Telecom Trends

It seems the bidding for AWS spectrum just keeps going and going and going.

The auction is now taking a one day break for Canada Day.

As June 30 drew to a close, 10% of the auction properties continued to be attracting new bids and the total value of the bids has continued to creep up about $1M per round.

When bidding resumes on Wednesday, will this be the final sprint to the finish?

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Industry Canada, AWS Spectrum Auction

Mark Evans has been writing recently about the need for people to pause, take a deep breath and think a little longer before hitting the send button. He had an earlier piece with a similar theme.

He writes:

One of the major challenges within the always-on, always accessible world is the belief that if someone is able to contact you, you’re obligated to get back to them as soon as possible. Rather than think, breathe and reflect, the default is respond ASAP.

Why is that? Why do we feel compelled to reply before really thinking through exactly what you want to say? Often, digital conversations can become complicated and convoluted because not enough thought goes into what should/needs to be said.

I waited a couple days to write this post, in order to reflect a little more on his words. I took a few deep breaths, got up, walked around and even reviewed a draft before hitting the 'publish' button.

A year and a half ago, I wrote about 4 degrees of impersonal communications.

Face-to-face communications (a first degree interaction) has no record, no evidence beyond the memory of the participants. Telephony (second degree) may have a record, such as an audio voice message. Email (3rd degree) gets circulated, over and over. Thanks to search engines and web-archiving tools, the web (4th degree) offers a permanent record.

I observed that:

Paradoxically, we seem to take more care in communications when the conversation can most easily be private and candid.

Some of Mark's readers have said the solution is to unplug for a period - one day on; one day off - in order to recharge their batteries and experience the real world more fully.

I am not sure that is necessary. I like being connected while on the road; I find that being available is what lets me get away. For others, there is a real need to turn off the phone and Blackberry.

Whatever it takes, I hope you get to find that source of inspiration and invigoration as we move into the traditional vacation season.

Enjoy the Canada Day weekend... I'll be taking a few days off. Fishing with my Blackberry at my side. Drinking some wine, eating some cheese, catching a few rays [can anyone name the movie?].

But being careful with my communications devices near water. They don't float, you know.

Technorati Tags:
Mark Evans, 4 degrees

For those who couldn't make it to The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit, Fox Group Media has prepared a summary video.

There are interviews with speakers, summaries of keynote addresses, conversations with delegates.

In addition, the 40 minute video includes our opening remarks at The Canadian Telecom Summit. The focus is on the first day.

Time		Presentation & Interview
00:00		Introduction - Roberta J. Fox, Editor in Chief, Publisher, FOX GROUP Publishing
02:00		Mark Goldberg & Michael Sone, co-chairs of the Canadian Telecom Summit comment on Canadian Government and Telecom Policy arena
09:47		Nadir Mohammed, President & COO, Rogers Communications is queried by Roberta Fox in an open forum and summarizes the comments of his keynote speech
12:52		Bill Archer - CMO - AT&T Corp. - Roberta provides a summary of his Luncheon Keynote regarding top global Telecommunications industry trends
17:46		John Maduri - President and CEO – Barrett xplore - Wireless Internet Services – Roberta in a One on One Interview on top issues facing Canadian SMBs
25:25		John Cameron - CEO - Aizan Technologies - Voice Technologies – One on One Interview with Roberta Fox on benefits of hosted voice solutions
20:50		Tony Cassetta, Chairman - Pulse Voice - One on One Interview with Roberta Fox on top telecom issues facing Canadian organizations
33:30		Mike Zafirovski – President & CEO, Nortel Networks, Roberta provides summary of his Keynote Presentation
35:30		Martha Bejar - Corporate VP, Communications Sector, Microsoft Corp. - Roberta provides summary of her Keynote presentation
37:45		Stuart Wells, President Global Solutions, and Mario Belanger, President of Avaya Canada, summary of telephone interview on top telecommunication trends affecting enterprise and SMBs in Canada
41:54		Wrap-up and Closing Remarks by Roberta J. Fox, FOX GROUP Publishing & Telecom Consulting

You really need to attend in person to experience the event, but hopefully the video will provide a taste for you.

Plan to attend in 2009: June 15-17 in Toronto.

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Canadian Telecom Summit

I have been test driving the new Fido Uno mobile service recently and I have to say that I like it. I have the handset connecting automatically to various WiFi networks; the set up was pretty easy.

The service is a good way to save on long distance charges, but I am left thinking that we should be expecting more. After all, Bell and TELUS really don't need fancy Fixed Mobile Convergence to deliver a competing service; all that is needed is lower (or no) long distance charges for domestic calls.

If all the customer sees is a reduction in pricing, then it seems like a lot of effort.

Recall my POTS over IP postings [here and here]. [PoIP - don't you just love a 4-letter acronym that embeds a 4-letter acronym?]

How can service providers leverage VoIP for more than just price advantages?

Markham-based Iristel is trying to find that service mix. They have announced IP Mobiliy Service, integrating hybrid WiFi / GSM phones into business communications, thereby enabling the suite of unified communications capabilities to be available from office phones or hybrid mobile/wifi devices. It is now announcing Iristel IP Mobility, a service that enables users to seamlessly switch between their mobile carrier’s network and fixed lines when moving from one location to another (e.g. car to office).

Iristel IP Mobility’s universal features enable business users to remain productive and active in conference and group calls when out of the office by providing access to all the same telephone features users would have from their desk. It also provides VoIP roaming, enabling subscribers to access fixed line services when away from home or office through wireless VoIP.

Will customers embrace Iristel's services? What about mobile carriers themselves?

Are these the kinds of services that might let new entrants differentiate themselves?

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Iristel, Rogers, Fido Uno

As bidding for AWS spectrum cracks though the $4B mark, I like to look at the details to see where people aren't bidding.

For example, the 10MHz 'G' band [1910-1915 MHz / 1990-1995 MHz] has attracted no bids in Newfoundland, New Brunswick and Northern Ontario. Not even an opening bid.

And almost all of the 5MHz 'I' band [1670-1675 MHz] remains in the government's hands; the exception is Manitoba where MTS has bid half a million dollars for it. Will any equipment be available to operate in this orphaned band?

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Industry Canada, AWS Spectrum Auction

Michael Geist's column in the Toronto Star this week joins our call for the government to examine a national connectedness strategy as a way to use the windfall from the spectrum auction, as bidding approaches the $4B mark.

He suggests three uses, among them:

Third, a large chunk of the surplus could be allocated toward fulfilling the goal of ensuring that all Canadians enjoy access to high-speed networks. Canada's broadband global ranking has been steadily declining in recent years with one-third of Canadian communities still without high-speed access. For those Canadians without access – whether in rural areas, or on the outskirts of major cities – the Internet's potential for communication, commerce, access to knowledge and culture remains largely unrealized.

As Michael Sone and I suggested in our opening remarks at The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit, the digital divide is not just a matter of connecting communities, but helping lower income Canadians get on-line, regardless of where they live.

As I asked in the opening remarks, will broadband policy find a place on the election platforms of various political parties this fall?

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broadband, Michael Geist, Toronto Star, Canadian Telecom Summit

The CRTC rejected an appeal by MTS Allstream of a couple of earlier Centrex forbearance decisions, Decisions 2007-80 and 2008-10.

MTS Allstream had argued that these Decisions had the effect of foreclosing any possibility of sustainable competition in Centrex services. It said that maintaining these Decisions would cause irreversible damage to competition.

Among its arguments, MTS Allstream provided evidence that showed that ILECs had in excess of 95 percent market share of business local exchange services to large and very large business customers. MTS Allstream claimed that the ILECs had "significant market power" in Centrex services as seen by the ability to raise prices as much as 19 percent within a year, with no loss of ILECs' market share.

However, the Commission found that the market share data submitted by MTS Allstream was inconclusive. For example, the data submitted by MTS Allstream did not separate the in-territory from out-of-territory regions where ILECs operate as competitors.

The Commission remains of the view that market share is but one measure of competition. The Commission considers that competitor presence is widely accepted in economics and competition law as a measure of a market's competitiveness and notes that it was the required test in the local forbearance framework set out in modified Telecom Decision 2006-15.

The Commission noted that the forbearance framework for wholesale services would ensure that competitors have access to inputs needed to compete in retail markets, independent of the regulatory determinations in the retail market. And of course, the Commission retains its powers to address issues related to undue preference and unjust discrimination.

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CRTC, centrex, MTS Allstream

Peter Nowak continued his outstanding coverage of The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit by conducting an interview with Sandvine co-founder, president and CEO, Dave Caputo, following the Wednesday morning Net Neutrality panel.

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Canadian Telecom Summit, CBC, Peter Nowak, Dave Caputo, net neutrality

At the end of the day on Thursday, bidding for AWS spectrum cracked through $3.9B and it seems to keep creeping up almost $5M per round. At that pace, we will get close to, but not quite at the $4B level before the week is through. I have already written about my thoughts on how the government might reinvest its windfall in enhancing accessibility to broadband by lower income Canadians. I noticed coverage in Tech Media Reports as well.

At the Canadian Telecom Summit on Tuesday, Ken Engelhart did some quick arithmetic to show that the amounts are in line with valuations in recent auctions in other countries - it's just that his comparables were for different frequency bands.

Still, we can be confident that the business plans still justify the levels. The question of where will all the capital come from remains. How many global players have stayed away because of foreign ownership restrictions?

While there are certainly legal constructs that can allow companies to satisfy a license review, how many companies have stayed clear of such games because they tend to believe that if they are putting up most of the bucks, they should get to control the board?

Would a loosening of foreign ownership restrictions result in even more competitive service providers?

Technorati Tags:
Industry Canada, AWS Spectrum Auction

I have been a little tied up for the past few days so I am grateful that my blogging colleagues, veteran journalists Peter Nowak and David George-Cosh have been providing such outstanding coverage of The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit in their roles as writers at CBC Online and The National Post respectively.

Their posts provided complementary coverage of Wednesday's speakers. Peter talks about the keynote addresses early in the day from Robert Depatie and Pierre Blouin; David covers Competition Bureau chief Sheridan Scott's address late in the afternoon. David also asks an important question arising from M. Depatie's keynote.

The event is now over. Thank you to the delegates and sponsors for your support. Thank you to the speakers for imparting your experience to our attendees. And thank you, David and Peter for assisting in bringing news of the event's proceedings to the rest of the public that couldn't make it there in person.

The dates for next year's 2009 Canadian Telecom Summit will be June 15-17, 2009 and we expect to be in Toronto.

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Canadian Telecom Summit, CBC, Peter Nowak, David George-Cosh, National Post

Day 2 of The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit featured a number of memorable sessions - including this year's installment of the Regulatory Blockbuster [covered here by CBC and here by the National Post].

Keynotes by University of Waterloo President David Johnston and CRTC Chair Konrad von Finckenstein were covered by Peter Nowak here. The CRTC Chair's keynote was described by David George-Cosh here.

Each year, it is a challenge for us to keep the event fresh and relevant and we try different things. A number of global industry executives who have participated as speakers and delegates have commented on the uniqueness of The Canadian Telecom Summit in gathering together such a panel of leaders - on stage and in the audience.

To close off Day 2, we had two receptions. The first, sponsored by Tech Mahindra, honoured the participation of their president of international operations, CP Gurnani, and BT CIO Clive Selley.

This was followed by a reception and concert sponsored by the Israel Economic Mission and the Canada Israel Chamber of Commerce, featuring Mosh Ben Ari.

He opened the show with the song in the video I posted earlier this year - a song called "The Way" - which is my favourite. To quote a lyric from the song, it was an especially sweet moment for me.

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Canadian Telecom Summit

The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit opened yesterday with more than 500 delegates gathered to hear from 75 industry leading speakers.

You can watch our introductory remarks here.

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Canadian Telecom Summit

David George-Cosh reviews Nadir Mohamed's opening keynote at The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit this morning.

He quotes Nadir:

There's a recognition on the part of Rogers that the world has changed. We'll be changing our prices to reflect that.

The National Post included an 8-page special Telecom Summit supplement this morning.

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Canadian Telecom Summit, Nartional Post, David George-Cosh

Peter Nowak gave us a nice bit of coverage on his CBC Online column.

I like the way he referred to The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit in a uniquely nationalistic way:

The three-day summit — the Stanley Cup finals of the telecommunications industry — this year comes at an active in Canada.

His article also provides a preview of the remainder of the event.

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Canadian Telecom Summit, CBC, Peter Nowak

A few weeks ago, the National Governors Association (yes, there really is such an association), released an issue brief: State Efforts to Expand Broadband Access. The document tries to provide strategies for states to increase broadband access and adoption.

Among them, the press release suggests that some states have established public-private task forces to evaluate the current state of broadband deployment and identify policy changes needed to expand access and adoption.

We have already had lots of talking, lots of evaluating, and even lots of identification of policy changes. I would suggest that on this side of the border, we don't need another task force.

On the other hand, we should welcome some action.

In our opening comments today at The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit, Michael Sone and I called for the government to take some of the nearly $2B windfall from the AWS spectrum auction (the excess over the original estimates of $1.5B) and invest it in initiatives to stimulate demand for broadband from under-serviced segments.

We suggested that a new approach is needed. We don't think government programs should pick winners by subsidizing one service provider over another:

We propose that the government establish a sustainable program that helps lower income Canadians to pay what it costs to provide service, regardless of means. Our tax system is already structured to be able to offer such subsidies and there are even mechanisms to differentiate based on geography.

This kind of approach would use the AWS auction windfall to stimulate economic investment in broadband infrastructure by regional and niche service providers. It represents a way for the government to re-invest money generated from the telecommunications industry, back into the industry to help bridge the digital divide and render broadband affordability a non-issue.

The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit runs through June 18 at the Toronto Congress Centre. It has once again attracted a sell-out crowd of more than 500 industry leaders.

Plan to attend next year - join our mailing list. The 2009 Canadian Telecom Summit will take place June 15-17, 2009.

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Canadian Telecom Summit

The halls are set. The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit opens this morning. At 7:00 am, the registration desk opens and it will be 'showtime'.

More than 500 delegates have registered to hear from 70 speakers and to join with colleagues, clients and competitors for 3 days of schmoozing.

I will provide some updates throughout the event. Watch this space!

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Canadian Telecom Summit

A Fraser Institute report examining net neutrality was released last week.

The executive summary characterizes the issue as "a prominent focus of debate in the ongoing evolution of Canadian broadcast and telecommunications regulatory policy."

The executive summary tries to summarize the net neutrality argument as:

Many believe that the Internet should be universally available for all possible uses and that access to content and applications should not be interfered with, particularly by service providers.

The report is intended to counter the tautology of that view.

proponents of net neutrality share a view that regulatory constraints on private sector decision-making will enhance the net economic benefits of the Internet to Canadians. This study critically evaluates and rejects this view.

The Fraser Institute addresses concerns on three key issues: access-tiering; vertical integration with the carrier based ISPs; and, innovation. The report concludes with recommendations that rely on existing regulatory mechanisms.

I'd be interested in your comments.

We'll be exploring net neutrality on Wednesday next week at The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit.

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Canadian Telecom Summit, net neutrality, Canada

The CRTC has given approval to the proposed rates for accessing the Do Not Call List database.

To subscribe to the database will cost $11,280 per year for all of Canada, or $600 per area code.

There is also an ad hoc query rate. Let's say you are a company that received a list of sales leads and you want to validate them. Just pay Bell $0.50 per number and the list will get checked against the database.

Accordingly, telemarketers that are required to subscribe to the National DNCL can expect to pay the following in these hypothetical examples:

1. A telemarketer that conducts telemarketing campaigns across Canada throughout the year could get an annual subscription for $11,280, which would give them access to all area codes for a full year.
2. A telemarketer that conducts telemarketing campaigns in just four area codes throughout the year could get a subscription for $2,460.
3. A telemarketer that conducts a seasonal telemarketing campaign across Canada that lasts just three consecutive months could get a subscription for $2,970.
4. A telemarketer that conducts a limited telemarketing campaign that targets just 50 telephone numbers could query those 50 numbers for $25.

We can expect that the contract for subscriptions will have prohibitions against resale.

Will businesses that aren't professional telemarketers comply? Is the cost of compliance such that companies will choose to take their chances and not bother checking?

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CRTC, DNCL

Dunt, da-dunt, da-da... It's Telecom week in Canada.

There is a lot of attention to telecommunications issues over the course of the next week.

Of course, the launch of iPhone v2 has been part of the global hype, but there is a lot of news made in Canada as well.

David George-Cosh and Jamie Sturgeon kicked things off last Saturday with their look into the future of wireless: Better. Faster. Smarter.

The AWS spectrum auction, having moved into Stage 2 earlier this week, is moving faster toward its conclusion. Stage 3 started Wednesday (lower bid increments; all points have to be bid each round) and the process moves to 6 rounds per day starting this morning. More than $3.5B has already been bid, more than double the original estimates. As I said to Peter Nowak at CBC yesterday, we seem to honing in on the final number.

Bell will have its day in court next Tuesday to see what tune the Supremes will sing. Will the deal just keep them hangin' on?

The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit opens on Monday at the Toronto Congress Centre and there will coverage of the event all of next week in the major media outlets. Watch for our special Telecom Summit supplement in the National Post. Registrations are strong again this year and we are grateful for the industry support.

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Canadian Telecom Summit

On Monday, the CRTC issued a Public Notice to consult on what kinds of information carriers should be required to provide to customers.

Over the years, a number of regulatory requirements have been imposed - mainly upon incumbents - to provide information to make customers aware of their basic rights and responsibilities.

Under the information requirements, the ILECs are required, for example, to publish information in their white pages directories, on their websites, and/or in billing inserts about the Terms of Service, the Statement of Consumer Rights, a description of the quality of service regime, the privacy implications of number and name display services, the Unsolicited Telecommunications Rules and information as to how to register on the National Do Not Call List, 900 service safeguards, and information pertinent to forborne markets.

In consideration of the current competitive environment, the CRTC has called for comments on questions such as whether market forces have made the rules obsolete.

Michael Geist notes that

concern over the lack of transparency associated with Internet and telecom services has been mounting, the CRTC has just launched a public consultation on the prospect of eliminating mandatory disclosures, relying instead on market forces. The outcome of this consultation could lead to dramatic changes in what the telcom companies are required to disclose to consumers.

In a competitive environment, does the regulator need to mandate disclosure in order for consumers to be informed? How do consumers get informed about all of the characteristics of the services they are buying in an increasingly complex market? For example, what is a reasonable set of FAQs for consumers for their internet access service, given the different treatments by service providers for P2P traffic?

On the other hand, should the regulator dictate what media are used for disclosure of consumer information: does anyone actually use white pages anymore, let alone read the introductory pages? How many trees go into the pages printed with the Terms of Service? What rules would be efficient?

Yesterday, the Commission announced a combined Broadcast and Telecom notice of consultation and public hearing scheduled for November 17, 2008. The consultation is to explore unresolved issues related to accessibility of telecommunications and broadcasting services to persons with disabilities. Based on a quick review of the associated consultant report, maintaining access information is an issue for the community of persons with disabilities. [Note: the link to the consultant report was broken from the Telecom PN, but it works from the Broadcast PN.] In particular, the report suggests customer service and support are seen as increasingly inaccessible due to the need to navigate voice response systems.

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CRTC

While some internet service providers (ISPs) may claim that they perform no network management, no ISP can sustain that position for the long term.

Network management covers a range of activities that help protect the integrity of the customer experience. For example, service providers need to guard against denial of service attacks - that is network management. ISPs need to watch for and manage spam - both incoming and outgoing - that is network management.

Yesterday, Rogers held a briefing to provide insights on its philosophy and approach to its network management.

A question on many people's minds is how does my ISP deal with peer-to-peer file transfers.

Rogers appears to have taken a different approach from other ISPs in Canada. It does not interfere with download capacity for torrent-type traffic. Instead, Rogers divides its upload bandwidth into two segments: a P2P file transfer portion; and everything else in the other portion.

The allocation is largely static; it doesn't change based on time of day. Rogers doesn't interfere with encrypted packets; it does not block traffic; it does not manage the downstream traffic; it does not inspect the content of packets.

Their approach was determined to have the least customer impact in that most customers aren't even aware when their machine is being used as a server. It does not affect the downloading of content and Rogers does not differentiate based on the content or the application - just on the characteristics of the application: if it is a P2P file transfer application, then its upload demand goes into a different bucket.

The objective of all network management techniques is to balance the internet experience for all subscribers, even those heavy downloaders. Some of the data indicates that 34% of all users are now downloading music and 18% are downloading video. These kind of figures mean that more than just students are beginning to use file download software. Downloading has crossed into the mainstream.

Is the Rogers approach more consumer friendly and competitively neutral?

Mike Lee, Rogers' Chief Strategy Officer, will be speaking next week on the Net Neutrality panel at The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit, June 18. Have you registered yet?

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Rogers, Canadian Telecom Summit, net neutrality

From reading the transcripts, it must have been an entertaining time in Winnipeg last Wednesday when the CRTC was looking at how to deal with erratic conformance from Harmony Broadcasting - radio station CJVW.

The station was in violation of its conditions of license and it ignored a variety of CRTC orders to bring it into conformance. The station closed in October, the company was dissolved, but then revived with an apparent change in control - absent CRTC approval. to it was sold.

But, as a campus station, one has to wonder how it could be sold in the first place.

The Commission has called Harmony to this Public Hearing to show cause as to why additional mandatory orders requiring the licensee to conform to the Regulations and to its Conditions of Licence should not be issued, why the Commission should not suspend or revoke Harmony's licence under sections 9 and 24 of the Broadcasting Act, and why prior Commission approval for the apparent change of control is not required.

In the event that prior approval is required, the licensee is expected to show cause as to why the Commission should grant its approval to the change in control and why further measures, such as suspension or revocation of Harmony's licence, are not warranted.

There is more.

Lots of intrigue at the opening - questions about who really owns the company, requests for subpoenas. surprise motions. This was not your average broadcast hearing.

Maybe some production company will look at creating a reality TV show modeled after the People's Court blended with Canadian Idol. Regulatory cases will be presented and then home viewers will vote. A warning - the language in this episode would require the show to be aired after the kids are in bed.

Most of the time, going through regulatory transcripts is worse than reading instructions on how to fill out your tax return.

This one is an exception.

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CRTC

The AWS auction is moving to 'Round Two' as of Monday morning:

The auction will move to stage 2 on June 9, 2008 at 09:00 in round 35. The activity rule will be 90 percent. In a round, bidders must be active on licences covering 90 percent of their total eligibility points in order to maintain that level of eligibility points in the following round. The percentage bid increment will be 8 percent and the absolute increment will be $2000/point.

Recall that when the auction opened, the increment was 15%, then this slowed to 10% last week.

As a sign that we are starting to reach an asymptote around $3.25B, the total bid price has only been increasing by about $10M between round 34 versus 33.

What does the level of bidding mean for the future competitive landscape? Vince Valentini has cut price targets for Quebecor, TELUS and Rogers because of the spectrum cost.

Technorati Tags:
Industry Canada, AWS Spectrum Auction

Many analysts had thought the current AWS spectrum auction would generate bids of about $1.5B. As the week draws to a close, the federal treasury has already raised more than $3B. It seems that we are heading towards a windfall of about $1.5B - $2B more than just about anyone in Canada's Department of Finance could have reasonably expected.

I find it interesting to look at where people are bidding and which spectrum blocks within certain geographies. While the situation may change by the time you look at it, one company has bid a third more - $80M for one of the 20 MHz block than another company bid for the same geography (Toronto), same size block.

Lots of folks have looked at what it means for service providers spending more on spectrum than they might have originally hoped.

I'm interested in hearing what the government plans to do with the extra money besides the standard line that it is paying down the debt.

I have some ideas. What are yours?

Technorati Tags:
Industry Canada, AWS Spectrum Auction

Last January, I wrote about a US cable industry standardization initiative, tru2way, intended to enable open development of new services and features that rely on two-way communication over the cable network.

In effect, tru2way will eliminate proprietary set-top boxes, allowing conforming open standard set-top boxes to run on any cable network. Alternatively, tru2way could be built into new TV sets, eliminating the set-top box altogether. That is precisely what Sony, Panasonic, Samsung, and LG Electronics plan to do, helping to eliminate at least one remote control and for many, simplifying household wiring.

Light Reading wonders how telcos will respond. As a cable industry initiative, how would IPTV networks interface to tru2way TV sets?

It might be in the best interests of cable companies facing IPTV competition to provide incentives for customers to buy tru2way equipped TVs. Will telephone companies need to develop a kind of plug-in-the-wall interface to enable IPTV to operate with tru2way TV sets.

With wall mounted flat panel TVs becoming more common room fixtures, I have to think that eliminating the extra device, the set-top box, has value for a lot of people. For cable companies, tru2way-enabled TV sets may help keep customers from churning away to IPTV.

Consumers in a Multi-screen World is the theme of one of our break-out sessions at The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit on June 16. Have you registered yet?

Technorati Tags:
cable, set top box, tru2way, Canadian Telecom Summit

I had a professor who said that you always had to test your questionnaire. Watch the face on the respondents to see if they understand what you are asking.

I have written before about the book "Art of Asking Questions."

Ipsos Canada is part of one of the world's leading survey-based marketing research firms. You would have thought that they would know how to test their surveys before releasing them to the field.

So tell me, how should I have responded to the very first question in a survey that said:

Please indicate below whether there are male adults present in your household in each of the following age ranges.

(Please select all that apply.)

☐ Under 18

☐ 18-24

☐ There are no male adults in my household

Hmmm. Hardly mutually exclusive and exhaustive. What do you answer here if you are a male adult aged 25 or older? How about, none of the above? The survey wouldn't let me continue without selecting at least one response.

I asked the help line what they were expecting from me and they said that I should have clicked on the box that said there are no male adults. Right - that makes sense.

It was a lot easier for the survey help desk to answer my inquiry that way. The alternative would have been for them to tell the study director that they had to start this survey over.

The client will never know the difference.

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Ipsos

From looking at the photos of last week's net neutrality rally in Ottawa, the reports of 300 people said to have been there must have included about 150 tourists who thought that the guy in the godzilla suit was the RCMP musical ride.

However, the rally was apparently a stimulus for a pair of private member's bills, starting with Bill C-552, introduced by NDP MP Charlie Angus and announced at the rally. It proposes to add some text to Section 36 of the Telecom Act. Recall that the current section basically says that carriers can't play with content without the express consent of the CRTC.

He has proposed that the following be added:

The Telecommunications Act is amended by adding the following after section 36

1. Network operators shall not engage in network management practices that favour, degrade or prioritize any content, application or service transmitted over a broadband network based on its source, ownership or destination.
2. Nothing in subsection (1) shall be construed as limiting or restricting the right of a network operator to
   
   1. manage the flow of network traffic in a reasonable manner in order to relieve congestion;
   2. provide reasonable security protection for a user's computer or the network;
   3. give priority to emergency communications;
   4. offer directly to each user service at different prices based on defined levels of bandwidth or the actual quantity of data flow over a user's connection;
   5. offer directly to each user consumer protection services, including parental controls for indecency or unwanted content, software for the prevention of unsolicited commercial electronic messages, or other similar capabilities, provided that the user is given clear and accurate advance notice of their ability to refuse or subsequently disable each consumer protection service;
   6. handle breaches of the terms of service, provided the terms of service are not inconsistent with subsection (1); and
   7. prevent any violation of federal or provincial law.
3. Network operators shall not prevent or obstruct a user from attaching any device to their network, provided the device does not physically damage the network or substantially degrade the use of the network by other subscribers.
4. Network operators shall make available to each user information about the user’s access to the Internet, including the speed, limitations, and network management practices of the user's broadband service at any given time.
5. For the purposes of this section, “network operator” means a person who operates or provides access to telecommunications services.

It seems to me that a lot of folks keep forgetting that, unlike its counterparts in other jurisdictions, the CRTC already has the tools it needs to guard against discriminatory practices.

Bill C-552 appears to be balanced on a cursory examination, but I can already detect areas that give me concern about the possibility to limit future developments in the internet.

Yesterday, Liberal MP David McGuinty introduced C-555, "An Act to provide clarity and fairness in the provision of telecommunication services in Canada." He has proposed to add certain consumer protections as a condition of license for mobile carriers.

While neither bill may not stand a chance of passing, especially with summer recess around the corner, Bill C-555 is a sign of frustration with anti-consumer practices such unilateral changes of terms and fees outside of contracts. Carriers might be thankful that the honourable member didn't think of adding the condition to wireline BITS licenses as well.

For the final word on this lengthy post, I found it ironic that in writing about net neutrality this past weekend, Mark Evans seemed to endorse new neutrality laws and regulations but simultaneously quipped that

regulating the Internet is a joke unless your goal is to create bureaucracy, policy and opportunities for lobbyists.

Net neutrality will be the theme of a special session at The 2008 Canadian Telecom Summit on June 18.

Technorati Tags:
Charlie Angus, net neutrality, Canada, Canadian Telecom Summit

Call me a stickler for details, but there is a big difference between "kb" and "kB".

In CAIP's interrogatory responses to the CRTC, the units seem to be used interchangeably, perpetuating an erroneous statement in one of the attachments that throttled traffic speeds being experienced (around 30kBps) are half of dial-up speeds (56kbps).

Lower case 'b' refers to bits. Upper case 'B' refers to bytes (with 8 bits to a byte). So, 30 kBps means 30 kilobytes per second which is 240 kbps - around four times dial-up.

Of course, there is still a big difference between 240 kbps and 5 Mbps, so the exageration was not necessary to make their point.

Why would the association continue to make such an obvious mistake in its regulatory filings? Is it just me or does this cast suspicions on the quality of the rest of its complaint?

Technorati Tags:
Bell, CRTC, CAIP

The AWS spectrum auction has already generated $1.5B in bids for the federal treasury. The auction will be stepping up the pace later this week: after round 13 (the first round on June 2), bid increments will be 10% (instead of the current 15%). In addition, the auction will be moving to 5 rounds per day as of Thursday.

From the original pack of 30 applicants, 3 didn't make it past the qualifying list. A number of bidders withdrew prior to the auction commencing. Some others were no shows when the bidding got underway. Still others have seen partial or dramatic erosion in their eligibility points.

Very interesting to look at where people are bidding and perhaps more importantly, where they are not bidding.

I referred to bidding early last week as the preliminary round. We are starting to move toward the end of regular season play this week. The play-offs are still to come.

Technorati Tags:
Industry Canada, AWS Spectrum Auction