Yesterday, the CRTC issued a public notice for “Establishment of a regulatory framework for next-generation 9-1-1 in Canada“. Along with the formal public notice, the Commission issued a press release, launched a splashy video, and a new website: http://www.canada.ca/next-generation-911.

The public proceeding will cover many issues, including:

• NG9-1-1 services
• NG9-1-1 architecture and responsibilities
• transition steps and timelines
• funding
• confidentiality
• reporting and monitoring

A little over two years ago, the CRTC announced “Text with 9-1-1 services for hearing or speech impaired persons“. At the time, I wrote: “Regrettably, I am not convinced this is a service that truly meets the needs of the community it is intended to serve.” The user interface struck me as too complicated. I closed off that post with a question: “Should people need a training course and have to invest in new mobile handsets in order to make emergency calls?”

The blog post attracted more comments than any other in 2014, with a debate about my harsh reaction.

Two years later, the wireless industry is preparing to release an instructional video to help potential users learn how to Text with 9-1-1. Yesterday, an email circulated among the review committee providing comments on the draft video. One of the people who most strongly defended the text with 9-1-1 user interface in the comments on my blog post admitted that he had trouble making his first test call. He wrote: “When I practiced my first call I forgot to press the send phone.” Since most of the target community never makes voice calls, this person, who has been deeply involved with the design of the service, forgot to push the “send” button after dialing the numbers 9-1-1.

It has been 4 years since Canada allocated 700MHz spectrum for use by public safety agencies. Commercial carriers began using similar spectrum within two months of getting the spectrum. That led me to suggest that new approaches might be worth exploring. One of the biggest challenges in improving public safety communications is governance: the CRTC is exploring national solutions, but most first response agencies are municipal. This is an area that the CRTC plans to explore.

At the end of the day, next generation 9-1-1 will require the public safety organizations to upgrade their equipment, which is an area the CRTC acknowledges is beyond its jurisdiction:

13. Local PSAPs have their own internal systems composed of hardware and software used to receive 9-1-1 calls, display caller information, and dispatch emergency responders. PSAPs’ systems fall outside the Commission’s jurisdiction, as explained below.

The oral hearing opens in January, 2017. Initial submissions are due May 20, 2016.

Hopefully, Next Generation 9-1-1 won’t require people to view an instructional video before making an emergency call.

For three full days, The Canadian Telecom Summit delivers thought provoking presentations from the prime movers of the industry. The Canadian Telecom Summit gives you the chance to hear from and talk with them in both a structured atmosphere of frank discussion and high octane idea exchange and schmooze in a more relaxed social setting of genial conversation.

The leadership of the telecom, broadcast & IT industries will converge at the Toronto Congress Centre from June 6 to 8 to discuss the key issues and trends that will impact this critical sector of the economy. Join more than 500 of your peers, suppliers, policy makers, regulators, customers and competitors in attending telecom’s most important gathering.

The past year has witnessed the release of a number of significant regulatory and policy decisions that are certain to impact telecommunications and broadcasting industries for years to come. That is why we are so happy that our speakers at The 2016 Canadian Telecom Summit will include Privacy Commissioner Daniel Therrien, CRTC Commissioner Raj Shoan, FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai, former Minister Maxime Bernier, among more than 70 other industry leaders, including Dr. David Bray, Chief Information Officer of the FCC. Check out the conference brochure for the details on confirmed speakers. And we will be announcing shortly our keynote speakers from Bell, Intel, Red Hat, and Wind River.

Why not plan on joining them?

The Canadian Telecom Summit has become the place for Canada’s ICT leaders to meet, interact and do business, inspired by high-octane interaction, top-level keynote speakers and thought-provoking panel discussions.

These leaders and many more will all be at The 2016 Canadian Telecom Summit.

You should be there too. Register today! Visit the conference website or download the brochure for more details.

Continuing Professional Development: The time spent attending substantive sessions at The 2016 Canadian Telecom Summit can be claimed as “Substantive Hours” toward Continuing Professional Development (CPD) requirements for the Law Society of Upper Canada.

Will distrust in government impact digital literacy and adoption of technology?

Over the past week, I have engaged with some folks who are advocating the removal of WiFi equipment from schools. Activists within teachers’ unions believe there is a workplace safety issue associated with WiFi, despite assurances from Health Canada and other agencies.

Why do educated, intelligent people reject the findings of the agencies that are charged with the responsibility to ensure safety standards?

What causes people to put their trust in a speakers who evangelize with emotionally-charged presentations based on debunked studies and misrepresented quotations?

I have cited Pew Research Center studies a number of times through the years, most often in looking at internet adoption. Pew also tracks “Public Trust in Government“, which appears to have been hovering at historically low levels in the US.

The OECD says only 40% of people trust their government. It suggests 6 ways for governments to earn back the trust of their citizens:

• Reliability: Governments have an obligation to minimise uncertainty in the economic, social and political environment.
• Responsiveness: Trust in government can depend on citizen’s experiences when receiving public services – a crucial factor of trust in government.
• Openness: Open government policies that concentrate on citizen engagement and access to information can increase public trust.
• Better Regulation: Proper regulation is important for justice, fairness and the rule of law as well in delivering public services.
• Integrity & Fairness: Integrity is a crucial determinant of trust and is essential if governments want to be recognised as clean, fair and open.
• Inclusive Policy Making: Understanding how policies are designed can strengthen institutions and promote trust between government and citizens.

In an article in Scientific American (Trust Me, I’m a Scientist), the author seeks to understand “Why so many people choose not to believe what scientists say”:

Why do people say that they trust scientists in general but part company with them on specific issues?

Many individuals blame the poor quality of science education in the U.S. If kids got more science in school, the thinking goes, they would learn to appreciate scientific opinion on vaccines, climate, evolution and other policy issues. But this is a misconception. Those who know more science have only a slightly greater propensity to trust scientists. The science behind many policy issues is highly specialized, and evaluating it requires deep knowledge—deeper than students are going to get in elementary and high school science classes. A more direct approach would be to educate people about why they are prone to accept inaccurate beliefs in the first place.

It is particularly disconcerting to me that school teachers are among the most active voices in the camp that does not trust the scientific community on safety standards for RF emissions.

As I tweeted yesterday, “I’m more concerned about kids being exposed to teachers promoting Junk Science than RF emissions that are under limits”.

In this post, I’m not going to get into the debate of one study versus another. Rather, this is a statement of concern that we are seeing reduced levels of trust in the authorities charged with responsibility to review the safety standards.

We have seen this phenomena create political problems, when municipalities pander to those who want to keep cell towers away from schools and community centres. Although safety standards for radio frequency emissions are set by Canada’s federal agencies, activists target municipalities that are reviewing applications for mobile phone towers. School teachers’ unions are looking for relief from local school boards and provincial workplace safety agencies.

Having virtually no chance of success in influencing federal agencies such as Health Canada, activists are looking for relief from local municipal councils, school boards or even an individual university.

How do we ensure that junk science doesn’t hinder expansion of wireless infrastructure in our communities and our schools. Will digital adoption be impacted by declining trust in government?

Apparently, some Ontario local teachers unions are calling for a moratorium on WiFi use in schools.

This issue seems to pop up every few years, so it is worth highlighting a few posts from my archives to counter the misinformation being distributed by fraudulent misrepresentations of science.

For example, in my post called “Academic dishonesty“, I point out the misleading editing of a World Health Organization press conference, intentionally removing a key sentence that referred to the junk science:

the lobbyist cut out the introductory sentence that refers to the bad science (“methodological limitations”) producing a “body of evidence” that is “uninformative for the overall classification.”

In 2012, I suggested some teachers needed to go “Back to school”

It is important to keep in mind that the World Health Organization put exposure to radio frequency energy in the same class of carcinogens (2B) as coffee. As my son tweeted, remove WiFi and you’ll have to remove coffee from our schools as well.

Not sure we’d see much teacher support for that.

Why is Ontario handing $15 million to Sandvine to create just 75 jobs? According to the Ottawa Citizen, “Sandvine spokesman Rick Wadsworth says the company has trouble convincing itself to hire people in Ontario.”

“Sandvine, like any global high-tech company, has to choose the best regions to do our development work,” he said Friday by email. “Our natural predisposition is to do that work in Ontario, but there are other parts of the world where Sandvine currently operates that also have qualified candidates and much lower cost. The Jobs and Prosperity Fund took a difficult decision about where to locate future jobs and helped gap some of the cost difference, but not all of it.”

Sandvine is right. Like any other high-tech company, Sandvine has to choose where it hires people to do its development work. And apparently, Ontario’s high tech development talent needs a $200,000 per job subsidy in order to be competitive with other parts of the world, despite the company sitting on $140 million in cash. That is the message that is being sent to the marketplace by the government handout.

The Toronto Star quoted Ontario’s Economic Development Minister Brad Duguid: “Look, we’re competing in a fiercely competitive global economy… The days when you could just sort of spread out through a tax credit to everybody a little bit of help to help businesses rise — and not be investing in your fast runners — are gone”.

And that is a message that should concern policy makers looking at boosting Canada’s innovation economy.

What are the implications for other high tech jobs? For start-ups and the majority of employers that aren’t identified as “fast runners”.

Ontario is trying to create more innovation clusters. Sandvine, with lots of cash in the bank, together with the province, is saying that Ontario development talent is too expensive and needs to be subsidized to the tune of $200,000 per job to be competitive. That should be a concern to all entrepreneurs.

Companies that are looking to recruit the best talent are now competing against another firm that gets $200,000 to outbid them. That drives the cost of talent even higher.

Last week, I referred to the National Digital Talent Strategy that has been launched by ICTC. The 2016 Canadian Telecom Summit includes a session looking at “Strengthening Canada’s Digital Advantage in a Hyper-connected Global Economy”, moderated by ICTC CEO, Namir Anani.

Do government funded job subsidies help or hurt the innovation ecosystem? Does the short-term benefit for one industry participant come at a cost to others?

The Canadian Telecom Summit takes place this year from June 6-8 in Toronto. Have you registered yet??