MTS Allstream has turned to the public for support of its cabinet appeal. The official comment period has closed on the Gazette Notice, but the broad coalition of ISPs on the Competitive Broadband home page is looking to influence Cabinet to overturn the CRTC’s Decision from last December.

Under the Telecom Act, Cabinet has one year from the date of the original decision to act on the appeals.

The website contains various links to the materials filed by MTS Allstream and a Top 10 list of reasons why the coalition would like to see the Commission’s decision overturned. It includes a reference to the flawed OECD study that erroneously said that Canada has among the highest cost, slowest broadband:

Canada already has more expensive and slower broadband services than many countries. Within the OECD, Mexico and Turkey are the only countries where broadband services are more expensive.

The Competitive Broadband coalition misses the point that Canadians already enjoy among the world’s highest levels of intermodal competition – the vast majority of us have access to broadband service over twisted pair, coaxial cable, fixed and mobile wireless as well as satellite.

Cabinet has to balance the interests of value added service providers, such as those represented in this new Coalition, against the interests of facilities based service providers – the companies making massive investment in infrastructure in a competitive environment.

Canadian Press covers the story here.

Labour Day has marked the end of summer for most of us, which means it is time for attention to turn toward the preliminary planning for The 2010 Canadian Telecom Summit (June 7-9: registrations are open).

We are already hearing from a number of companies that are proposing speakers: we welcome proposals for participation at all levels.

At the event this past June, it was great to see participation by leaders of smaller ISPs and communications service providers. The diversity of voices contributed to the broader understanding of the issues.

Your suggestions are welcome.

IIC is holding its annual conference in Montreal, October 26-27. This is a major policy conference, this year looking at a theme of Trends in Global Communications: Wrestling with unpredictability.

The conference is being hosted by CRTC Chair Konrad von Finckenstein, who is the President of the Canadian Chapter, International Institute of Communications. Confirmed speakers include Heritage Minister James Moore.

Prices increase after September 11.

In the wake of successful prosecutions of three British men who conspired to bring down trans-Atlantic aircraft, the former Director of Public Prosecutions in the UK, Ken Macdonald, said that intercepted emails and phone calls were critical.

According to the AP article, Britain is one of the few countries in the world to bar the use of evidence from intercepted personal phone calls, e-mails, letters and faxes.

the best evidence you can have, people convicting themselves out of their own mouths.

Yesterday, Mobile Syrup had a write-up about Industry Canada’s aborted launch of a mobile rate calculator.

Mobile Syrup is pretty clear about the lack of utility from the rate calculator:

Bernard Lord was correct – no data plans. This would have been a nightmare if it actually launched. More Canadians are transitioning towards Smartphones and this, if actually launched, would have been shelved within the first month as it was poorly thought out.

The Mobile Syrup review appears to be based on the same set of slides that Roberto Rochon at The Montreal Gazette referenced in his blog last Thursday. Roberto credits PIAC for the slide show.

Reading both of these posts, it is apparent that the tool would have been useless as for shoppers. There is no interactivity and as Mobile Syrup points out, the caveats in the proposed terms and conditions leave users with the feeling that the tool would have been saying: take your valuable time and enter your info here but it may not be right… check back later.

After reading these pieces, I understand why scrapping the tool was front page news. But it seems to me that the story should have focussed on why any government funds expended on this project in the first place?

While you are at it, look at the April 30 CWTA letter that The Gazette provides [ pdf, 87KB] – why was there no consultation with the wireless industry in the design phase of such a tool? What consumer problem was supposed to be solved? How would updates to rate plans be added?

PIAC’s April 22 letter to the Minister [ pdf, 2.53MB] is also available on the Gazette site.