8 ms·

Meanwhile in Canada, internet prices trend upwards, and google fibre-esque offerings are nowhere to be seen.

by kennywinker 14y ago

shawnc 14y ago
pretty much exactly.
jrockway 14y ago
Startup opportunity?
- Permit 14y ago
  Part of the problem with Canada is that it's less dense than many other countries. Unless you already have serious financing, it's going to be very difficult to be able to pay for your own fiber lines. I imagine the regulation makes it tough to start your own Telco as well.
  - biomechanica 14y ago
    If I'm not mistaken, I think, at least in Ontario, there is a massive amount of dark fiber just laying around not being used.
    - toast0 14y ago
      Dark fiber tends not to be running to homes. The costly part is connecting a cable to each building. Equipment isn't cheap either, but that will probably change over time (and/or same cost expensive equipment will become more capable).
      - deleted 14y ago
        [deleted]
- calciphus 14y ago
  Not sure how Canada's laws are, but in the US it is heavily regulated. You can't just become an ISP, even if you could get the city to let you trench fiber. FCC licenses are heavily policed. We don't have duopolies in internet throughout most of the country by accident or because no one has noticed. It's because it's illegal to operate otherwise.
  - jrochkind1 14y ago
    Huh? You only need an FCC license for radio and other over-the-air, not for running fiber. I know people who have started local ISP's in the US (10+ years ago, not recently, because it's hard to get into the market now for business reasons) -- they needed no FCC license. Although, yes, by renting fiber from the teleco's not by running their own. But that's a capital issue, and a right-to-run-fiber-through-the-public-way issue (permission from muncipality, as you note), not an FCC issue. I'm not sure what you're referring to.
    - skyraider 14y ago
      A lot more than statutory law is at play here in the US: Court cases, regulations and states' implementations of the law matter greatly. Basically, there's often a tacit (or even explicit) understanding that the winner of a bid to supply cable or Internet services to a municipal area will have the exclusive right to do so (mainly, the service providers argue, to make the capital investment involved in supply said services worth it). There has been a long-running debate over whether or not last-mile networks and local cable are natural monopolies - i.e., whether or not it is most efficient for the industry to have a monopoly. If such services are public utilities with high capital costs, service providers might argue, they should have the exclusive rights to sales in an area. In fact, it got so bad that the Supreme Court said that municipalities could be guilty of antitrust violations if they explicitly gave monopoly power to such providers (see Community Communications Co. v. City of Boulder). So municipalities and service providers moved to implicit guarantees of monopoly - RFP processes that are hard for less-well-resourced companies to win, for example. [1] What I'd like to know is whether or not these implicit guarantees are still a problem. Some states (like North Carolina) set up a 'franchising' process for service providers to get the right to serve an area. So it's not always just about permission from the municipality. It might be about whether or not your state's equivalent of a franchising process is exclusive on the local level. For cable, North Carolina's is supposedly non-exclusive, though I wonder how many times Time Warner runs into trouble getting approve to serve an area, and whether they end up developing small natural monopolies in some locations. But regardless of whether or not those monopolies develop, you have to think about who gets to run lines on whose land. The fact is that the big companies have an easier time running lines for any data/media service (cable, Internet, etc) through easements and public areas. (This is the part some people refuse to believe. 'Oh, but anybody can purchase land!' Sure, but do you have the capital to do that, or does Time Warner?) A truly competitive market would involve setting up the infrastructure and having the public own that, instead of owning or operating actual ISPs, which, to any rational observer, constitutes unfair competition, even in light of the desperate need for competition in some markets. States and municipalities would hand out licenses to the infrastructure, not to the land. That'd be really cool, and possibly really efficient. [1] - http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa034.html http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa034.html (Good summary of the debate; pretty fair)
- w1ntermute 14y ago
  Wired telecoms is not exactly the first industry that would come to mind if someone were to mention startups. Maybe if you found a wireless way to do it? But even then, government regulation's a bitch.
- yuhong 14y ago
  I still remember the incumbents trying to impose the same low bandwidth caps to the independent ISPs that leased their lines via the CRTC. At the time the CRTC was pretty much corrupted by the incumbents, so it took the Cabinet overruling the CRTC for them to stop. The director ended up leaving, and it is much less corrupt now.
narcissus 14y ago
I don't know where you are, but believe it or not the competition between Eastlink and Bell Aliant FibreOp are making the market pretty good here in the Maritimes. I think, anyway. I pay $99/month for 50M/50M internet, phone and TV (with the movie network, a couple of extra 'networks' and the full home DVR). Admittedly, that's for 12 months, but I can renew at that price for another 24 months after that. If worse comes to worst I'll switch back to Eastlink. For now, though, it was worth switching just for getting Bell to run network cables throughout the house for me for nothing :)
- biomechanica 14y ago
  100$ a month for 50M/50M still seems pretty damn steep of a price to me; even with phone and tv. Especially compared to Google Fiber at 1G.
- kennywinker 14y ago
  Sounds a lot better than Vancouver. I'm paying $45/mo for 15 down 1 up, with a bandwidth usage cap. You literally can't get home internet for less than $40/mo, and the speed you get when you pay that is a joke.
  - pault 14y ago
    Here in Belize I pay $200/mo for 4Mbit cable that is usually closer to 1Mbit.
    - kennywinker 14y ago
      Gah, how dare you put things in perspective! I'm entitled to my feelings of outrage, dammit!
  - ROFISH 14y ago
    I live in the states, though admittedly not in a major city. (Tucson, AZ) It's $56/month + taxes for comparable and $42+taxes minimum, both with softcaps. I imagine that for many parts of the country outside of top 50 cities, the price of internet is the same.
goatforce5 14y ago
Bell introduced a $10/month unlimited bandwidth add-on to their Fibe packages a few days ago. That's effectively a discount for anyone who was already a mid/heavy bandwidth user: http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Bell-Canada-Offers-Unlimited-Data-122921?nocomment=1 http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Bell-Canada-Offers-Unlimi...

Meanwhile in Canada, internet prices trend upwards, and google fibre-esque offerings are nowhere to be seen.

shawnc 14y ago

pretty much exactly.

jrockway 14y ago

Startup opportunity?

Permit 14y ago
Part of the problem with Canada is that it's less dense than many other countries. Unless you already have serious financing, it's going to be very difficult to be able to pay for your own fiber lines. I imagine the regulation makes it tough to start your own Telco as well.
- biomechanica 14y ago
  If I'm not mistaken, I think, at least in Ontario, there is a massive amount of dark fiber just laying around not being used.
  - toast0 14y ago
    Dark fiber tends not to be running to homes. The costly part is connecting a cable to each building. Equipment isn't cheap either, but that will probably change over time (and/or same cost expensive equipment will become more capable).
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
calciphus 14y ago
Not sure how Canada's laws are, but in the US it is heavily regulated. You can't just become an ISP, even if you could get the city to let you trench fiber. FCC licenses are heavily policed. We don't have duopolies in internet throughout most of the country by accident or because no one has noticed. It's because it's illegal to operate otherwise.
- jrochkind1 14y ago
  Huh? You only need an FCC license for radio and other over-the-air, not for running fiber. I know people who have started local ISP's in the US (10+ years ago, not recently, because it's hard to get into the market now for business reasons) -- they needed no FCC license. Although, yes, by renting fiber from the teleco's not by running their own. But that's a capital issue, and a right-to-run-fiber-through-the-public-way issue (permission from muncipality, as you note), not an FCC issue. I'm not sure what you're referring to.
  - skyraider 14y ago
    A lot more than statutory law is at play here in the US: Court cases, regulations and states' implementations of the law matter greatly. Basically, there's often a tacit (or even explicit) understanding that the winner of a bid to supply cable or Internet services to a municipal area will have the exclusive right to do so (mainly, the service providers argue, to make the capital investment involved in supply said services worth it). There has been a long-running debate over whether or not last-mile networks and local cable are natural monopolies - i.e., whether or not it is most efficient for the industry to have a monopoly. If such services are public utilities with high capital costs, service providers might argue, they should have the exclusive rights to sales in an area. In fact, it got so bad that the Supreme Court said that municipalities could be guilty of antitrust violations if they explicitly gave monopoly power to such providers (see Community Communications Co. v. City of Boulder). So municipalities and service providers moved to implicit guarantees of monopoly - RFP processes that are hard for less-well-resourced companies to win, for example. [1] What I'd like to know is whether or not these implicit guarantees are still a problem. Some states (like North Carolina) set up a 'franchising' process for service providers to get the right to serve an area. So it's not always just about permission from the municipality. It might be about whether or not your state's equivalent of a franchising process is exclusive on the local level. For cable, North Carolina's is supposedly non-exclusive, though I wonder how many times Time Warner runs into trouble getting approve to serve an area, and whether they end up developing small natural monopolies in some locations. But regardless of whether or not those monopolies develop, you have to think about who gets to run lines on whose land. The fact is that the big companies have an easier time running lines for any data/media service (cable, Internet, etc) through easements and public areas. (This is the part some people refuse to believe. 'Oh, but anybody can purchase land!' Sure, but do you have the capital to do that, or does Time Warner?) A truly competitive market would involve setting up the infrastructure and having the public own that, instead of owning or operating actual ISPs, which, to any rational observer, constitutes unfair competition, even in light of the desperate need for competition in some markets. States and municipalities would hand out licenses to the infrastructure, not to the land. That'd be really cool, and possibly really efficient. [1] - http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa034.html http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa034.html (Good summary of the debate; pretty fair)
w1ntermute 14y ago
Wired telecoms is not exactly the first industry that would come to mind if someone were to mention startups. Maybe if you found a wireless way to do it? But even then, government regulation's a bitch.
yuhong 14y ago
I still remember the incumbents trying to impose the same low bandwidth caps to the independent ISPs that leased their lines via the CRTC. At the time the CRTC was pretty much corrupted by the incumbents, so it took the Cabinet overruling the CRTC for them to stop. The director ended up leaving, and it is much less corrupt now.

narcissus 14y ago

I don't know where you are, but believe it or not the competition between Eastlink and Bell Aliant FibreOp are making the market pretty good here in the Maritimes. I think, anyway. I pay $99/month for 50M/50M internet, phone and TV (with the movie network, a couple of extra 'networks' and the full home DVR). Admittedly, that's for 12 months, but I can renew at that price for another 24 months after that. If worse comes to worst I'll switch back to Eastlink. For now, though, it was worth switching just for getting Bell to run network cables throughout the house for me for nothing :)

biomechanica 14y ago
100$ a month for 50M/50M still seems pretty damn steep of a price to me; even with phone and tv. Especially compared to Google Fiber at 1G.
kennywinker 14y ago
Sounds a lot better than Vancouver. I'm paying $45/mo for 15 down 1 up, with a bandwidth usage cap. You literally can't get home internet for less than $40/mo, and the speed you get when you pay that is a joke.
- pault 14y ago
  Here in Belize I pay $200/mo for 4Mbit cable that is usually closer to 1Mbit.
  - kennywinker 14y ago
    Gah, how dare you put things in perspective! I'm entitled to my feelings of outrage, dammit!
- ROFISH 14y ago
  I live in the states, though admittedly not in a major city. (Tucson, AZ) It's $56/month + taxes for comparable and $42+taxes minimum, both with softcaps. I imagine that for many parts of the country outside of top 50 cities, the price of internet is the same.

goatforce5 14y ago

Bell introduced a $10/month unlimited bandwidth add-on to their Fibe packages a few days ago. That's effectively a discount for anyone who was already a mid/heavy bandwidth user: http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Bell-Canada-Offers-Unlimited-Data-122921?nocomment=1 http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Bell-Canada-Offers-Unlimi...