Blogging Tory and conservative L' enfant terrible Adam Daifallah prasies the Harper Governments direct interferance in the CRTC. The CRTC is supposed to be arms length from the government, in the past the Conservatives as the opposition howled whenever this came up in Parliament denouncing the actions of the Liberals when they challenged CRTC rulings. However without any debate in parilament, during a week when parilament was in recess the Conservatives do this;Conservatives overrule CRTC on regulation of internet phones
And their reason? Well having destroyed the Income Trusts for Telus and BCE, this is a token kickback to them. But for us as consumers it is an attack on choice, and furthers the monopolistic power of these two giant Telcos. And a conservative like Daiflallah supports such anti-market interferance. Astounding.
The federal government is ordering the CRTC to change its ruling on the regulation of some telephone services offered through broadband internet connections.
The move by the federal government to overrule a decision by the CRTC is a seldom-taken step.
The directive is seen as favourable to the large telephone companies, such as Bell Canada and Telus, even though it fell short of the full deregulation of internet phone pricing that the established phone companies had sought.
The CRTC's initial decision on VoIP in May 2005 ruled against the big telephone companies, saying they could not use their pricing power to undercut smaller businesses and newcomers to the telephone market, such as cable companies.
The agency said it would regulate internet-based phone service the same as any other local phone service, meaning large telephone companies such as Bell and Telus can't offer internet-based phone services below cost.
New companies entering the VoIP market, however, can set prices as low as they want, said the CRTC.
I also have a problem with the so called cable company competitiors Rogers and Shaw which are regional monopolies.
Shaw cable in Alberta is a virtual monopoly for cable services. And true to it's monopolistic practices complained to the CRTC that Vonage was undercutting it's VOIP service. So it arbitrarily uped the cost of purchasing vonage services through its cable network. A network it leases from Telus. A network paid for by the Taxpayers of Alberta. The Tories arbitrary overruling of the CRTC does nothing to address Vonages concerns.
Who controls how you use your Internet access? Vonage Canada challenges Shaw "VoIP tax"
service company Vonage Canada warns that cable and phone
companies could restrict "network neutrality" by limiting Canadians'
freedom of choice on the Internet; requests CRTC investigate
"anti-competitive" action by ShawCommunity Security: the Provident blog: Rogers Home Phone vs. Shaw ...
At best, I would consider the Rogers site misleading... taking a page from Shaw's Digital Phone marketing department, they have decided that rather than explain exactly how their service works, it is just simpler to offer a false statement that is easier for most people to understand.
So, whether using Shaw or Rogers, our position is unchanged: we do not recommend relying on any type of VoIP service (whether Shaw, Rogers, Vonage or anything else other than Telus) without having a secondary, back-up communications method such as cellular back-up or MESH radio.
Forgetting that the airwaves are 'public space', regulated for and by the public for public use.
My complaint about the CRTC is that it does not serve the public interest but the corporate interests. But that is a blog article for another time.
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