p2pnet news view Freedom | P2P:- From Telus and Bell to the people who keep them in business: “We’ll give you nothing, and you’ll like it and you’ll pay for it.”

A battle is brewing with the No 1 and No 2 Telco companies in Canada  against their very own wholesale customers.

The CRTC has ruled both Bell Canada and Telus need to open up their network to wholesale to faster internet speeds (7-meg, 10-meg, 16-meg etc), and to submit pricing.

Currently, wholesale customer are limited to 5-megs and less in our technologically advanced nation.

Bell and Telus both disregarded the ruling by the CRTC and ran to the government to put a stop to this madness claiming it would hurt the Canadian economy, affect jobs and that they wouldn’t invest in future structure.

In other words, Bell Canada and Telus joined forces and ran to the government to get the CRTC ruling over-turned and affirm their monopoly status’s for their territories. (http://www.ic.gc.ca/eic/site/smt-gst.nsf/eng/sf09316.html)

The Canadian Association of Internet Providers (CAIP) and a Coalition of wholesale and other Internet Service Providers formed, and also filed with Industry Canada to counter and rebuke Bell and Telus’ claims, and to strengthen MTS’s claims that internet need to be changed to an essential Telecom service.

See:
http://www.dslreports.com/r0/download/1426111~9b8f44221e5c18c412a794ee83cb071d/Competitor_Coalition_DGTP-004-09_May_4_2009.pdf
http://www.dslreports.com/r0/download/1426112~ae2379b9b6158b1a274a963cb1817cfe/Coalition%20-%20Comments%20on%20Bell%20Telus%20Petitions%204May09.pdf
http://www.dslreports.com/r0/download/1426113~943f713697e737fe36d0c8256fb1337c/Cover%20letter%20-%20Comments%20re%20MTSA%20Petition.pdf
http://www.dslreports.com/r0/download/1426114~4b59e4e8cbf5458a5f4e4e103a7ac195/Coalition%20Comments%20on%20MTSA%20Petition%20_4May09_.pdf

Caip also release this press-release, “Coalition of Competitors Asks Government to Support Customer Choice for Brandband Internet Access” – http://www.cata.ca/Media_and_Events/Press_Releases/cata_pr05050903.html

CAIP’s Tom Copeland told p2pnet »»»

Sooner or later regulators and policy makers will have to realize that it is un-natural and nonsensical to expect the large incumbents to play nice and embrace wholesale competition on their networks while they own competing retail operations. Only functional separation of the network part of the business from the retail part of the business will give us true competition in the retail market. It has worked in the UK and is beginning to work in other jurisdictions. Canadian telecom policy needs to reflect this dynamic before true competition is eradicated.

A separation of structure. Hmmmm. This was also suggested by the Quebec Consumers Union.

Over in Europe, “The debates on the Telecoms Package, thanks to a remarkable citizen mobilization, led to an extremely strong recognition of the access to internet as a fundamental right with the re-adoption of amendment 138/46 in second reading by a qualified majority.” http://www.laquadrature.net/en/amendment-138-46-adopted-again

Over in Australia, Tesltra lost in court for stealing its wholesale rivel, Optus, customers’ data and using it for their gains. http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,25425381-5014099,00.html

“OPTUS has won a Federal Court ruling against Telstra in which it was alleged that Australia’s dominant telco misused Optus’ confidential information for its own marketing gains in the 1990s.

Optus claimed that in the period 1993 to 2000, Telstra breached an access agreement by obtaining confidential information about Optus’ long distance telephony traffic.

The traffic information, which included the number of calls made, the source of call, the destination, duration, time, kind of call and value, was used to track the success of Optus’ marketing campaigns, The Australian reports.

This information was provided by Telstra Wholesale to Telstra Retail, where it was used to launch marketing and advertising attacks in the long distance call market in a bid to lure customers away from Optus.”

“The sharing of information between Telstra`s wholesale and retail arms also allowed the telco to monitor in real time, the success of Optus` marketing initiatives and special offers.

“There can be no doubt that in preparing the market share reports Telstra used traffic information of Optus; certainly not every element of such information, but at least the aggregate quantity of Optus` traffic that travelled over Telstra`s network … perhaps more,” Justice Richard Edmonds said in his ruling.

This is, “very ancient history and excellent evidence of why structural separation results in a more competitive environment by removing the opportunity for monopoly access providers to succumb to the temptation to eat their own (wholesale) customers,” Internode carrier relations manager John Lindsay said.

Telstra declined to comment.

Do you think Bell is doing this? And maybe Telus?

Bell has already made claims on their wholesale customers B/W usage.

It’s time for Industry Canada and the CRTC to recognize the need for true competition for the benefit of the Canadian people and for the benefit of stronger economic competition and innovation.

It’s time for a separatation or break up the monopolies.

History and current affairs shows it doesn’t work and leads to all sorts of data mining on the wholesalers, and complete anti-competitive acts.

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 ]

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May, 2009