Cogeco Unveils 50Mbps Tier > The Blood Letting for Consumers continues

The Blood Letting for Consumers continues

Do Canadian consumers actually not give a damn that they're getting hosed? This is depressing

They don't have a choice because they refuse to pressure the regulating bodies. Most canadians are apathetic.

There is some of that mashiki, but not entirely. What unfortunately is currently going on is that we are suffering from the effects of free enterprise. The same kind of problem that got AT&T split up all those years ago, where AT&T said "We're the phone company and we can do what we damned well please".

In the US, the regulators finally came along and told AT&T to dismember itself, which it did into the baby bells, which still maintained the "we're the phone company and do what we damned well please ... just to fewer subscribers". And now, like the Terminator, AT&T is reassembling itself to live again and continue the well known mantra "We're the phone company ..."

The problem right now in Canada is that we have had governments that want to promote free enterprise or corporate greed based capitalism, supposedly letting the corporations self regulate and let free market competition set the rules. As a result our regulators ... the CRTC are playing laissez faire and ignoring the telecommunications act, and the Competition Bureau who supposedly handle consumer protection and anticompetitive behaviour for corporations at this level are passing the buck to the CRTC.

So, the corporations get away with murder. The public is totally disillusioned with the lawmakers and the regulatory bodies who won't stand up to the corporations.

Standing up and complaining is utterly pointless.

Free enterprise? Where? You do realize it is government that made these companies as large as they are. Look up the word "subsidies". Keep yelling for more regulation and government intervention. It just means they will get more subsidies and perks to become bigger and bigger. Maybe even more ex Bell and Rogers employees well get to be members of the CRTC. Everyone here complains about no competition but don't understand how that came to be. Your comment is beyond absurd, there is nothing "laissez faire" of the current system. There is no free market capitalism in Canada. When the government created these monopolies in the first place what you have is corporate socialism, that's the system in Canada.

The companies became as large as they are because they were allowed to do so in the name of the free market.

Time after time, we see evidence of what happens when we open the door to a "free market". All those free market players in the US LD industry have vapourized. The VoIP industry rocks back and forth. The energy industry suffered Enron. GM's nearly bankrupt. Chrysler is now owned by Fiat because nobody can keep it afloat. Eastern Airlines bought and sold in pieces at the expense of the creditors while the owner sneaks away with millions.

Time after time self regulating industry fails itself due to greed.

The collapse of the banking industry in the US should show what is happening. Free market capitalism doesn't work due to people's greed. Our government is trying to recreate the US mess in Canada.

reply to sbrook

reply to Minimal
Actually if you look at the details of mergers, acquisitions, and policy making of Canadian broadband, you will quickly notice it was a lack of any real regulation that destroyed the small ISPs and eliminated competition for the big incumbents. Essentially the CRTC failed to follow its own rules and approved every decision, however questionable, requested by the incumbents.

Liberals tend to support socialistic policies. They do not support allowing big businesses to do whatever they please.

Honestly libertarians drive me nuts. Like rapid ultra conservative Christians they dogmatically follow an ideology without thinking of the realities around them.

If it weren't for the independents sucking away votes from the Democrats, Bush wouldn't have been elected in the first place.

Can you imagine how much better off we'd be if Al Gore, the creator of the internet and a staunch supporter of environmentalism, had been elected President?

We'd all be driving in sub-20k EVs right now and connecting to 100mbit/sec internet connections at home. Extremely idealistic, I know, but you get the point.

reply to sbrook
Free Enterprise is when businesses and individuals interact with themselves without ANY government involvement. The government only protects the companies and consumers with fundamental laws of property, privacy and contract.

The fact there is the CRTC proves that this is NOT a FREE Enterprise system which you blame. The problem is two part. One that we believe the people in government should control us and know what is better for the millions of people, the companies and their interactions. Secondly the government, preaching morals and fairness, actually does the opposite because it doesn't have a value system. We the customers vote with our dollars, they the government order business and consumers for possible kickbacks and bribes but are directly affected by any of these changes.

This is a moral and philosophical issue, and the people who believe in regulation or believe that we live in a free market are hypocrites, because they are free to put in regulations but do not allow others to do the same and choose for themselves.

It's that simple.

Without government interference the baby bells reconstituted themselves into AT&T. Without government regulation all industries would be consolidated, and we'd end up living in a world controlled by gigantic conglomerates who stifle innovation.

Changes would only occur every century or so through bloody revolution.

Hardly a paradise.

reply to JohnGaltExpress
That's what Free Enterprise SHOULD be, assuming that businesses and individuals act in a morally and socially acceptable manner. History has proven time after time that they do not. Corporations attempt to control the governance of the nation for their own ends.

I do agree with you JGE that the government preaching morals is like putting a wolf in the henhouse to guard the chickens, but at least we have the opportunity to CHANGE those in government. We have NO way to change those controlling corporations.

And yet government has shown itself to be so moral time and time again? You socialists amuse me in a twisted way, you claim to be against violence, and then put all your trust into organized violence known as government, the very organization that brought you the holocaust.

Some of us will remember, as worldwide economies continue to crumble, how you blamed those who do business on a voluntary basis. Yet you will give more power to the likes of whom are capable of genocide and world wars. I wonder if your family will be among the victims of your violent ideology?

hahaha ... that's a good one.

Why are worldwide economies crumbling? Because of the greed of corporations and individuals who are the same kinds of people who caused wars and genocides trying to dominate over others. It's no different.