[kwlug-disc] UBB comes to Teksavvy

[R. Brent Clements]

Some other points to consider, not necessarily Bell related:

Virtually everyone who lives in an appartment building that wants to
watch TV is forced to pay around 50 bucks a month for cable because
Rogers convinced the government to pass law requiring that an antenna
attached to a building that can be accessed by more than one
residential unit must be owned by an entity holding a multi-million
dollar broadcasters licence.

A political lobby group sprung up in Toronto sprung up to try and
convince city council that antennas and satelite dishes were ugly and
ruining property values.  This group was created and funded by Rogers.

Traditional TV stations that have been purchased by Rogers are
threatened to be taken off the air and made cable only.  The only
reason CityTV and the Omni stations are still broadcast is because the
frequencies will be taken away from Rogers and given to someone else
if they aren't using them, and Rogers doesn't want someone else to
have them.

Local TV stations are having trouble making ends meet because their
signals are being stollen by Rogers and Bell for rebroadcast with the
commercials they sold being replaced by commercials that are
financially benefitting Rogers and Bell, not the broadcasting station.
 And they are being stollen.  The stations are not being financially
compensated for providing the content that Bel-gers makes money off
of.

Brent

On Tue, Feb 1, 2011 at 1:45 AM, R. Brent Clements <rbclemen at gmail.com> wrote:
> Factual basis for my statements?  None of this has passed the scrutiny
> required to be called a fact.  But consider these scenarios:
>
> "Billy, you can't google that author for your book report, because
> Microsoft released service pack 20 this month."
>
> Linux Distro Downloads?
>
> "Sally, you can't facebook grandma because your brother watched a porn clip"
>
> "What? what do you mean my computer has a spambot on it?"
>
> To put it simply, access to the internet is an oportunity for
> education not available in the past that can make us better as a
> nation.  At least a dozen times at work I have heard people arguing
> over some topic completely in error, that I have been able to fix with
> a quick google from my phone.  That has to be useful to our students.
> Let the learn when inspiration strikes them.  Not when bandwidth
> allows.
>
> Litterally thousands of musicians need people to stream their songs
> and videos from Youtube or their own websites in order to promote
> their shows.  Hell, Justin Bieber would still be a geeky kid from
> Stratford if it wasn't for teenage girls on youtube (ok, bad example)
>
> Skype has made it possible for families all over the world to see and
> hear eachother in new ways.
>
> Facebook continually consumes bandwidth if you leave the browser window open.
>
> Everything else aside, we pay too much for Internet.  If you make
> enough money that you are willing to pay a company that makes 16
> billion dollars profit a year more money to do the stuff everyone else
> in the world gets to do for far less than we already pay, then by all
> means go for it.  But I don't make that much money.  I never have.
> Neither do so many other Canadians.  The internet levels the playing
> field.  It allows friendships to foster between people who would never
> have spoken to each other before.  It provides us access to
> entertainment, culture, information, and knowledge quicker and more
> efficiently than any other technology or medium ever in our history.
> It provides oportunities for business and economic growth that would
> never have existed, let alone have been accessible to so many people.
> And it does this for everyone.  regardless of where you are, how well
> connected your family is, how mainstream acceptable your ideas may be.
>  There is room an opportunity for all.  One politically well connected
> entity in our society should not be allowed to stifle this community
> that is not theirs to begin with on the grounds that 16 billion
> dollars a year is not a high enough corporate profit.
>
> People make information available for free.  Other people provide
> wonderful services at reasonable prices.  If a musician posts music
> online, we should be listening to it.  If someone releases a
> groundbreaking new piece of software on Sourceforge, we should take
> the oportunity to access it?  I pay them for a connection to these
> services.  What right should the ISP have to a cut of that?
>
> As another example, I have never walked down Father David Bauer drive
> in Waterloo,  Probably never will.  Why should my tax dollars be used
> to maintain sidewalks on that street.  Should we put toll booths in
> every street, sidewalk, public path and mall corridor in Canada?
> Should we make every television in every home coin operated?  Should
> the gasoline industry decide where and when you can drive your car?
>
> The government owes us.  They should be required to step in not
> because Bell is charging too much money.  They should be required to
> step in because they allowed Bell and Rogers to sieze control of the
> mechanism that naturally tempers businesses like this--Freedom of
> Choice.  They have taken away our choices.  Every new option that has
> been made available to us has been taken away by them in the name of
> their profits.  And in this day and age we cannot deprive any child of
> oportunites to learn.  The internet provides those oportunities.  Sure
> there is lots of bad stuff, wrong stuff, and even dangerous stuff out
> there, but I won't deprive myself of a meal because something else in
> the fridge is moldy.
>
> Brent
>
>
> On Mon, Jan 31, 2011 at 7:38 PM,  <unsolicited at swiz.ca> wrote:
>> On Mon, 31 Jan 2011 20:41:44 +0000, rbclemen at gmail.com wrote:
>>> It is not in Bell's or Rogers best interest for Canadians to use the
>>> Internet. This move is a blatant attempt to make using the Internet
>>> undesirable. And that will have a tremendous impact on our society and
>> the
>>> ability for the less affluent to access the wealth of knowledge that the
>>> internet is full of.  It is an attack on our culture and our educational
>>> development in the name of, not increasing--but maintaining, corporate
>>> profits.
>>
>>> ... and the
>>> ability for the less affluent to access the wealth of knowledge that the
>>> internet is full of.
>>
>> That has to be a crock. If you take out streaming or torrents you won't go
>> over the cap, and you will incur no additional cost. (And you're already on
>> the lowest, or almost lowest tier service, capacity and speed, anyways.)
>>
>> What is the factual basis for your statements?
>>
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