Calgarypuck Forums - The Unofficial Calgary Flames Fan Community - View Single Post - Shaw Internet - Magical New Speeds and Lots-o-bandwidth, fickle geeks appeased

Graysdir · 01-24-2011, 12:31 PM

Hi,

I'm new here - Just thought I'd bring up a couple of key points:

The main petition is available at http://openmedia.ca/meter
It now has 40,000 signatures, but still needs more support. Please sign it, and forward to your friends, family, and co-workers.

According to the CEO of Teksavvy, it only costs 1-3 cents for an ISP to deliver data to a customer. Shaw is charging $2 per gb. I recognize there are other costs involved, but $2 per GB?!

Once the infrastructure is in place, it costs an ISP very little to send you data. We as Canadians paid for this infrastructure, and now they are charging us exorbitant fees to use it.

You should also know that just as Netflix arrived in Canada, Shaw began charging overage fees, and simultaneously (and quietly!) reduced ALL caps by approximately 33% without telling customers. If you are a Shaw customer, your caps were reduced. But they are willing to sell you back the usage they took away - for $2 per GB.

It is a conflict of interest to allow a TV broadcaster to also be an ISP. If Shaw TV is having issues competing with Netflix, then Shaw Internet simply implements VERY low usage caps, coupled with VERY high overage fees, and makes it cost prohibitive to access Netflix.

Our ISP should not be able to prevent our access to their own competitors.

We are using the internet for more and more each day:

* Work
* Telephone (Skype, Facetime, Magic Jack)
* Movies / TV Shows
* School / Research
* Web Surfing
* Purchasing & playing video games
* Web radio
* Online backups

Shaw Phone competes with Skype/Facetime/MagicJack. By implementing UBB, they prevent us from switching to their competition.

Shaw VOD, and Shaw Cable both compete with Netflix/Hulu/Web-TV. If you pay $8 per month for an Unlimited Netflix package, and you are already at your usage cap for the month, one HD Netflix movie is 4GB, so you pay Shaw an additional $8 PER MOVIE!

Shaw wants total and complete control over what you use the internet for; to ensure you use THEIR products and services, instead of those of their competitors. That is what UBB is all about.

Canada is the only country in the world moving towards UBB. All others have already moved towards unlimited usage, or are in the process of doing so - in order to promote technology.

Innovative services like Apple TV, Google TV, Netflix, Hulu, and iTunes will suffer; and if they are available in Canada, they won't be for long. If they were considering opening up business in Canada (ie: Hulu) they will reconsider now.

UBB will bring in hundreds of millions of dollars of extra revenue. Shaw claims this implementation of UBB is not financially motivated. This is, of course, ridiculous. After they reduced the caps even on the low-end packages, EVERYONE will be paying for every web page they read, and email they view.

In any event, hopefully my post will have been of interest to you. Please allow me to provide you with a few links to information that you may find useful:

This is a thread that explains how UBB affects the average user:
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r253...-Open-Internet

This is the mega-complaint thread regarding UBB/Shaw:
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r249...xtra-bandwidth

Thanks for listening, and allowing me to join your community.

01-24-2011, 12:31 PM	#141
Graysdir Draft Pick Join Date: Jan 2011	Further Information Hi, I'm new here - Just thought I'd bring up a couple of key points: The main petition is available at http://openmedia.ca/meter It now has 40,000 signatures, but still needs more support. Please sign it, and forward to your friends, family, and co-workers. According to the CEO of Teksavvy, it only costs 1-3 cents for an ISP to deliver data to a customer. Shaw is charging $2 per gb. I recognize there are other costs involved, but $2 per GB?! Once the infrastructure is in place, it costs an ISP very little to send you data. We as Canadians paid for this infrastructure, and now they are charging us exorbitant fees to use it. You should also know that just as Netflix arrived in Canada, Shaw began charging overage fees, and simultaneously (and quietly!) reduced ALL caps by approximately 33% without telling customers. If you are a Shaw customer, your caps were reduced. But they are willing to sell you back the usage they took away - for $2 per GB. It is a conflict of interest to allow a TV broadcaster to also be an ISP. If Shaw TV is having issues competing with Netflix, then Shaw Internet simply implements VERY low usage caps, coupled with VERY high overage fees, and makes it cost prohibitive to access Netflix. Our ISP should not be able to prevent our access to their own competitors. We are using the internet for more and more each day: * Work * Telephone (Skype, Facetime, Magic Jack) * Movies / TV Shows * School / Research * Web Surfing * Purchasing & playing video games * Web radio * Online backups Shaw Phone competes with Skype/Facetime/MagicJack. By implementing UBB, they prevent us from switching to their competition. Shaw VOD, and Shaw Cable both compete with Netflix/Hulu/Web-TV. If you pay $8 per month for an Unlimited Netflix package, and you are already at your usage cap for the month, one HD Netflix movie is 4GB, so you pay Shaw an additional $8 PER MOVIE! Shaw wants total and complete control over what you use the internet for; to ensure you use THEIR products and services, instead of those of their competitors. That is what UBB is all about. Canada is the only country in the world moving towards UBB. All others have already moved towards unlimited usage, or are in the process of doing so - in order to promote technology. Innovative services like Apple TV, Google TV, Netflix, Hulu, and iTunes will suffer; and if they are available in Canada, they won't be for long. If they were considering opening up business in Canada (ie: Hulu) they will reconsider now. UBB will bring in hundreds of millions of dollars of extra revenue. Shaw claims this implementation of UBB is not financially motivated. This is, of course, ridiculous. After they reduced the caps even on the low-end packages, EVERYONE will be paying for every web page they read, and email they view. In any event, hopefully my post will have been of interest to you. Please allow me to provide you with a few links to information that you may find useful: This is a thread that explains how UBB affects the average user: http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r253...-Open-Internet This is the mega-complaint thread regarding UBB/Shaw: http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r249...xtra-bandwidth Thanks for listening, and allowing me to join your community.