Why am I feeling like ****? It's because I'm about to lose an extra $200 a year just because some large corporate giant says so: Recently, Bell Canada has had the Canadian Radio-television Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) make a decision that aims to take more money out of the pockets of Canadian consumers and ruin online services that are competitors to Bell Canada. This decision is called Usage Based Billing (UBB). Details for UBB can be found here:
http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/archive/2011/2011-44.htm . To summarize it, the CRTC recently rendered a decision forcing all independent DSL and Cable Internet providers to substantially match incumbent (like Bell) usage rate caps. The data caps that Bell imposes are ridiculously small and would normally be avoided by switching services to another independent DSL Internet Service Provider (ISP). This will influence all internet service packages eventually, but DSL residential customers in Ontario and Quebec first, as of March 1. From March 1 on, users who purchase Internet packages in Ontario can expect a usage cap of 25GB (60GB in Quebec), substantially down from the 200GB or unlimited deals that these independent ISPs were able to offer before the CRTC’s decision to impose usage based billing.
Content and data like Netflix, YouTube, IPTV, large file downloads or other streaming services can consume large amounts of bandwidth and place cap limits in jeopardy very quickly. Users now need to monitor your usage carefully, as the CRTC has imposed a very high overage rate, above your new monthly limit, of $1.90 per gigabyte ($2.35 per gigabyte in Québec). Companies like Netflix, iTunes and other companies who provide digital content distribution services are harmed by this new decision and ISPs are using UBB as an excuse to limit our access to their TV competitors by making them cost prohibitive to access. It is a conflict of interests to allow our TV Broadcasters to also be our ISPs, and therefore, the gateway to their competition.
So far 107,578 people have signed a petition against this Usage Based Billing at
http://openmedia.ca/meter .
This will start costing the average Canadian consumer exorbitant amounts of money as they start receiving massive Internet bills starting March the 1st. More information about UBB can be found here:
http://www.antiubb.com/why-should-we-oppose-ubb/ . In conclusion, I (as an average consumer) am being forced to pay more money per month out of my pocket for less services than I used to receive only because Bell wants to be anti-competitive.
Edit: This link
http://www.antiubb.com/what-can-i-do/ seems to provide some useful advice of what the average person can do against UBB. This matter may also be in violation of the Competition Act
http://www.competitionbureau.gc.ca/eic/site/cb-bc.nsf/eng/h_00148.html#competition
Technology is supposed to progress, not regress.
