CRTC decision already having effect?
Last week, the CRTC released it’s initial net neutrality decision, which was quickly followed by a wide range of opinions, from pie-in-the-sky to “The sky is falling“. More reasonable responses suggested that the ruling wasn’t bad, and the head of a 3rd party ISP or two even said it was pretty good overall, with some problems.
That being said, one of the major issues was bandwidth throttling, and there were guidelines put in place that would restrict how and when ISPs could do so. Less than a week after the framework was announced, I’ve received emails from people who have noticed that their download speeds have “increased drastically” or “were going really fast”, and apparently not just a fluke.
Since this is more or less a work in progress, those interested in net neutrality should keep the pressure on…
Critics of the CRTC approach rightly note that the onus falls to consumers to compile evidence of traffic management practices that run afoul of the commission’s test and file complaints.
When asked about the issue last week in the House of Commons, Clement stated that he is “watching those providers very closely and I do not want to see a situation where consumers are put at risk in terms of their access to the Internet.”
He can go several steps further by asking the CRTC to conduct regular compliance audits of ISP traffic management practices and by providing financial support to consumer groups who wish to conduct their own investigations.
So true.
I think this is confirmation bias. I haven’t noticed any difference at all personally, and Geist’s article you linked to as support for it not being a fluke, doesn’t actually say any such thing; so it looks like the Star just slapped a very misleading headline on Geist’s text.
Continue full court press to sell the public a shit sandwich!! 8)
P.S. I have lost a lot of my respect for Geist in this affair. He even said ‘No throttling was never in the cards, anyway.’ Oh really, Geist?! You fooled me then, I’ve been reading your blog for no reason. Go away now.
The biggest problem with the CRTC ruling is that is IS merely a framework. Within that framework is some good and some bad, and very little set in stone.
I mention the anecdotal evidence because it was emailed to me. For example, one person, let’s call him ‘Gil’ said that his downloads were going ‘really fast’ now (something he hasn’t had since Bell implemented the throttling), and that was before he knew about the ruling.
I don’t know where you get the ‘selling a shit sandwich’, since my first post on it was middlin’ to say the least, and this one says people should still keep the pressure on.
Oh, I was reacting to the general echo chamber selling the shit sandwich, not really meaning to aim that directly at you. Sorry about how that sounded, but I am frustrated at the way everybody is talking about this ruling, and very disappointed with Michael Geist for folding so easily before what is so far no more than kabuki. He is reassuring everyone; we should not feel reassured. If anything, we should feel more uncertain about the future of our rights online than ever.
For what it’s worth, here’s my anecdote, regarding TekSavvy (which I was torrenting with yesterday in Brampton) and Rogers (which I am torrenting with tonight).
TekSavvy: no change whatsoever. Torrents even with thousands of seeds were maxing out at around 20-40KBps. It’s been like this for months and months.
Rogers: worse today than it has been in a long time. I’m downloading very popular TV shows here and getting no more than 12K each. On a Monday evening, it should be better than this even with the throttling.
I was the only one using either connection at the time.
Diude you totally must listen to the latest Search Engine podcast wherein Jesse Brown questions a CRTC commissioner and reveals him to be an utterly slippery slimeball who has obviously swallowed all of the ISP’s arguments but just doesn’t want to come out and say so.
The only thing this ruling gives us is a measure of ‘transparency’ which is completely useless in the extremely noncompetitive marketpace we have in Canada. This entire thing is a runaround fiasco; those who are saying otherwise have been taken in.
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/10/27/canadas-top-internet.html
I listened to the podcast, but will make a post about it this evening, before the Left 4 Dead 2 demo is activated.
Priorities and all, ya know. 🙂