Last week was the deadline for public input into the Minister’s policy direction to the CRTC. I commented briefly on part of the MTS Allstream filing.
It isn’t that I wanted to single them out. Actually, kudos to MTS Allstream for being the only party to actively distribute their comments to the public. Further, Allstream is having a conference call to discuss their position.
PIAC has posted their submission to their own website. I have seen a couple others but I am under an embargo until the public can view the pieces.
It has been hard to get a hold of the various submissions, since Industry Canada has not yet updated their website.
It is an interesting process – parties make submissions, but unlike the CRTC, there is no right to reply. This is a process where the lobbyists, press and public opinion may become more important. Watch this space. I am sure that we’ll have more to say about this debate.
On July 11, a new icon, “E-Mail Settings”, magically appeared on my Blackberry. As it turns out, the icon is a launch pad for the Blackberry web browser with a shortcut to my web client settings page. When I spoke to a couple colleagues that evening, I found that their Blackberries had been also ‘infected’. We all had inherited this new home screen icon.
The concern that I have isn’t this particular application. I’m concerned about how the icon got onto my Blackberry without me knowing about it and authorizing it first.
The issue is a question of who has the right to control what software and applications get loaded onto a device, once it is in the hands of a consumer. When Microsoft issues a patch for our PC software, aren’t we first asked if we want to load it? Should our Blackberry devices be any different?
The initial response from the team at my service provider was that this was part of a service book upgrade that was necessary to keep my service running. I’m not convinced.
When there have been other service problems, I was told to download patches and load them myself. When I read the customer agreement, it seems to imply that the user is solely responsible for software upgrades:
The Customer’s System. Where Customer is purchasing Services which require additional equipment, software and/or services, Customer acknowledges and agrees that it shall be Customer’s sole responsibility to purchase, install, configure and maintain, at Customer’s cost, (i) all required equipment, software and services, including interconnections and network configurations (the “Customer’s System”) to enable Customer to purchase and receive the Services; and (ii) any additional equipment, software, services, enhancements or upgrades (“Upgrades”) that become available for use with the Services. [Service Provider] shall have no responsibility hereunder to correct or fix any problems or errors relating to or caused by the installation, configuration or modification of the Customer’s System or any components thereof.
So, according to the Terms of Service, I am solely responsible to effect any needed software, but on the other hand, it was OK for them to do it on their own?
What about loading spyware onto my device, to track my browsing habits. Or an audio recorder? Or any other software that might interfere with applications that I have purchased for my Blackberry? After all, the service provider is taking no responsibility hereunder to correct or fix any problems or errors.
What about the cost of the data stream? I notice from my monthly billing statement that I had very high usage on July 11 – was this due to the software that was unknowingly sent to my machine? For people who pay by the Kb, shouldn’t they get to manage their costs? If I happened to be travelling, who would have paid the roaming charges for the download?
My service provider referred the question to RIM, where it seems to have disappeared.
I will be pleased to post RIM’s reply, when it emerges. Who made the decision that it was OK to tamper with user devices without so much as an advisory? What process is used to determine that such an intrusion is justified? Where did users agree to have parties load software without a warning like ‘Click here to load an emergency patch’?
If service providers “shall have no responsibility hereunder to correct or fix any problems or errors relating to or caused by the installation, configuration or modification of the Customer’s System or any components thereof,” then don’t users have the right to refuse to have outsiders, including service providers, mess around with their devices in the first place?
I had lunch recently with an old friend – OK, he’s not old so let’s call him a longtime friend – who asked me how frequently I updated my blog. I told him that I try to have something fresh each day.
Sure it’s a challenge – on a couple fronts.
First, as I have written before, I don’t want to digress into boring you with pictures of my vacation, birthdays, etc. – unless, of course, I can develop a logical tie-in to telecommunications trends. In that case, watch out!
Secondly, I want to provide some inspirational thoughts – not simply a news item – but something that will lead you to write me, call me, challenge me, or maybe even engage me.
Let’s continue from my thoughts yesterday on YouTube and take a look at IP-TV. I am concerned that IP-TV, as a straight broadcast medium over twisted pair, is just not going to work in North America. There needs to be a better way for telcos to play.
We North Americans love our TVs. We have TVs in the family room, in the kitchen, in our bedrooms. During the World Cup this summer, we had TVs running in every bar, in many banks, in office food courts.
What we saw from the World Cup was the power of High Definition. With retail prices for HD equipment falling and the amount of HD content increasing, more homes will have HD sets, and many will have multiple HD devices, watching different HD shows at the same time.
And therein is one of the problems for the telcos’ IP-TV plans.
It is tough enough to upgrade the access plant to distribute one HD signal down those skinny little wires. Multiple HD channels may be beyond the capability of twisted pair until too late in the development and deployment cycle. As a result, Verizon is spending $20B to run fibre-to-the-home for 16M subscribers. $1250 per sub.
That is a brute force way to fight off the converged communications portfolio of cable. It is certainly one approach: replace the entire access infrastructure.
There is another way. Change the rules of the game. Think of Captain Kirk in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Faced with an no-win scenario in the Star Fleet academy, then cadet James Kirk found a way around the test by reprogramming the simulation, thus changing the conditions of the contest. In doing so, Kirk defeated the Kobayashi Maru scenario, and went on to fame as a Starfleet captain.
What if the telephone companies rewrite the rules of the game? Participate in changing the way we watch TV. In a universe of hundreds of channels and global programming, how much do we really need to watch broadcast TV anymore? With PVRs, YouTube, file swapping and multiple runs of shows across continental time-zones, people are already starting to control their viewing beyond that of the traditional broadcast medium. Why fight it?
To start with, telcos should be embracing smart boxes like TiVo. Telcos should be helping such technologies and finding solutions for digital rights management for peer-to-peer distribution of programming.
Telcos need to help stimulate changes to the way typical users watch TV – not just our kids, but our parents.
At the end of the day, we are talking a fundamental shift, a disruptive change, to broadcast TV. Maybe it is YouTube on steroids.
Telcos need to disrupt the broadcast model because the alternative means fighting the battle using the cable industry’s rules. Disruption is how you beat the Kobayashi Maru scenario.
If you don’t read the papers, you are uninformed. If you do read the papers you are misinformed.
Mark Twain
What do we say then, about the impact of YouTube on corporate advertising and spin-off parodies? In a story in the NY Times, Matt Lindley, an executive creative director at Arnold Worldwide says “I consider it the highest form of flattery to show up on YouTube.” His firm created a campaign that has made its way to YouTube with originals and parodies showing up in a search under Vonage.
My personal favourite parody ad on YouTube is the parody for Volkswagon, celebrating German engineering.
On the unmoderated, user-created internet, how do you know what is real? What is fake? How do companies protect their brands and their image in this environment?
As important, how do companies leverage the power of alternate distribution of their messages?
