jfmezei
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join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC
 ·ELECTRONICBOX
| Status of 2008-108 Throttling Review and Vary
Got this in the mail today:
The CRTC page for the file at:
»www.crtc.gc.ca/partvii/eng/2009/···7727.htm
(my submission had been files as the V42 * 7826 file, I assume they will combine with CAIP's submission).
========================================
29 May 2009 File No.: 8662-V42-200907826
8662-P8-200907727
BY E-MAIL
Mr. Tom Copeland
Chair
Canadian Association of Internet Providers
tom.copeland@caip.ca
Mr. John Lawford
Counsel for PIAC
lawford@piac.ca
MR. Jean-François Mezei
Vaxination Informatique
86 Harwood Gate
Beaconsfield QC H9W 3A3
jfmezei@vaxination.ca
Dear Sirs:
Re: Part VII Applications Requesting a Review and Vary of Telecom Decision
CRTC 2008-108
The Commission is in receipt of an application, dated 20 May 2009, made by Vaxination
Informatique (Vaxination) pursuant to Part VII of the CRTC Telecommunications Rules of
Procedure requesting that the Commission review and vary Telecom Decision
CRTC 2008-108, The Canadian Association of Internet Providers' application regarding
Bell Canada's traffic shaping of its wholesale Gateway Access Service, 20 November 2008
(Decision 2008-108).
The Commission is also in receipt of a Part VII application made by the Consumers’
Association of Canada, the Canadian Association of Internet Providers and a number of other
parties (CAIP et al.), dated 21 May 2009, also requesting that the Commission review and
vary Decision 2008-108.
In view of the similarity of the issues raised in these applications, these two applications will
be considered in one combined proceeding. Interested parties may file with the Commission,
serving a copy on Vaxination and CAIP et al., comments with regard to the issues raised in
these applications by 20 June 2009. Vaxination and CAIP et al. may provide their responses to these comments, serving a copy on all other parties, by 30 June 2009. Documents to be
filed and served in accordance with the above process are to be received, not merely sent, by
the dates indicated.
Commission staff notes that Vaxination has proposed that the cost studies requested by the
Commission in support of its consideration of Bell Canada Tariff Notice 7181 be made part
of this Part VII process. Commission staff considers that these cost studies do not relate to
the issues raised in this proceeding, and hence they will not form part of the record of this
proceeding.
Yours sincerely
Original signed by
Yvan Davidson
Senior Manager
Costing & Competitive Services |
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InvalidError
join:2008-02-03
·TekSavvy Solutions..
 ·Videotron
| said by jfmezei  :Commission staff notes that Vaxination has proposed that the cost studies requested by the Commission in support of its consideration of Bell Canada Tariff Notice 7181 be made part of this Part VII process. Commission staff considers that these cost studies do not relate to the issues raised in this proceeding, and hence they will not form part of the record of this proceeding. More proof that the CRTC is staffed by either morons or Bell sympathizers.
How is a cost study related to throttling any different than a cost study for UBB or providing ADSL2 to GAS? These are simply three facets of the same thing, they use the same infrastructure, wires, fibers and other facilities so all their costs are intrinsically linked to each other.
I guess this means we can look forward to the CRTC requesting separate cost study for each individual issue and with a 2+ month allowance each time, we will not be remotely close to seeing the end of this BS this year.
The CRTC needs to get its ass in gear, decisions made in geological time are incompatible with access to technology. The CRTC makes even the FCC look good. |
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jfmezei
Premium
join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC
·ELECTRONICBOX
| This may have to do more with process.
CRTC gave a june 30th deadline for comments on the R&V. The Cost study arrives July 10th.
By diassociating both, it allows the CRTC to proceed with this R&V without having to wait for the cost study.
My argument was that if ISPs are paying in full for bandwidth, then Bell should provision its network to provide said bandwidth without having any negative impact on others. And "paying in full" would be proven by the cost studies.
By the time the CRTC gets around to deciding on the R&V, they will have seen the cost study, and I suspect they alreaydy know that it will show that ISPs are paying in full for their bandwidth and then some. |
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Maynard G Krebs
@teksavvy.com
| reply to jfmezei
CRTC Special Edition Kneepads are now available in your favourite Telco / Cableco colours.
Sized to fit every CRTC Commissioner. |
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Angelo_
The Network Guy
Premium
join:2002-06-18
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| i'm not shocked JF
this is the wrong time to ask for a cost study.
Also what caip brought up the crtc currently has to look into as privacy issues should be their #1 concern. Theres been too many people fighting bell over this for this to go awa y now, it'll be interesting to see what happens when bell looses |
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jfmezei
Premium
join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC
·ELECTRONICBOX
| >this is the wrong time to ask for a cost study.
I update my submission hours before submitting it when I find out that the CRTC was asking for a cost study anyways.
All the issues are interrelated and come down to one simple issue:
increased average use by customer who will download more and more media-heavy files (aka: large files, angello, you, of all people, should know this). This is not very different from dial-up days when Bell's busy hour moved to the evening because of dial-up internet suddently changed average call duration and wrecked Bell's capacity models. Yet, Bell reacted by adding sufficient capacity to handle the load.
In the case of GAS, there are changing patterns from the old style HTTP only transactions that were short bursts with large amount sof iddle time while the user read the text page. Bell is reacting by preventing the changing patterms by throttling those who have evolved into new style of internet usage, this, despite ISPs paying for the capacity that is requyire to service the new generation of users.
Sympatico may have decided to not invest to support the new generation of internet usage. But some other ISP is willing to purchase the capacity needed to provide this service, Bell shouldn't be allowed to prevent this.
To this end, proving that GAS rates reflect the costs of providing the capacity that is being purchased is critical to show that Bell has no right to claim that GAS customers are using more than they are paying for.
The ultimate result should be that the CRTC forces Sympatico to buy GAS from Bell, or that the CRTC decide that GAS is a totally separate service from Sympatico and that Bell cannot be allowed to manage it in the same way.
In the later case, proving that GAS rates match or exceed the cost of providing the service means that Bell should be obligate to have sufficient capacity in its network to deleiver the purchased products.
If there is sufficient capacity, then usage within the bounds of what is being purchased should not negatively affect other users. |
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freejazz_RdJ
join:2009-03-10
| reply to jfmezei
I'll agree that cost studies don't really come into play in the R&V process since they had no part in the original proceeding... cost of the service wasn't discussed as a central claim.
I'm sure we'll be fascinated by the cost study analysis, but the costs themselves likely won't be public in order to protect the business, as we would expect. It could either be that they've been making obscene profits on the GAS service or that they've been making little if any profit. At the end of the day, if it isn't obscenely profitable and they can show growth in traffic and the corresponding growth in transport isn't being recouped by the GAS fees it would hurt the indie ISP's.
It's also important to remember that the transport of a GAS customer's traffic is more expensive than for a retail client. Not only because retail clients likely hit an IP-pop much closer to home, but because GAS clients require additional engineering/equipment/licensing that wouldn't be needed if wholesale didn't exist. |
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Maynard G Krebs
@teksavvy.com
| reply to jfmezei
said by jfmezei :...... This is not very different from dial-up days when Bell's busy hour moved to the evening because of dial-up internet suddently changed average call duration and wrecked Bell's capacity models. Yet, Bell reacted by adding sufficient capacity to handle the load. Absolutely correct.
Look at the timeline:
Independent ISP's corporately, and their users, experienced no capacity issues prior to August/November 2007 when Bell began to throttle Sympatico users.
It's not as if Sympatico users suddenly began to consume dramatically more bandwidth.
Then in the period between November 2007 - March 2008 when Bell began the stealth throttle of ISP GAS links, none of the independent ISP's were having any capacity issues on GAS except for their normal growth patterns - necessitating merely normal capacity planning on their part.
Subsequent to March 2008, Bell pulls back the curtain on their on-line movie store.
It's abundantly clear that what Bell was/is doing is attempting to discriminate against all by reserving bandwidth for paid content offered by one of their subsidiaries during the evening hours when the bulk of such content is typically viewed.
Bell could have run fiber from its movie store head-end to each CO to give themselves a dedicated pipe for their paid content, and bypassed the allegedly congested GAS-tariffed pipes (bought and paid for by independent ISP's), but they didn't. |
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jfmezei
Premium
join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC | reply to jfmezei
Update: The deadline for comments has been moved to June 22nd from June 20th (I had incorrectly stated 30th before).
CAIPetAl, as well as myself will have until July 2 for the final comments. |
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Angelo_
The Network Guy
Premium
join:2002-06-18 | theres no point for a cost study.. bell will just fudge the numbers. |
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mlerner
Premium
join:2000-11-25
Nepean, ON | They don't have to fudge the numbers, the CRTC will just accept it as is. |
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Angelo_
The Network Guy
Premium
join:2002-06-18
·TekSavvy Solutions..
| said by mlerner :They don't have to fudge the numbers, the CRTC will just accept it as is. LOL i somehow belive this |
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globus999
join:2008-05-15
|  reply to jfmezei
Yur missing the point. Look, it *IS* simple. When you are in a bureaucratic organization *AND* you fully respond to "superiors" in you chain of command, you *DO NOT*, under any circumstances, make your superiors look fool. Your job is NOT to fulfil your job description but to keep your bosses happy (call them the Telco/Government Industrial Complex - borrowing from Eisenhower). The simplest method of doing so, is to make the processes *SO* incomprehensible, *SO* intertwined, *SO* lengthy as to:
1 - Confuse the heck out of everybody
2 - Give rise to a gazillion questions that will clogg the minds
3 - More importantly: provide "plausible deniability" for the upper-ups, a series of layered CYI escape hatches for all and, if all fails, cover your own ass.
The issue of "cost studies" falls squarely within this tactic.
OF COURSE "cost studies" have no blinkig *RATIONAL* reason to be required for this. HOWEVER, they are perfect for steps 1, 2 and 3.
I said it before, continually, and I will say it again. We are *DOOMED*. The CRTC has been fully paid for in advance. We have no chance in HELL to get anything even close to fair decision out of them for the foreseeable future (aka, until hell freezes over).
My two cents. |
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jfmezei
Premium
join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC
·ELECTRONICBOX
| >The simplest method of doing so, is to make the processes *SO*
>incomprehensible, *SO* intertwined, *SO* lengthy as to:
Ah, but here, we have a case of a few people having gone through the text of the rules and procedures and found the way to challenge the CRTC decision. And having read the text myself, I can tell you that it really isn't that complicated. In fact, the Telecom Act is not very "legalese" and is quite readable by anyone who understands telecommunications.
For TN7181, Bell has essentially asked to double the rates by charging for both capacity and metered usage. It is part of the CRTC's bureaucratic duties to ask Bell to justify this significant increase in rates by proving that its costs to operate GAS have recently doubled.
But what the CRTC *really* needs to do is to step back and take a "big picture" look at all of what Bell is asking for and not wanting to give. Bell wants to thorttle, Bell wants to charge exhorbitant per gig rates, Bell doesn't want to give us access to modern DSLAMs, relegating us to unupgraded "legacy" equipment and network.
This does not lead to a competitive environment when Bell is rebuilding its last mile and not giving competitive access to it, yet, wants to throttle competitors who aren't even on the same network anymore.
Throttling is all about Bell being unable to provide the bandwidth that it sells to ISPs. This is due to insufficient investment in the GAS infrastructure. While some ISPs brag about all their GigE links, many others are still stuck with ancient ATM links because the COs they are attached to don't support GigE service yet.
In TN7181, Bell asks to double the rates, still throttle and not give increase in speeds. The text of the 7181 request mentions the acquired right to throttle thanks to 2008-108.
So, if the cost analysis shows that Bell gets sufficient revenus with the current structure and should have plenty of money to upgrade equipment to modern standards and provide the full bandwidth that is being purchased by ISPs, then there would not be any need to throttle the ISPs. |
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jfmezei
Premium
join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC
·ELECTRONICBOX
| reply to jfmezei
Just a heads-up.
The R&V for the GAS throttling 2008-108 decision has a deadline for comments coming this monday (22-Jun-2009 23:59:59.9999999997)
This deadline applies to both general comments as well as comments from interested parties such as Bell and probably other telcos, and folks like Sandvine.
Hopefully, there will be other independant ISPs who file something.
Unless the process changes, Bell will not have another say in the matter. So it will not have an opportunity to reply to yoiur comments if they appear after Bell has made its submission.
Unless the process changes, the 2 co-leaders (the CAIp group and myself) will then file separate submissions no later than July 2nd at 23:59:59.9999996 )
During the day on Monday, we should be getting email copies of the various submissions. |
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jfmezei
Premium
join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC
·ELECTRONICBOX
| Distributel has filed comments. Have not had the time to fully read them yet, but they support my (and that of CAIPs) applications. |
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diskace
Ebox Senior
Premium,VIP
join:2002-02-21 | Very good ! Thank you so much JF
--
Electronic Box Inc. |
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R0CKY
TSI Rocky
Premium,VIP
join:2005-05-19
Chatham, ON
| reply to jfmezei
Was a good submission by Distributel!
They're generally a very quiet group so I hope this gets recognized by the CRTC....
When someone normally works with the system "as is" until it finally has no choice but to speak up someone should ask why!
....this is one of those cases!
--
TSI Rocky - TekSavvy Solutions Inc.
Authorized TSI employee ( »TekSavvy FAQ »Official support in the forum )
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jfmezei
Premium
join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC
·ELECTRONICBOX
| reply to jfmezei
Bell's submission. (I created a .PDF from their proprietary microsoft document). |
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jfmezei
Premium
join:2007-01-03
Beaconsfield, QC
·ELECTRONICBOX
| Ok, after first read:
BASICALLY:
Bell doesn't really address the arguments of the 2 applicants, it argues that the R&V is not justified and that 2008-108 was legitimate and rightly gives Bell the right to thorttle.
There are a couple of areas where I can see Bell scroring a few points, but those can be challenged fairly easily.
This document is not very strong in my opinion, but it could be that Bell has already invited the CRTC commissioners to a number of golf tournaments and doesn't feel it necessary to write up documents. |
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