Adam's Ideas

Well, looks like Canada has joined other “developed” countries by joining in the collective effort to tap into our internet connections without a warrant. Thank goodness! All this freedom I’ve had to explore the internet without someone watching me was getting me worried.

It’s a good thing those incompetent fools running Ottawa are, oh forget it. Can anybody out there inform me of a good thing that Harper and his motley crue have done? Swearing at Toronto doesn’t count, rest of Canada.

I was looking into Teksavvy the other day to switch away from stupid Rogers. Sadly the CRTC seems to want to make it so I have the wonderful choices of Bell or Rogers (hope you can read the sarcasm there). Anyway, make sure your voice is heard by the CRTC and tell them you don’t like how Bell is throttling internet speeds for their competitors. As in, Bell makes it so any other company using their fiber is penalized and this is wrong.

In March 2008 Bell started throttling its Wholesale Customers (TekSavvy among a group of many) without notice. We attempted to have the CRTC force Bell to stop as it removed our ability to do business and give Market choice. The throttling was done in the name of congestion, even if Bell, at the same time launched higher speeds (which they did not share with their wholesalers) and also dabbled with launching IPTV, which consumes even more capacity.

The CRTC sided with Bell in November 2008 but launched a Public Hearing to discuss Network Management Practices, clearly showing they made a decision on throttling without having all the details in hand to do so. As a result we launched a request to reverse their decision from November (The Review & Vary) in May 2009.

The only way we are going to make a difference at this point is to get full public support to stop companies like Bell from bullying the market and the regulators! The Telecom and Cableco Monopolies control 96% of our marketplace, so if we don't stand up and voice our concerns, this will become a two party dance where choices and services are going to be completely removed and rates raised to unreasonable levels!

Here are the details on how to submit your comments:

1) Go to: http://support.crtc.gc.ca/crtcsubmissionmu/forms/Telecom.aspx?lang=e
2) Select "Part VII / PN" from the drop down list and then click Next
3) In box entitled "Subject" line, insert "CRTC File #: 8662-P8-200907727"
4) In the box entitled "Description / Comments / Questions", insert any comments that you may have on the review and vary application.
5) If you would like to attach a document, select "yes" and follow the instructions for attaching a file. As indicated in the Title, I believe the deadline is June 22nd, so don't wait to long PS – R&V details here.

Via Boing

I remember when I was still in high school when the major banks of Canada were screaming for the opportunity to go international in ways they weren’t allowed. At the time I was thinking that the banks were just really greedy (greedy banks – shocking ) and were planting the seeds of their own destruction. The rule change would allow the banks to invest in crazy foreign schemes and be bought out by larger international banks.

That would’ve been the end of Canadian economic sovereignty, and luckily, Paul Martin (as finance minister) said a big fat NO to the banks.

Now, there’s an educated analysis of what was going on at the Progressive Economics Blog called the Left was Right:

My personal theory as to why the Canadian banking system survived the great global financial crisis relatively unscathed is that calls by the big Canadian banks in the late 1990s to allow mergers were successfully resisted. Had the big banks been allowed to merge to pursue their global ambitions, they would have ramped up their US and high risk foreign operations considerably, and the cozy, profitable, risk-averse Canadian banking oligopoly would have been broken up by the quid pro quo for mergers – allowing foreign takeovers of Canadian banks. The Liberal Government decision to effectively prohibit bank mergers – despite massive pressure from the big banks – effectively maintained a national financial system under widespread Canadian ownership, and thus subject to national regulatory oversight and control. Much of the credit goes to the popular movements which fought for bank regulation, not to the government regulators who largely bought into the financial sector arguments for deregulation.