p2pnet news view Freedom | P2P:- A new battle has started up between Canada’s largest ISP, Bell Canada, and CAIP, the organization representing some 55 smaller providers.

Like its counterpart in the US, Comcast, Bell started an all-out war with its own consumers having tried to throttle their accounts, claiming it was forced into the action by the activities of people who use P2P file sharing applications.

But this time the fight centers on costs, not Bell Canada’s attack on Net neutrality, or its practice of “managing” the bandwidth it’s selling to its users.

The Quebec Union des Consommateurs kicked things off by filing a claim of $14,950.00.

The Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC), acting for the Consumers Council of Canada (CCC), and National Anti-Poverty Organization (NAPO),  followed up with a claim of $13,709.38.

Then the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC) demanded $10,355.00.

This brings it to $39,014.38 by public interest groups so far. But you can bet the $39K isn’t the end of it. And the groups — all of them — want the CRTC (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission) to order Bell Canada to pay up.

In full.

The money wouldn’t even amount to pocket change for Canada’s largest ISP. Nonetheless, it’s saying CAIP (Canadian Association of Internet Providers), “given its level of interest and participation in this proceeding,” should pay a third.

However, CAIP doesn’t agree.

Bell’s objections were online at the CRTC site for all to see, but at the time of writing, CAIP’s weren’t.

p2pnet has a copy. And here it is. In full »»»

Subject:  CAIP Part VII Application for Certain Orders Directing Bell Canada to Cease and Desist from “Throttling” its Wholesale ADSL Access Services
1.    The Canadian Association of Internet Providers (CAIP) is in receipt of the following claims for costs made pursuant to section 44 of the CRTC Telecommunications Rules of Procedure in relation to the above-noted proceeding from three not-for-profit organisations (collectively, the “costs claimants”):
(a)    the Canadian Internet Policy and Public Interest Clinic (CIPPIC) as counsel for the Campaign for Democratic Media (CDM) dated 29 July, 2008;
(b)    l’Union des consommateurs dated 12 August, 2008; and
(c)    the Public Interest Advocacy Centre (PIAC) as counsel for the Consumers Council of Canada (CCC) and the National Anti-Poverty Organization (NAPO) dated 21 August 2008.
2.    CAIP is also in receipt of Bell Canada’s (“Bell”) response dated 6 August, 2008 (the “6 August Response”) to the first-noted claim from CIPPIC above as well as a further and significantly modified response from Bell dated 2 September, 2008 (the “2 September Response”).
3.    CAIP has no objection to the costs claimants’ entitlement to costs, the amounts claimed and their proposal that Bell should be the sole cost respondent to their claims.  The amounts claimed appear reasonable and the participation of these costs claimants was necessary to bring to the Commission’s attention relevant arguments from the perspective of consumers who are customers of CAIP’s members.  CAIP also agrees with the costs claimants that Bell alone should pay any costs awarded by the Commission because the entire proceeding has focussed on and was triggered by Bell’s actions.
4.    In addition, CAIP respectfully submits that the CRTC should take into consideration the fact that CAIP is a not-for-profit association that represents independent Internet service providers.  It has no permanent, full-time staff, including no regulatory or legal personnel.  The impugned actions of Bell have necessitated the making of CAIP’s application, which in turn, has placed a significant and wholly unforeseen financial burden on CAIP and its members.  As a result, CAIP is in no better position to pay a costs award than the costs claimants themselves.  As for CAIP’s members, on a national scale, independent Internet service providers represent a mere 3.8 per cent of the market for high-speed residential Internet access services, which is the telecommunications market that is most directly affected by Bell’s traffic shaping measures.  Indeed, the market share of independent ISPs in the overall market for residential Internet services has declined in recent years.
5.    Furthermore, it is important to note that Bell’s decision to shape all competitors’ traffic was made well in advance of March 2008 and yet was done without notice or consultation with GAS customers of any kind.  Leaving aside the other grounds raised by CAIP in its application, Bell has manufactured a crisis, engaged in highly controversial self-help measures that it knew would disrupt the provision of retail services by CAIP’s members to their end-user customers and forcibly transferred to CAIP’s members the burden, inconvenience and entirely unforeseen expense of bringing this application.  At a minimum, CAIP submits that the scale, scope and consequent expense of this proceeding could have been minimised, if not avoided altogether, had Bell notified its GAS customers of its intentions and in the normal course, applied to the Commission prior to making the changes to the GAS service that are at issue in this proceeding.
6.    In the specific circumstances of this application, neither CAIP nor any other participant in the proceeding should be named as a cost respondent.  Rather, as requested by the costs claimants, Bell should be the sole cost respondent in this proceeding.  CAIP respectfully submits that the Commission should exercise its discretion by naming Bell as the sole cost respondent to the costs claimants’ requests.
7.    In the alternative, and without conceding that CAIP should pay any costs in this proceeding, CAIP takes exception to the fact that Bell is now capriciously arguing that fully one-third of any costs awarded to the costs claimants should be borne by CAIP.
8.    With no explanation whatsoever, Bell in its 2 September Response is taking a position that directly contradicts the position it adopted in its 6 August Response, wherein it stated:
[w]ith respect to the allocation of costs among cost respondents, [Bell Canada] submits that the Commission should follow its practice of allocating costs in proportion to each respondents [sic] share of Telecommunications Operating Revenues, as set out in Costs Order 2008-11.
9.    Bell’s 6 August Response was at least consistent with the practice of the Commission to apportion costs pursuant to section 44 of the CRTC Telecommunications Rules of Procedure in accordance with the ability to pay (using the proxy of relative proportion of revenues).  This practice is especially appropriate in cases where the establishment of new or revised regulatory policies or frameworks is under consideration, which is not the case in the instant proceeding.  In this proceeding, CAIP is simply seeking to restrain conduct on Bell’s part that breaches the Act and Commission-approved tariffs.
10.    The allocation proposed by Bell is completely arbitrary and manifestly unfair in light of the fact that it bears no relationship to CAIP’s proportionate revenue share of the market for residential high-speed Internet access services, Bell’s prior 6 August submissions and the fact that the departure from Bell’s prior submission has not been rationalised or even referenced in any way in Bell’s 2 September Response.  
11.    In conclusion, CAIP submits that in the circumstances of this particular case, as set out in CAIP’s application and in this submission, the Commission should exercise its discretion to name Bell the sole cost respondent to the costs claimants’ requests.  In the alternative, should the Commission determine that CAIP should be a cost respondent in this proceeding, then all participants in the proceeding (other than the individual Canadians who intervened in this proceeding) should also be named as cost respondents and CAIP (along with all other independent ISP participants) should be responsible for no more than 3.8 per cent of the costs, which parallels independent ISPs’ proportionate share in revenue terms of the market that has been most directly affected by Bell’s shaping of competitors’ GAS traffic, namely, the residential market for high-speed Internet access services.

But according to Bell, CAIP should cover the costs of the public advocacy groups because CAIP, “instigated and actively participated in the proceeding on behalf of many companies”.

Screeching halt

But Whoa! Hold on! Who instigated what?

Who started a traffic throttling war against not only its own customers,  but also people with other companies?

Who started throttling the competition without warning or consultation?

Who said this throttling is/was for the benefit of their wholesalers customers?

This leaves me totally baffled.

What choice did CAIP and the wholesale ISP’s have?

What choice did they leave the people who have NO representation at all have?

Who are the ones paying and getting throttled so Bell’s own service looks good compared to the wholesale competition?

WOW!!! Talk about spinning the truth!

Bell says it’ll pay it all if the CRTC says Bell was the cause of the dispute. But CAIP should pay if the CRTC rules CAIP is the cause.

But hold on!

Cause of the dispute?

Bell, who throttled all wholesale DSL in Quebec and Ontario as well as their own services in these provinces with out ANY notice to the CRTC, with out ANY consultation or regard with anyone, is behind the whole mess.

And they took the actions entirely in their own self interest.

What alternative did they leave the pubic advocacy groups and everyone else who’s up in arms against it?

Who instigated what?

Who is the cause of what?

Who forced those taking pop to incur the expenses in the first place?

Who angered Canadians across the country?

It surely wasn’t CAIP.

So who should pay the cost of this throttling war? The innocent people who stood by and were stepped on? Or the big Telco who started throttling 3rd party ISP’s, and forcing a neutrality debate in Canada?

You can post your reply on the CRTC’s website by doing the following:

1. go to http://www.crtc.gc.ca/PartVII/eng/2008/8622/c51_200805153.htm
2. Select “Part VII/PN” from the drop down menu
3. In the box entitled “Subject”, the following text should be inserted:
#: 8622-C51-200805153 – Canadian Association of Internet Providers
(CAIP) – Application requesting certain orders directing Bell Canada to
cease and desist from throttling its wholesale ADSL Access Services
4. In the box titled “Comments”, explain in your own words what you think of independent ISPs having to pay for costs incurred by other parties in a proceeding which could have been avoided entirely if Bell had not violated the Telecommunications Act. After all, it is solely because of Bell’s conduct that this proceeding came about.

 Ottawa Gal – p2pnet

[Ottawa Gal is a long-time p2pnet reader and comment poster who’d rather would be anonymous. She says she works in the University, likes her cat, reality TV, and Doctor McDreamy. Her favourite web sites are the Michael Geist blog and p2pnet.net. 'Privacy on the net is also important to me,' she says. 'I need a tinfoil hat ' She’s also the mother of, 'two darling little girls who tore down my ceiling fan thinking it would be fun to hang from it.' So she advises parents to, 'never have an armchair around from which little ones can reach fans'. (No one was hurt ) ]

---

Use free p2pnet newsfeeds for your site. It’s really easy!

Subscribe to p2pnet.net | | rss feed: http://p2pnet.net/p2p.rss | | Mobile – http://p2pnet.net/index-wml.php

---

Net access blocked by government restrictions? Use Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. Go here for details.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 10th, 2008 at 12:40 pm and is filed under Freedom, P2P. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

HOME

Viewed 4056 times