Wednesday, August 08, 2007

Cellular Backwater in Canada

Michael's post today took me to the National Post.

This took me to the NYT Editorial. Read it while you still can for free before the paywall goes up and Access Copyright tries to "tax" you for browsing and - heaven forbid - printing.....

The editorial decries the excessive restrictions and oligopolist rents earned by US cellular companies and the resulting gap in services and price compared to other nations.

The closed nature of America’s wireless networks is the main reason that its cellphone technology is so primitive compared with Europe’s and Japan’s. The F.C.C.’s new rules go part of the way to solve this, but unfortunately, American consumers have once again been denied a truly open and competitive cellular market.

Everyone knows that US cellular prices and technology are vastly better than in Canada.

So where does that put Canada....????

CRTC (Konrad von Finckenstein) and Competition Bureau (Sheridan Scott) - "please phone home" (for those who remember the long missing E.T.) That is if you can afford the roaming charge.

And what does that have to do with this blog?

Excess oligopoly verging on monopoly is strangling Canadian competitiveness. Canada's copyright policy is rapidly going in this direction, particularly with respect to collectives.

More on that to come.

HK






1 comment:

  1. I rented an 18th century apartment in Paris for a month which was equipped with incredibly high speed internet, VOIP, and internet TV. The internet service was unrestricted. I also took along an unlocked GSM phone and signed up for French cell phone service (Bouygues) which was very cheap and no charge for incoming calls of any kind, including data. Where I lived there were at least 8 cell phone stores within 5 minutes walking distance and they were extremely competitive. The French telecom market is very competitive and the services are more advanced than anything we can get in North America, especially Canada where Rogers and Bell are virtual monopolies.

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