Sun sells hardware, and they have a hardware maker's mentality that the software just sells the hardware, folks. That's partly why they went 'open' in the first place-- but it was a lame attempt at building a community that McNealy couldn't stomach and Schwartz pays lip service to. It's all about shareholder equity-- make no mistake about this. Sun couldn't figure out how to make Java open? No, it's just they put the openness change through so slowly that it didn't really matter. It was lip service. Open Solaris isn't like OpenSUSE or Fedora or CentOS; these non-supported version have traction now where OpenSolaris doesn't and can't get any respect. Yes, it's nice, solid, Unix, and it has no wind in its sails/sales, so as a non-revenue producer, it gets no attention at Sun. Sun hasn't figured out how to make FOSS revenues, unlike numerous other organizations. Buying MySQL didn't give them much of a clue, now that closed-source details are starting to emerge regarding MySQL. They don't get it, and as long as it doesn't have an ecosystem to produce revenues, they never will.
Sticking it to Microsoft is just a side-benefit of opening up source and using 'free' licensing schemes to get things moving. You should be in politics. I hear there's a huge void left when Karl Rove left.
We have to disagree on engine efficiency. The amount of output per cubic displacement has risen steadily. While turbos/superchargers may shorten engine life, they've become more interesting and reliable still. Add in variable valve timing, vastly more intelligent systems controls, and things are much better. My family has five vehicles where I live; the 'fleet' economy gets better with every purchase we make (and not SUVs, but cars and utility trucks).
It's very 'western' of you to attempt to see heart and mind as separate entities; this, too, is a fallacy. Convincing often requires repeated attempts at clarity about choices made from decisions made on good data, or data that fits intuitional molds.
Finding the truth isn't difficult, rather, getting the signal from the noise surrounding it is. You can get lots of inputs, as is the habit these days, and hear the same BS repeated over and over and over. It's still BS, despite the multiplicity of attempts.
The subjective and objective are additional concepts that bear dealing with. I have my own subjective observations, and I have those that I believe are objective because of the referential integrity of the information used to conclude them. Wishing and hoping are wonderful emotions, but they aren't the reality of what actually exists, just our mapping of emotions on the the current situation.
Fear is what war is mostly based on, and baseless fears at that. Only rarely can war be defended as a defense. Most other times it's one bozo leader after another's goodies. In this case, it was oil, and perceived dignity, IMHO. Objectively, it was done without international community support and done with the worst of intentions and poor planning, which also served the whims of the various business constituencies in 2002/3. This is documented sufficiently to be usable as fact.
To tie back to TFA, blind-deaf-dumb shills of Pentagon are know 'called-out' for what they did. The leaders of a 'free press' did this....followed along blindly with a propaganda machine that's known for its misleading and bias/CYA coverage. Better the devil you know, than the one you don't.
It's about 80% of the energy. Much depends on engine efficiency, which gets better all the time. SO let's say $1.20. Now add in the 18c/gal tax, so we're up to $1.38. In my state, add in 9% adjusted sales tax, so, about $1.50 per gallon. Markups? Yes, there's a problem.
The key you missed is that going from 50% eff to 100% eff may be unbelievably expensive, this driving it all back up again. Is ethanol a better 'green' fuel? In many ways, yes. Hydrogen would be optimal, but it has other risks associated with it that keep the price and 'greenness' high.
Your concepts of ideological fiefdoms betrays your skepticism, which may be beyond healthy at some point. Yes, there will always be partisanship, and no source is totally bereft of some kind of bias.
And civics and citizenship bestows obligations to those that wish to participate civilly, and through their citizenship. One of these obligations is not to spew specious loads of bullshit. If you look, and believe me, I share a goodly amount of your skepticism, you'll find those sources of information that can educate you without bias. The future can have referential integrity. The future can have people spewing 'talking points', too. Let's hear when each is being done by knowing the source. That's what media watching organizations do (with their own inherent bias) that helps balance out the obvious deceptions. You see, there is truth. It might not be what you wanted to hear, but there is. Finding it will always be tough. I'll die trying.
A little bit harsh, and your post misses the point of referential integrity. It's ok to rebroadcast Pentagon propaganda if you want, as long as you cite the source. We know that the Pentagon will have a bias towards itself and against its enemies. To otherwise re-write, wholesale, Pentagon propaganda then pass it off as their own findings. Therein lies the really hideous part: fabrication.
Bias detection, bullshit meters, and other healthy skepticisms are great-- tainted by the concept that some organizations actually go out and get the news with real references, where others are willing to swallow whatever without alerting the populace/readership that there might be bias from the source. Hence journalism's odd standards. There are some of us that believe in them, and believe in sources, and believe in referential integrity. There are those that only want to listen to what they want to hear.... and some that re-write for the public consumption, just that.
1. Backup to media, and keep that media offsite and rotate it out frequently; check to make sure that the media is readable and usable.
2. Record your serial numbers, model numbers, CD keys (if needed), versions, and other characteristics of your hardware and then scan it to PDF and upload it to an online account as a draft message entitled: if_it's_stolen.
3. Use your camera to take pictures of everything you own for your insurance company. Link these items where possible into the aforementioned file.
4. File a police report, in detail, quickly, and then the same to your insurance company if you have one.
5. Hide your most important stuff; most burglars have to get in and get out quickly and aren't going to look between couch cushions, under garments in a closet, and so on. If your machine is your life, then make sure your life is hidden, obscure, or with you at all times. I prefer with me at (almost) all times. When in doubt, obscure it.
Sorry for your loss; look on craigslist and used computer shop sites.
Very few political entities are bereft of terrorism. Schier once again makes numerous mistakes in pointing to the culpable. The culpable are: all of us, ranging from users teaching users, to ISPs, to the website owners, to the makers of protocols with holes like Swiss cheese (and apologies to the Swiss). It could be fixed, but no one wants to claim the nexus of responsibility.
The terrorism label is a red herring, great for propaganda and useless war mongering. No one doubts the existence of many organizations that will murder, some en masse, in the name of their cause.
And this is there way of co-opting use profiles very handily into their plans. Instead, it's time for them to invest capex and opex into new and improved facility for Comcast shareholders and most importantly users -- to keep up with demand.
The upshot is that all of the noise and smoke and confusion about the process will help increase awareness of what the ISO and allied 'standards body' agencies do, and what their process and impacts are to members and non-members. For too long, many people have been in the dark about what the ISO, IEEE, and other bodies represent. It's a good thing to shed light on it and perhaps open the processes to more involvement and scrutiny from non-vendor sources.
It's kind of like the Schwarzchild radius. Instead of slowing down and being forever entrapped by the immense gravitational point source of the black hole, it's like being entrapped in the immense graviational field of a sun.
It's a shame that NS has to be watched like a hawk, but they're proven in the past that they'll stretch their agreements to their edge. Of course no one else does this, right?
There are the honorable, and the dishonorable organizations and it's getting more difficult to tell them apart. My take of NS (and I left them long ago, but my friends deal with their madness) is that they'll continue to push the edges to gain revenue at the expense of perceived honor. They remind me of telcos in this regard.
There's one difference in between your sense of cupric vs fiber. Landlines are old technology, where the capacity per cable lay is around 220 users (differs, obviously). A WM fiber can haul perhaps 100x of that number, with variables. Landlines often use aerial carriage, where fiber is usually buried. Landlines, therefore, are a bit different if ill-defined.
Co-ops are good ideas... but take common standards and funding methods to do. There's hope.
Project Utopia in Utah is a good example of what can be done when you get people to make it happen.
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. A lot of it is dark and no one knows just how much except those that laid it.
Cellphones do a heel-on-the-garden-hose broadband. Not very good. But there are ways to say 'no' to monopolistic behavior.
As a utility, the crown owns Bell's turf, or at least many pieces of it. The crown giveth, and the crown can take it away. So can provincial governments that grant access, easements, right-of-way, and tax them. I hope it doesn't get to that... but perhaps they'll start to get the idea.
Consider: cell phones. Consider: connectivity that doesn't use 'landlines' or tip-and-ring technology, rather, symmetrical fibre and local digital infrastructure (not DSL).
Get rid of the monopolies and governmental sanctioned phone-mafias. Be inventive. Be firm.
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.
Kind of left that out of his background there on his bio page.
Microsoft is interested in anything that sells Windows Server. However, with all of their sword rattling, known monopolistic behaviors, partnering with them still can get you the Black Widow Effect. Just ask 3Com, or Ashton Tate, etc.
Slashdot Mirror
I'll bet there's a huge consulting wing at McKinsey, waiting to help you redesign your data center.
While it's true that cost savings aren't being seen because data center/NOC design is state-of-the-art 1995, there's lots being done to achieve better savings. Virtualization (while not green, still a good performance/watt idea) works wonders. SaaS is in its infancy. Higher storage/watt is here, today, as well. Until we find the end of Moore's Law, we'll continue to be more efficient, if only because energy==money.
The whole thing smells of consultants wanting money, rather than citation of methods that pursue more efficiency. Maybe Iceland still needs to be the data center of the earth (think geothermal, and they have mindless amounts), but TFA is largely specious.
Without a doubt, you should use safe practices, but a homeowner/lessee have a lot of latitude. While UL equipment is the norm, there are many safe home-brew systems that can save money depending vastly on what you do with them.
The conventional wisdom of pubs like HomePowerNews and The Mother Earth News seem to advocate understanding battery technology and inverters, and also where you're consuming juice where those consuming devices can be better used (unplugged when not in use) or replaced with more cost-effective devices.
Low-voltage devices might be able to be used but may be actually more expensive to both buy and power over the long term with a shorter usage life.
Driving the power company's meter backwards may or may not even be legal in some states/areas, so you need to consider running dual systems (not as tough as it sounds) to get genuine savings over the investment life of what you do.
Solar may not work in some regions or areas; windmills may be restricted, and other generating schemes may have additional implications. Every site is different and needs to be treated that way. That said, the more we can save initially (and rationally) the better. Generating your own juice needs some thought because there's a varying amount of wisdom about what works in different applications. But by all means, DO IT. Permits aren't often required, but it's municipally defined, or thru state laws, or by the National Electrical Code and whatever your insurance company agrees with.
Liability for 'curing' the problem is a great question. I don't want to see the 'cure' become another infection vector. Do we know that the cure is going to disable this network, but not enable a subsequent one?
It's a lead-pipe cinch that law enforcement people will and can do nothing to disable the network, and it-- like others-- represents a huge security hole and a big problem in terms of potential misuses of the existing botnet.
The 'authority' to even legally disable botnets is onerous. What's a botnet-- is p2p a botnet? Is every torrent site a botnet? Is every Skype user enabling a botnet?
Some Van Damme coder that goes over the line to disable them might be a hero. He/she might also be the unwitting infection vector for a subsequent botnet if they don't get their own code right.
Mandatory machine cleansers might be nice, the 'system health' check that Microsoft uselessly tried to employ with Windows 2008 server. There's no leadership to vet how this might be done, and how it's kept up to date, and what constitutes potential botnet user software found and what might be useful in terms of gateways to monitor traffic.
So botnets are going to continue to be a problem until wise people decide how to first cleanse the problem, then how to design operating systems (this means you) to prevent botnet infection, and be able to distinguish botnets from p2p/etc. apps that have legitimate use-- and what constitutes 'legitimate' use.
Bottom line: nothing changes soon, because there are too many issues surrounding the question(s).
Ah, you've been hoodwinked. Or your a propagandist/apologist for Sun. I'm lucky enough to have been around when SunOS was just a pup, and I had grey hair, then.
Yes, Sun has pushed for open standards, but not for their own software components, rather RPCs/IPCs/APIs. When I did Connectathons, I watched how Sun worked, then the evolution of Solaris, along with the evolution of Sun workstations and servers and their tough migration to a services model to emulate the success of IBM and others.
As I'm not a Linux zealot, rather I understand the orthodox nature of FOSS (and subscribe to some of its tenets), I've watched the half-assed 'open source' passive/aggressive behavior they've managed over the past dozen years. Java was a great environment. And I once fixed James Gosling's laptop, which at the time, ran Windows. I'm not orthodox, and neither was James.
McNealy was very interested in fighting the big battles against his perceptions of the giants in his way. Like other big egos like Ellison, he found that wishing ain't making, and clever slogans don't make good products. Sun's otherwise very good engineering has been well-received.
But their hardware is sold by their software, for it if it stood alone, there would be no hardware sales. No one rushes to write new operating systems for UltraSparc III 8-cores. No one. Solaris helps sell their servers, and the combos help sell services, and that's plainly where their revenue comes from. Zealotry exists in the FOSS community, but Stallman's principles are well-stated and whatever zeal goes behind them is plainly missing from Sun's dribble of open source support.
You hit the nail on the head.
Linux drivers, sucky as they can be, are still chugging along because there are hackers that want to make things work. Sun sells hardware, and they have a hardware maker's mentality that the software just sells the hardware, folks. That's partly why they went 'open' in the first place-- but it was a lame attempt at building a community that McNealy couldn't stomach and Schwartz pays lip service to. It's all about shareholder equity-- make no mistake about this. Sun couldn't figure out how to make Java open? No, it's just they put the openness change through so slowly that it didn't really matter. It was lip service. Open Solaris isn't like OpenSUSE or Fedora or CentOS; these non-supported version have traction now where OpenSolaris doesn't and can't get any respect. Yes, it's nice, solid, Unix, and it has no wind in its sails/sales, so as a non-revenue producer, it gets no attention at Sun. Sun hasn't figured out how to make FOSS revenues, unlike numerous other organizations. Buying MySQL didn't give them much of a clue, now that closed-source details are starting to emerge regarding MySQL. They don't get it, and as long as it doesn't have an ecosystem to produce revenues, they never will.
Sticking it to Microsoft is just a side-benefit of opening up source and using 'free' licensing schemes to get things moving. You should be in politics. I hear there's a huge void left when Karl Rove left.
We have to disagree on engine efficiency. The amount of output per cubic displacement has risen steadily. While turbos/superchargers may shorten engine life, they've become more interesting and reliable still. Add in variable valve timing, vastly more intelligent systems controls, and things are much better. My family has five vehicles where I live; the 'fleet' economy gets better with every purchase we make (and not SUVs, but cars and utility trucks).
It's very 'western' of you to attempt to see heart and mind as separate entities; this, too, is a fallacy. Convincing often requires repeated attempts at clarity about choices made from decisions made on good data, or data that fits intuitional molds.
Finding the truth isn't difficult, rather, getting the signal from the noise surrounding it is. You can get lots of inputs, as is the habit these days, and hear the same BS repeated over and over and over. It's still BS, despite the multiplicity of attempts.
The subjective and objective are additional concepts that bear dealing with. I have my own subjective observations, and I have those that I believe are objective because of the referential integrity of the information used to conclude them. Wishing and hoping are wonderful emotions, but they aren't the reality of what actually exists, just our mapping of emotions on the the current situation.
Fear is what war is mostly based on, and baseless fears at that. Only rarely can war be defended as a defense. Most other times it's one bozo leader after another's goodies. In this case, it was oil, and perceived dignity, IMHO. Objectively, it was done without international community support and done with the worst of intentions and poor planning, which also served the whims of the various business constituencies in 2002/3. This is documented sufficiently to be usable as fact.
To tie back to TFA, blind-deaf-dumb shills of Pentagon are know 'called-out' for what they did. The leaders of a 'free press' did this....followed along blindly with a propaganda machine that's known for its misleading and bias/CYA coverage. Better the devil you know, than the one you don't.
Uh, no.
It's about 80% of the energy. Much depends on engine efficiency, which gets better all the time. SO let's say $1.20. Now add in the 18c/gal tax, so we're up to $1.38. In my state, add in 9% adjusted sales tax, so, about $1.50 per gallon. Markups? Yes, there's a problem.
The key you missed is that going from 50% eff to 100% eff may be unbelievably expensive, this driving it all back up again. Is ethanol a better 'green' fuel? In many ways, yes. Hydrogen would be optimal, but it has other risks associated with it that keep the price and 'greenness' high.
Your concepts of ideological fiefdoms betrays your skepticism, which may be beyond healthy at some point. Yes, there will always be partisanship, and no source is totally bereft of some kind of bias. And civics and citizenship bestows obligations to those that wish to participate civilly, and through their citizenship. One of these obligations is not to spew specious loads of bullshit. If you look, and believe me, I share a goodly amount of your skepticism, you'll find those sources of information that can educate you without bias. The future can have referential integrity. The future can have people spewing 'talking points', too. Let's hear when each is being done by knowing the source. That's what media watching organizations do (with their own inherent bias) that helps balance out the obvious deceptions. You see, there is truth. It might not be what you wanted to hear, but there is. Finding it will always be tough. I'll die trying.
A little bit harsh, and your post misses the point of referential integrity. It's ok to rebroadcast Pentagon propaganda if you want, as long as you cite the source. We know that the Pentagon will have a bias towards itself and against its enemies. To otherwise re-write, wholesale, Pentagon propaganda then pass it off as their own findings. Therein lies the really hideous part: fabrication.
Bias detection, bullshit meters, and other healthy skepticisms are great-- tainted by the concept that some organizations actually go out and get the news with real references, where others are willing to swallow whatever without alerting the populace/readership that there might be bias from the source. Hence journalism's odd standards. There are some of us that believe in them, and believe in sources, and believe in referential integrity. There are those that only want to listen to what they want to hear.... and some that re-write for the public consumption, just that.
1. Backup to media, and keep that media offsite and rotate it out frequently; check to make sure that the media is readable and usable.
2. Record your serial numbers, model numbers, CD keys (if needed), versions, and other characteristics of your hardware and then scan it to PDF and upload it to an online account as a draft message entitled: if_it's_stolen.
3. Use your camera to take pictures of everything you own for your insurance company. Link these items where possible into the aforementioned file.
4. File a police report, in detail, quickly, and then the same to your insurance company if you have one.
5. Hide your most important stuff; most burglars have to get in and get out quickly and aren't going to look between couch cushions, under garments in a closet, and so on. If your machine is your life, then make sure your life is hidden, obscure, or with you at all times. I prefer with me at (almost) all times. When in doubt, obscure it.
Sorry for your loss; look on craigslist and used computer shop sites.
Very few political entities are bereft of terrorism. Schier once again makes numerous mistakes in pointing to the culpable. The culpable are: all of us, ranging from users teaching users, to ISPs, to the website owners, to the makers of protocols with holes like Swiss cheese (and apologies to the Swiss). It could be fixed, but no one wants to claim the nexus of responsibility.
The terrorism label is a red herring, great for propaganda and useless war mongering. No one doubts the existence of many organizations that will murder, some en masse, in the name of their cause.
And this is there way of co-opting use profiles very handily into their plans. Instead, it's time for them to invest capex and opex into new and improved facility for Comcast shareholders and most importantly users -- to keep up with demand.
The upshot is that all of the noise and smoke and confusion about the process will help increase awareness of what the ISO and allied 'standards body' agencies do, and what their process and impacts are to members and non-members. For too long, many people have been in the dark about what the ISO, IEEE, and other bodies represent. It's a good thing to shed light on it and perhaps open the processes to more involvement and scrutiny from non-vendor sources.
It's kind of like the Schwarzchild radius. Instead of slowing down and being forever entrapped by the immense gravitational point source of the black hole, it's like being entrapped in the immense graviational field of a sun.
No, wait....
It's a shame that NS has to be watched like a hawk, but they're proven in the past that they'll stretch their agreements to their edge. Of course no one else does this, right? There are the honorable, and the dishonorable organizations and it's getting more difficult to tell them apart. My take of NS (and I left them long ago, but my friends deal with their madness) is that they'll continue to push the edges to gain revenue at the expense of perceived honor. They remind me of telcos in this regard.
There's one difference in between your sense of cupric vs fiber. Landlines are old technology, where the capacity per cable lay is around 220 users (differs, obviously). A WM fiber can haul perhaps 100x of that number, with variables. Landlines often use aerial carriage, where fiber is usually buried. Landlines, therefore, are a bit different if ill-defined. Co-ops are good ideas... but take common standards and funding methods to do. There's hope.
Project Utopia in Utah is a good example of what can be done when you get people to make it happen. 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. A lot of it is dark and no one knows just how much except those that laid it. Cellphones do a heel-on-the-garden-hose broadband. Not very good. But there are ways to say 'no' to monopolistic behavior.
Seems like a red herrings, but even red herrings add up to fodder to be used to get what they want. The concessions they want aren't deserved.
As a utility, the crown owns Bell's turf, or at least many pieces of it. The crown giveth, and the crown can take it away. So can provincial governments that grant access, easements, right-of-way, and tax them. I hope it doesn't get to that... but perhaps they'll start to get the idea.
Consider: cell phones. Consider: connectivity that doesn't use 'landlines' or tip-and-ring technology, rather, symmetrical fibre and local digital infrastructure (not DSL). Get rid of the monopolies and governmental sanctioned phone-mafias. Be inventive. Be firm.
VoIP isn't that bad, if you spend the same money to protect it that you spend protecting landlines/tip-and-ring. 'Terrible' is relative.
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.
Kind of left that out of his background there on his bio page.
Microsoft is interested in anything that sells Windows Server. However, with all of their sword rattling, known monopolistic behaviors, partnering with them still can get you the Black Widow Effect. Just ask 3Com, or Ashton Tate, etc.