Canadian Internet Bills to Skyrocket Soon

Again, measuring by volume is completely useless for bandwidth. It is a (deliberately) broken way to measure. The only thing that matters in bandwidth is instantaneous demand -- that is, how many people are trying to use the service right now. As long as you're under your pipe's limit, that data is damn near free to transmit. The expense is in laying in the pipes, but once the pipes are in, the only thing that matters is peak demand. The only reason that matters is because too much demand means you need to add more pipe.

Running Bittorrent in off hours, in other words, costs them literally nothing. It only hurts when it's at 6PM.

Any measurement system that goes by bytes used instead of bandwidth available will be unjust to end-users.

Which is roughly why this decision is immeasurably better than the original decision the CRTC was reviewing. Billing by capacity makes a ton more sense than billing by volume. I don't doubt that Bell and Rogers will continue to charge their customers by volume, but at least the independent ISPs won't be forced to copy them.

So, a lot of people in the fight are still reviewing the decision (it's insanely huge and complicated) but basically yeah, it's capacity based billing as others have said. The general consensus is that this is both good and bad. It's good because UBB and AvP have essentially been killed. It's bad because this is still a huge win for the incumbents that they don't need or deserve and it will still allow them to gouge indie ISPs, result in higher prices and ultimately making it much harder for the indies to compete on price. The math is still being worked out but this could result in the indies having to pay in some cases 10x more for their backhaul connections than they do now, connections which already make the incumbents a healthy profit, all in the name of eliminating congestion that doesn't exist. This won't result in a 10x increase in price for the end user but everyone's bill is going to go up and the indie ISPs aren't going to realise any of that in additional profits, only the incumbents. This is a result of the CRTC continuing to be a mixture of inept and corrupt and make no mistake, while it's definitely a far better situation that we could have ended up with, this is not a win for consumers.

Still not quite sure what to make of this development, as this new billing proposal has gotten really complicated.

But, I found this article on Wind Mobile quite interesting.

Mr. Sawiris, who expanded Orascom Telecom in the Middle East and Africa, insinuated his Canadian rivals were coddled by foreign ownership restrictions.

“You have the most inefficient operators in the world. And why are they like that? If they were that good, why are they just in Canada here?” he asked. “Why don’t we have Rogers in the U.K. or Germany? Why is Vodafone everywhere? Why is France Telecom everywhere?”

Hell yes. I think a lot of these problems would be fixed if we got rid of foreign ownership regulations.

+1

Dysplastic wrote:
“You have the most inefficient operators in the world.

QFT!

Not internet related, but another Rogers mind-blown-f'up story:

Part of my townhouse condo fees is a group deal with Rogers, for "ultimate" cable TV service (don't be fooled by name "ultimate"--it is only second tier of four possible tiers you can order). With the package, I'm entitled to 2 SD digital receivers. In other words, I'm already paying for this, every single month I pay my condo fees.

I finally decided to collect one of those boxes from my local Rogers store. It took NINE people, an hour and forty minutes on the phone, and four trips to the store totalling more than an hour of waiting in lines, before I could walk out with a single receiver box that I'm already paying for.

MoonDragon wrote:
Dysplastic wrote:
“You have the most inefficient operators in the world.

QFT!

Not internet related, but another Rogers mind-blown-f'up story:

Part of my townhouse condo fees is a group deal with Rogers, for "anti-penultimate" cable TV service (don't be fooled by name "ultimate"--it is only second tier of four possible tiers you can order). With the package, I'm entitled to 2 SD digital receivers. In other words, I'm already paying for this, every single month I pay my condo fees.

I finally decided to collect one of those boxes from my local Rogers store. It took NINE people, an hour and forty minutes on the phone, and four trips to the store totalling more than an hour of waiting in lines, before I could walk out with a single receiver box that I'm already paying for.

Fixed for accuracy. Everything else though? Man, screw those freaking hippies.

Which is roughly why this decision is immeasurably better than the original decision the CRTC was reviewing.

Ah, apparently I misunderstood the decision, as I thought it was still usage-based.

It sounds like what really needs to happen is a breakup of your phone monopoly.

Malor wrote:

It sounds like what really needs to happen is a breakup of your phone monopoly.

That is exactly the crux of all of our phone/internet/tv woes.

Is this also the "Canadians rejoice because they're switching off Rogers services" thread? I guess it is now. Tomorrow, I'm switching over to TekSavvy, and our phone and cable have long ago been cancelled. Yay! No longer paying Rogers a single penny.

necroyeti wrote:

Is this also the "Canadians rejoice because they're switching off Rogers services" thread? I guess it is now. Tomorrow, I'm switching over to TekSavvy, and our phone and cable have long ago been cancelled. Yay! No longer paying Rogers a single penny.

Good on ya'! More people need to do this to get the point across. Sadly, Rogers does get some money when using TekSavvy cable but it's far less than they get with you being their customer directly. I'm happy that such is the only money big telco gets from me. We don't subscribe to cable or have a landline and now that I'm on TekSavvy cable, I'm happier that the big telco money goes to Rogers instead of Bell. They're both awful companies but Rogers is most definitely the lesser of two evils to me.

Not directly talking about Canada, but more network congestion in general:

Data caps a "crude and unfair tool" for easing online congestion.

This reinforces what I was saying upthread. There are three things that matter for network congestion: peak demand, peak demand, and peak demand. Offpeak demand costs the carrier almost exactly nothing, but it counts 1:1 against bandwidth caps.

As I got my latest usage warning (grrr), I wondered, would Rogers, slightly increase their data caps, then change their video signal so that it's less compressed and basically equal out? ...'cause I love a consipracy theory.

Regardless it doesn't affect me because I don't subscribe to Rogers Cable. I'm on the Netflix wagon. The only reason I'm still with Rogers, was because, I talked them into increasing my speed, cap, and beating Teksavvy's price without a term contract.

At that time it was less hassle than switching, though my cap is still under what Teksavvy offer. This latest warning makes me think of switching again.

Winter is definately seeing more data transfer with the kids inside more.

As so many other businesses, it's not about being a good business anymore. More squeezing the last single little drop of blood out of you.
The caps are ridiculously low. I use 50Gb on a day easily. Not every day. This month 250Gb and my provider here is fine with it.
And I live on a pissy little island. So, Rogers is just screwing you.

This thread is extremely interesting from an outsider's (U.S.) point of view, and makes me wish we had similarly large groups of South Korean, Russian, French, and others on this site debating their own systems and payment options from an informed consumer's point of view. I know those debates are happening in plain sight in other parts of the internet, but having goodjers with whom I can relate talk about it is about as close to knowing how I would feel if I were living in their country.

Ghostship wrote:

As I got my latest usage warning (grrr), I wondered, would Rogers, slightly increase their data caps, then change their video signal so that it's less compressed and basically equal out? ...'cause I love a consipracy theory.

Regardless it doesn't affect me because I don't subscribe to Rogers Cable. I'm on the Netflix wagon. The only reason I'm still with Rogers, was because, I talked them into increasing my speed, cap, and beating Teksavvy's price without a term contract.

At that time it was less hassle than switching, though my cap is still under what Teksavvy offer. This latest warning makes me think of switching again.

Winter is definately seeing more data transfer with the kids inside more.

Just switch. Honestly. Please.

Dysplastic wrote:
Ghostship wrote:

As I got my latest usage warning (grrr), I wondered, would Rogers, slightly increase their data caps, then change their video signal so that it's less compressed and basically equal out? ...'cause I love a consipracy theory.

Regardless it doesn't affect me because I don't subscribe to Rogers Cable. I'm on the Netflix wagon. The only reason I'm still with Rogers, was because, I talked them into increasing my speed, cap, and beating Teksavvy's price without a term contract.

At that time it was less hassle than switching, though my cap is still under what Teksavvy offer. This latest warning makes me think of switching again.

Winter is definately seeing more data transfer with the kids inside more.

Just switch. Honestly. Please.

+1. I also saw huge (huge!) performance increases when I switched. Not just in the obvious stuff, but in things like encrypted remote desktop sessions as well.

I got an email about TekSavvy rates going up a few weeks ago, which I'm not super pumped about, but at least I got an email about it. This as opposed to Rogers, where my rate just steadily climbed for 3 years with no notification or anything.

TS is absolute class.

Dysplastic wrote:

Just switch. Honestly. Please.

They made it easy to stay. They beat Teksavvy except for cap; including cost.
The only way they didn't beat Teksavvy was the cap. I'm at 100 instead of 300.

I was weighing the $65 startup fee and the risk of loosing service, versus the number of warnings I get at the 100 cap.

The other thing that I'm up against is that I'm running a business out of my house. I'm a one man show. Downtime could really hurt me. It's not just a matter of reading a book for a couple of days instead of watching my favourite TV show or playing an online game. I'm collaborating on remote servers and accessing online documents. My phone might get me by but doesn't really cut it.

I'm really afraid of Rogers trying to f*ck with TS on my time and losing a week of service plus all my time chasing people on the phone. That's all time that I don't spend working, and work at the speed of my phone's dialup tether when I'm not chasing technicians who missed my appointment. I had my confidence shaken when the instructions that TS gave me to quit Rogers without a delay were a complete mystery to Rogers (no surprise really).

Now, that being said, If I find a lull in the workload that's not filled with a family oriented holiday, I'd probably switch based on the moral issue, if I come close to the cap again. If I get billed overage again, it will be the second and last time.

So, during the whole CRTC thing, I signed a peition through openmedia.ca
I haven't removed myself from their mailing list. In fact, there have been several emails from them lately which I've ignored, and just marked as read; due to a busy year of work.

Today, I actually downloaded the images and read the email. I have to say that I'm not really liking the current approach they're taking.
While I'm concerned about the bills they've brought to my attention, I'm disapointed with the lack of factual information, and the money grubbing repeated throughout the email.

I do appreciate that, they're probably forming up a lobbying company, and need donations to compete against lobby groups with big business behind them, surely there has to be a better way to get me to donate. I'm less inclined to give anything to the door to door salesman than I am to someone who can educate me on why I need to give them money. I don't need to be told that I want to give them money. I do need to be lead to the facts so that I can make a decision. I particularly despise the "don't you want to be sure you're protected?" sales pitch. That last ditch effort of the door to door guy who you've just told "No". I won't be told what I do and do not want by someone knocking on my door /rant.

Is openmedia.ca just another spammer now?

They are most definitely not a spammer, at least not in the way you're thinking. That said, I think they send out way too many e-mails and way too many requests for money. They are a very small group (like under 5 people) trying to take on a monolithic industry with lobbying power that far exceeds their own and I know they need money but I don't think what they're dong is the right way to go about it. I've said as much to them myself. They apparently also have done things like re-sign people up for mailing lists after they've unsubscribed and also taken lists given to them from other campaigns and added them to their mailing list, even when they said they wouldn't. However, that information comes from the DSL Reports forums which since UBB got quashed has just become another scummy forum full of entitled whiners so it's not that trustworthy. I keep subscribed to their list simply to stay informed of their new petitions (which do still get a lot of signatures and attention) but I stopped my monthly donation and told them it was specifically because they are too pushy with their communications. They aren't a perfect organisation but they're the only one really fighting against the telecoms on behalf of consumers and frankly, the attention they've managed to get with who they're up against is astonishing. If you don't like their e-mail volume, I would unsubscribe and I strongly encourage more people to bring their dissatisfaction to the group's attention.

I did the bold for a bit of a TLDR.
I probably won't unsubscribe just yet.
I admit to a certain amount of complacency on these issues, so it's a good force feed.
I don't really have many other sources for these issues.

Is this turning up in the mass media? I can't imagine a privacy issue would be taken lightly. One of the pitfalls of not having cable TV, and working from a home office. I have to actively seek out the news, and when I do, I hear two small voices telling rather loudly that they'd prefer to be watching power rangers on netflix.

I don't know what's more disturbing; that you're hearing voices, or that they're telling you to watch Power Rangers!

Spoiler:

I know, they're kids. ;)

Fedaykin98 wrote:
Spoiler:

I know, they're kids. ;)

How can we be sure?
Well at least they're not telling me to watch dexter. That might be a warning sign.

Any tips for a cheap consistent Montreal internet provider? Sorry if its already been mentioned but I'm a dirty skimmer.

jowner wrote:

Any tips for a cheap consistent Montreal internet provider? Sorry if its already been mentioned but I'm a dirty skimmer.

TekSavvy has various offerings in Quebec and I still can't say enough good things about them. I've also heard good things about Electronic Box.

And in related news, any suggestions on BC providers? Specifically Vancouver?

MoonDragon wrote:

And in related news, any suggestions on BC providers? Specifically Vancouver?

TekSavvy offers cable and DSL services out that way too.

Parallax Abstraction wrote:
jowner wrote:

Any tips for a cheap consistent Montreal internet provider? Sorry if its already been mentioned but I'm a dirty skimmer.

TekSavvy has various offerings in Quebec and I still can't say enough good things about them. I've also heard good things about Electronic Box.

A lot of people on the SA forums have been talking up ColbaNet as well.

My discount with Rogers ran out, and they can't beat Teksavvy this time around.
I just switched. Now I just have to wait out the 30 days. Probably will give them the phone sale too.

Ghostship wrote:

My discount with Rogers ran out, and they can't beat Teksavvy this time around.
I just switched. Now I just have to wait out the 30 days. Probably will give them the phone sale too.

Welcome to the greener pastures sir! It's much nicer over here.