Category Archives: Technology

| Media, Opinion, Technology

What is the basis for forcing big tech to pay for news?

Bill C-18, the Online News Act, aka “An Act respecting online communications platforms that make news content available to persons in Canada,” has been passed by the House of Commons and Senate and signed into law.

Now, finally, after desperate demands from Canada’s news media, big tech companies like Meta (Facebook) and Alphabet (Google) will be required to compensate them for use of their news content.

Except, no.

Instead, Meta has already announced that it will choose to block access to Canadian news content on its platforms (including Facebook and Instagram), as it said it would do when the bill was working its way through the legislature. Google has done the same after failed talks with the government. Both have already begun tests of how they would accomplish this, though it’s not entirely clear how they will implement such blocking when they go ahead with it.

On top of that, both have announced that they will end existing programs that help fund news media, including a Facebook deal with The Canadian Press and the Google News Showcase.

This clearly is not what the government or the news media want. Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez says the government needs to “stand up for Canadians against tech giants,” while just about every media outlet has issued a statement accusing Meta and Google of censorship.

But while politicians are pointing fingers at each other, perhaps it’s well past time to ask a very simple question:

Why does this law exist, exactly?

In other words, what problem is it trying to solve?

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| In the news, Technology

Emergency alerts will take a while to get right

For the few of you who don’t still have ringing in your ears from that annoying emergency alert sound, today was the second attempt at the first test of the wireless public alerting system in Canada.

Set for 1:55pm local time (2:55pm in Quebec), the alerts started in Newfoundland and Labrador and followed the time zones to B.C. and Yukon. I’ve compiled reports of those alerts in this Twitter thread:

Every province and territory (even Nunavut, which didn’t participate last time) successfully sent out an alert, but that doesn’t mean that everyone successfully got one. There a lot of moving parts to this process, and each one has to be working properly for the alerts to reach people’s TV screens and phones.

Today’s process involved the following steps and groups:

  • Coordination of the emergency alert test, by government agencies
  • Issuing of the emergency alert test by provincial and territorial emergency agencies
  • Distribution of the emergency alert test by the National Public Alerting System
  • Broadcast of the emergency alert test by wireless providers, television providers, mobile applications and television and radio stations
  • Reception of the emergency alert test by compatible set-top boxes and mobile devices

If any of those steps fail, the message doesn’t get through.

Continue reading →

| Technology

CRTC: Videotron’s Unlimited Music program is illegal

In a big step toward the principle of net neutrality, the CRTC today established policies about differential pricing of Internet data (both wireless and wired) and ruled that a Videotron promotion that offers free streaming of music from selected music streaming services is against the rules.

The Videotron promotion in question is called Unlimited Music, which it debuted in August 2015. And the way it worked was it reached agreements with several music providers like Spotify and Google Play and Apple Music and exempted that data from its data caps for premium data plans. People with those higher-end plans could stream as much music as they wanted and never worry about busting their data caps.

But even though just about anyone was invited to join the program, it wasn’t automatic. And radio stations were not invited to join in.

It took minutes for net neutrality advocates to say this was wrong. I literally came out of the press conference announcing it and was on the phone with the head of the Public Interest Advocacy Centre who immediately said it was against the rules. But it took a year and a half for the CRTC process to unfold to declare it so.

Videotron said at the time it believed that because it wasn’t giving undue preference to its own music service, that the program was legal. It was mistaken.

The CRTC’s decision not only makes Unlimited Music illegal, but any plan from any provider that treats data differently depending on where it’s going or what kind of data it is. So a plan that offered no data but free access to Facebook, or a plan that didn’t count email downloads toward the data cap, those are now illegal.

There are some exceptions. One is for administrative functions. If you’re checking with your provider how much data you’ve used up on your plan, that could be exempted from data charges. Another is for “content-agnostic” stuff, like charging different rates depending on different times of day. So long as everything on the Internet gets treated the same, it’s OK.

The commission also leaves the door open to other exceptions opening up, and providers applying for pre-approval of new ideas. CRTC staff tell me such applications would go through the usual application process.

Otherwise, the commission will use guidelines established in its policy to evaluate (after the fact, following complaints) whether a service or program is compliant. These include whether the pricing is offered only on certain data plans, whether any money exchanges hands with third parties, how exclusive the offer is for certain services or subscribers, and “impact on Internet openness and innovation.”

Under the CRTC’s analysis, Unlimited Music did not meet the criteria of agnostic treatment of data, lack of exclusivity, and lack of negative impact on Internet openness and innovation. And there were no exceptional circumstances to warrant an exception to the rules.

So Videotron has until July 19 to bring Unlimited Music into compliance with the rules. But there’s likely no way to do so, so expect it to be withdrawn.

To be clear, this decision relates to data pricing only. Promotions like Rogers offering free Spotify subscriptions to certain users are still legal. But Rogers must treat the data from Spotify like any other Internet data. It can’t exempt that data from its data caps. (And it doesn’t.)

UPDATE: Videotron says it’s disappointed in the decision, and will analyze it in the coming days to figure out how to respond. In the meantime, the Unlimited Music offer remains in effect until further notice, and it promises to keep subscribers up to date.

| Opinion, Technology

The entirely predictable result of Quebec’s gambling-website-blocking law is coming

Only minutes after it was spotted at the very end of Quebec’s 2015 budget document, the proposal to force Internet service providers to block illegal gambling websites was criticized as being unconstitutional.

In the months that followed, the bill to implement the measure was criticized, by opposition parties, by Internet providers, by public interest groups, by Michael Geist, and by anyone with even a basic understanding of constitutional law in Canada. (Though, strangely, not by some actual independent gambling sites.)

And yet, the government kept pushing the legislation along. During parliamentary committee hearings, Finance Minister Carlos Leitão assured everyone that they had their lawyers look into it and it would pass a challenge. This isn’t a telecommunications bill, he argued, it’s about gambling, consumer protection and health, which are provincial jurisdictions.

When Bill 74 was finally adopted at the National Assembly in May 2016, it was with both opposition parties noting the potential issues (which also included worries about the impact this would have on small ISPs).

The Public Interest Advocacy Centre wasted little time, applying to the CRTC to ask it to declare the bill’s website blocking elements unconstitutional. Meanwhile, the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association launched a challenge in Quebec Superior Court.

On Thursday, the CRTC responded to PIAC’s application, arguing that on the one hand the court case should settle the matter of whether the bill is constitutional, while on the other hand saying that blocking websites is against the federal Telecommunications Act and complying with a provincial law is not justification for doing so.

The CRTC has given parties 15 days to respond to its preliminary findings, and if it doesn’t change its mind, it will suspend the PIAC application until the court case is settled.

The law won’t be implemented until probably 2018 at the earliest because it will take a while for Loto-Québec to set up its end of the system. That should be enough time for the court to decide on this issue, assuming it doesn’t end up being appealed.

In the meantime, we can sit here and shake our heads at all the energy, time and money being wasted by the Quebec government, the CRTC, the court system, Internet providers, PIAC, Loto-Québec and others over provisions of a law that is obviously unconstitutional and probably wouldn’t work even if it wasn’t.

| In the news, Technology

Letting Loto-Quebec force ISPs to block websites may soon be a thing

This post has been updated with a court judgment. See below.

It was the very last thing in last year’s Quebec budget. Literally, on pages 616-618 of the 620-page budget document (the last two pages are blank): The government was going to create a law that will require Internet service providers to block illegal gambling websites based on a list provided by Loto-Québec:

A legislative amendment will be proposed to introduce an illegal website
filtering measure. In accordance with this measure, Internet service providers
will not be allowed to provide access to an online gaming and gambling
website whose name is on a list of websites that are to be blocked, drawn up
by Loto-Québec. This measure will be applied by the Régie des alcools, des
courses et des jeux, which should have the necessary resources to fulfil its
new responsibilities.

That was all the budget said about this measure. There were no further details given (except for the fact that it was based on a recommendation from a working group on gambling) and there was no legislation drafted yet to criticize. But various players caught on quickly to the potential slippery slope of Internet censorship, as well as the inevitable jurisdictional battle between the provincial government’s legislation of gambling and the federal government’s responsibility over telecommunications.

Fast-forward a year later, and as Quebecers get ready to receive the 2016-17 budget, several aspects of the previous one still haven’t been put into law.

Introduced in November, and currently working its way through the finance committee, Bill 74, called “An Act respecting mainly the implementation of certain provisions of the Budget Speech of 26 March 2015” has various provisions, including the one about Internet website blocking.

What the bill says

The text of the bill modifies Quebec’s Consumer Protection Act to insert the following clauses:

“TITLE III.4

“ONLINE GAMBLING

“260.33. For the purposes of this Title, “online gambling site” means
a website on which a person may make wagers and bets through an interactive
mechanism.

“260.34. An Internet service provider may not give access to an online
gambling site whose operation is not authorized under Québec law.

“260.35. The Société des loteries du Québec shall oversee the
accessibility of online gambling. It shall draw up a list of unauthorized online
gambling sites and provide the list to the Régie des alcools, des courses et des
jeux, which shall send it to Internet service providers by registered mail.
The receipt notice or, as the case may be, the delivery notice serves as proof
of notification.

“260.36. An Internet service provider that receives the list of unauthorized
online gambling sites in accordance with section 260.35 shall, within 30 days
after receiving the list, block access to those sites.

“260.37. If the Société des loteries du Québec becomes aware that an
Internet service provider is not complying with section 260.36, it shall report
the non-compliance to the Régie des alcools, des courses et des jeux.
In such a case, the Régie des alcools, des courses et des jeux shall send a
notice to the non-compliant Internet service provider and send a copy of the
notice to the Société des loteries du Québec.

“260.38. For the purposes of this Title, the Régie des alcools, des courses
et des jeux and the Société des loteries du Québec may enter into an agreement
on the frequency at which the list of unauthorized online gambling sites is to
be updated and sent and on any other terms relating to the carrying out of this
Title.”

It also changes the Act Respecting the Régie des alcools, des courses et des jeux, to give it authority over enforcing this law, and the Act Respecting the Société des loteries du Québec, to give Loto-Québec the responsibility to draw up the list of banned websites and investigate ISPs. The latter adds these provisions:

“17.1. The president and chief executive officer, or the person the
president and chief executive officer designates for that purpose, may investigate
any matter relating to the carrying out of Title III.4 of the Consumer Protection
Act (chapter P-40.1).

“17.2. The person who conducts an investigation under section 17.1 of
this Act cannot be prosecuted for acts performed in good faith in the exercise
of the functions of office.

An ISP failing to block a website within 30 days of getting a list from Loto-Québec (by registered mail) is added to the list of offences in the Consumer Protection Act, which makes that ISP liable for fines from $2,000 to $100,000, or twice that for a repeat conviction.

The bill also states that while the Consumer Protection Act is supervised by the Minister of Justice and the consumer protection office, the provisions regarding websites and gambling are supervised by the Régie des alcools, des courses et des jeux and Loto-Québec, under the Minister of Public Security. (Finance Minister Carlos Leitão explains that Loto-Québec informs the RACJ that a provider is noncompliant, and the latter does any legal action.)

The problems

As highlighted by Michael Geist and others, this legislation has serious issues, some of them legal and some practical. Among them:

  • Telecommunications are a federal responsibility, administered by the CRTC, not a provincial one. The legislation could be challenged on constitutional grounds.
  • Telecommunications regulations forbid ISPs from manipulating Internet traffic in this way.
  • The legislation forces ISPs to block people from doing something that is not illegal: viewing an online gambling website.
  • The slippery slope argument: Implementing this could lead to the government ordering the blocking of other websites it doesn’t like. (Major ISPs block sites that contain child pornography, but that’s an industry measure, and isn’t required by law.)
  • The motive for this legislation seems to be as much about protecting Loto-Québec’s revenue as it is about blocking an illegal and unwanted activity.
  • There seem to be few checks and balances to ensure that the websites listed by Loto-Québec deserve to be there. There’s no obvious appeals process.
  • Implementing a government blacklist of websites would cost a lot of money, particularly for small Internet providers. (Leitão dismissed those costs in December, saying “Je ne pense pas que ce soient des coûts énormes, là, c’est une question de mettre la «switch on and off»”. He then threw out a range of $100,000 to $500,000 for additional costs to ISPs, plus another $15-75,000 a year in maintenance costs, and said the government might be willing to subsidize the costs for smaller providers.)
  • There are technical means around such blocks. And someone interested in online gambling will probably make quick use of such measures.
  • Online gambling sites could get around the blocks by setting up new domains or new sites.
  • There could be issues when traffic crosses provincial borders. If I’m a Wind Mobile customer in Alberta and I walk into Quebec with my cellphone, is Wind suddenly obligated to abide by this Quebec law for data it sends to my phone, even though it doesn’t operate in Quebec? Or is that the responsibility of the network I’m roaming on?
  • Other measures might be just as effective without the censorship problem, such as making it illegal for credit card companies to process payments to illegal gambling sites (though there are ways around such problems as well).

The jurisdictional issue seems to be the most problematic, though a legal analysis of the bill points out that many issues cross jurisdictional lines, and a law that seems to involve the other government’s turf isn’t necessarily unconstitutional. Leitão told the committee he was confident the law would stand up to challenges, because of a “latitude” in enforcing provincial law against illegal gambling, but he said there was no formal legal opinion provided on it beyond the opinions of people in his department.

Opposition MNAs Nicolas Marceau (PQ), André Spénard (CAQ) and François Bonnardel (CAQ) grilled Leitão on these aspects of the bill during the committee hearings in December and February. And they’re not done yet. (Reading the transcripts of those hearings gives you a good appreciation for the value of opposition legislators, regardless of party, who give a critical eye to legislation even when they may be in agreement about the overall goal.)

Bonnardel, the MNA for Granby, was strongest in his opposition on legal and constitutional grounds:

Il y a un enjeu où on serait la première province, à ma connaissance au Canada, qui pourrait censurer la libre circulation sur Internet. Coudon, qui censure la libre circulation sur Internet? Cuba, la Corée, le Québec en 2016? M. le Président, mon collègue l’a mentionné, il y a 70 gros moyens, petits fournisseurs au Québec.

…

Mais au nom de quoi, aujourd’hui, on veut censurer la libre circulation? Tant qu’à faire, pourquoi ne pas bannir ou barrer les sites de pornographie juvénile, propagande islamique tant qu’à y être? On est rendus là.

There’s opposition outside the National Assembly as well. Even the Union des consommateurs, who would normally be all for increased consumer protections, has expressed reservations about this law.

In La Presse last month, columnist Stéphanie Grammond asked why the government was rushing this legislation through. Even though it’s been a year since the plan was announced, it seems clear the government hasn’t been doing a lot of reflecting about the unintended consequences of its proposal.

Maybe it would be a good time to start, once the finance department is done talking about this year’s budget.

UPDATE (April 3): The Canadian Press has a story about this proposed law. It includes a new justification from the Quebec government, that it has the authority to impose Internet censorship laws because problem gambling is a health issue and health is under provincial jurisdiction.

UPDATE (July 24, 2018): Quebec Superior Court has struck down this law as unconstitutional. The decision is here.

| Technology, TV

Videotron jumps onto Apple Watch bandwagon with kinda-useful Illico app

Illico Apple Watch app with shuffle function

Illico Apple Watch app with shuffle function

On Monday, I was among a half-dozen journalists invited to a demonstration of Videotron’s new Apple Watch application for the Illico digital TV system.

This app is, as far as anyone working for Videotron knows, the first of its kind. (Except for a similar one launched simultaneously by its main competitor.) It allows users with next-generation Illico TV terminals to control them using the watch. At least a little bit.

Jean-Pierre Gauvin, principal director of development and planning for Illico, said they wanted to start simple, and not try to replicate the features of the remote control onto a tiny watch app.

So instead, the app has two screens and two basic functions. The one the team seemed the most excited about was shuffle. By pressing a yellow button, the TV is commanded to pick a channel at random, from among those you subscribe to or from a preset list (sports, family, film, music, news, anglo, franco and HD only). It’s a function that doesn’t exist on other platforms, though the team is open to the idea of incorporating it if there’s client demand.

Mind you, when I asked about client demand for a shuffle function in the first place, they admitted there didn’t seem to be any.

Illico Apple Watch app with play/pause and skip functions.

Illico Apple Watch app with play/pause and skip functions.

The first screen of the app seems to me the one that will get the more use. It features play/pause button, and skip ahead/back buttons, similar to those that exist on remotes now.

I could see this actually getting use. For example, if you’re going to the kitchen and want to get something to eat, you can tap your watch to pause the TV.

But there’s a lot of stuff that’s missing from this app. There’s no way to tune to a specific channel directly. No record button. No channel up or down or volume adjustment function. No voice interaction. Nor can you actually watch video on the watch (not that too many people would want to do that). Even its main feature, the shuffle, can’t be set to a user-defined playlist.

Gauvin said they wanted to start with basic stuff, get the app out there, and then add new functions later. That’s fair.

“What’s important is hearing the feedback of our users,” he said. “We’re definitely going to add functionality.”

Videotron estimates it has maybe 1,000 or 1,500 users who have Apple Watches, so “it’s really for early adopters.” Those early adopters will expect a lot more functionality, and fast.

And they might get annoyed by the fact that what little functionality is there is buggy. The demonstration got off to a rough start when it seemed the watch lost its connection to the phone and didn’t work. Tapping the shuffle button often didn’t work, requiring another tap before it would change the channel. And despite their claims of instantaneous reaction, most of the time it took about a second for the tap to result in a change on the screen. The fact that the signal travels from the watch to the phone via Bluetooth, then from the phone to Videotron via WiFi/cable, then to the box through the Videotron network, explains the delay, but probably won’t satisfy users much.

I’ve yet to be convinced that the Apple Watch is anything but an expensive gimmick, but if you have one and you’re a Videotron subscriber with a compatible terminal, there’s no reason not to add this app.

The Illico Apple Watch app is available by updating the Illico app for iPhone in the Apple store.

Asked why this was developed for the Apple Watch and not other Android-based smart watches (such as the Samsung Gear), Gauvin explained that the closed Apple environment made development and testing easier. They’re looking at creating a similar app for Android.

See also

| Opinion, Technology

Cooperation, not acquisition, might be better option for Quebecor

Put simply: Under the right conditions we are ready, willing and able to become
Canada’s fourth wireless competitor.

With that statement two months ago, new Quebecor CEO Pierre Dion launched a campaign to create fertile ground for his company to expand its wireless operation nationally, and become the fourth national wireless player that the Conservative government has been so desperate to see arrive.

Quebecor’s main issue is roaming — the fees it has to pay other carriers when its subscribers use their networks. Until it can build a national network that rivals those of the Big Three in coverage (something that would take several billion dollars to do), it would have to offer its subscribers access to someone else’s network, and at fees that would still allow it to undercut those networks’ operators on prices.

The CRTC is holding a public hearing in September on wholesale wireless services that should address this issue. The commission will try to determine if the market is sufficiently competitive and if not, what it can do to fix that. Quebecor would like low, regulated wireless wholesale rates, particularly for data. Bell, Telus and Rogers, needless to say, aren’t in favour.

And just two weeks ago the commission slapped Rogers on the wrist for exclusive roaming deals that it determined were anti-competitive.

Quebecor’s hand

At the moment, Quebecor’s network covers populated areas of Quebec and the National Capital Region. It also has a deal with Rogers that allows Videotron customers to use Rogers’s network where necessary. A year ago, the companies signed a 20-year agreement to build a shared wireless LTE network in Videotron’s existing territory.

The thought of Videotron becoming a national player took off in February after it purchased licenses in Quebec, Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia for $233 million. Because the big three were limited in the amount of spectrum they could buy, and new players like Wind and Mobilicity didn’t have the financial means to spend that kind of money, Videotron got a deal it simply couldn’t pass up. The licences could be worth a lot more than that, even with the limitation that they can’t be sold to Bell, Rogers or Telus.

The rest of Canada is split up between other regional players: MTS in Manitoba, SaskTel in Saskatchewan, and Eastlink in Atlantic Canada and Northern Ontario. They also got good deals on spectrum because those frequencies were reserved for smaller players.

So even if Videotron wanted to become a national player, it would need to team up either with one of the big three or all of these smaller providers. Plus building out networks in Ontario, B.C. and Alberta.

It has been suggested very openly that Videotron would be interested in buying either Wind Mobile or Mobilicity (or both) to instantly get a foothold in Ontario, B.C. and Alberta. This is important because next March will see another spectrum auction from Industry Canada, and its rules reserve licences for operators other than the Big Three that are already operating in those territories. Unless Videotron sets up its network in the next six months, it’s bidding potential is limited. But acquire Wind and/or Mobilicity, neither of which have the capacity to participate in the auction, and Videotron can make another government-assisted investment.

Except Videotron doesn’t have enough cash for such an acquisition. So it would need some source of money to step up to help it. And the clock is ticking.

Politics

But spectrum licenses and cash aren’t the only impediments to Videotron’s wireless expansion. Even if it develops a decent network, Videotron has no other infrastructure in the rest of Canada. It can’t bundle wireless with cable TV and Internet like it does in Quebec. It can’t leverage its brand, or set up Videotron corners in Archambault shops in the rest of Canada.

And then there’s the politics. Pierre Karl Péladeau is still the controlling shareholder of Quebecor and Videotron. And he’s not willing to put his stake in a blind trust until he becomes a minister (and even then it would come with an order not to sell the company). So the federal government’s best hope for a company that would give a shot in the arm to competition in wireless is one owned by a devoted separatist. It’s not exactly the kind of company the government would want to bend backwards to help. And that’s saying nothing about consumers who might see switching to Videotron as tantamount to funding Quebec separation.

Cooperation

But maybe there’s another way. What if, instead of buying Wind and Mobilicity outright, it partnered with one or both, giving them enough cash to participate in the March auction and allowing their subscribers to use each other’s networks seamlessly? For that matter, why not do the same with MTS, SaskTel and Eastlink? Imagine a national wireless player made up of regional players, all with the same problem of national roaming. It would take less cash than one company gobbling up the others, and avoids the problem of having to deal with Quebecor’s not-so-great brand outside of Quebec.

There are other possibilities, too. Shaw, which is active in B.C. and Alberta and has a lot of money but doesn’t have a wireless network, could become involved, and partner with Wind or Mobilicity or Videotron to offer a wireless service they could bundle.

Perhaps it’s just pie-in-the-sky dreaming, and I’m sure people will point out a bunch of practical problems with these ideas that would make them unrealistic. But if Ottawa really wants a fourth wireless player (even though experience in other countries suggest the market might not be able to support more than three), this sounds to me like a way to get there.

Of course, it would require Quebecor playing nice with others and swallowing a lot of humble pie.

| Technology, TV

Videotron finally joins the iPhone club

One of many ads in Saturday papers announcing Videotron's introduction of the iPhone.

One of many ads in Saturday papers announcing Videotron’s introduction of the iPhone.

Three and a half years after launching its mobile network, Videotron has finally solved its biggest issue: Until now, you couldn’t get a plan with an iPhone.

At first, the problem was technological. The frequency spectrum Videotron acquired in the 2008 auction was in the 1700 MHz band (called the Advanced Wireless Services band), and the iPhone wasn’t compatible with that band. It wasn’t just an issue for Videotron — it also prevented the iPhone from being compatible with the T-Mobile network south of the border.

That changed last year, when Apple introduced a model of the iPhone 5 that was compatible with AWS and the T-Mobile and Videotron networks. By last fall, people could get their hands on an iPhone 5 and by adding a Videotron SIM card make it compatible with the carrier’s network.

After that, the issue stopped being a technological one and started being a legal one. Videotron didn’t have a deal to sell the iPhone, so the best it could do was encourage people to buy it at Apple stores and install a Videotron SIM card themselves.

A couple of weeks ago, in a brief and understated email (whose contents were strictly regulated by the terms of the deal between Videotron and Apple), the company announced it would start selling iPhones on March 28. On March 29, full-page ads came out in all the papers announcing the iPhone 5s was now available at Videotron retail outlets.

Not only does this mean that Videotron can join the big guys, but also that it can stop pretending that non-Apple products are just as good as Apple ones. Without the iPhone, Videotron pushed Android apps and devices, including the Google Nexus One, which was the hot new thing when the network launched. Parent company Quebecor did its best to wipe the iPhone out of its universe, even going so far as to push producers of fictional shows on TVA to replace characters’ iPhones with Android devices (Quebecor downplayed this as something similar to product placement).

All the while, it remained impatient, hoping that Apple would soon deem Videotron worthy of inclusion.

Illico TV app now available

On Monday Tuesday, Videotron will announce that the Illico TV app is available for iPhone users. The application allows subscribers to Videotron’s television service to access live TV channels and free video-on-demand shows on their iPhones. And for the most part, they can do this regardless of who their carrier is.

Using the app, which was added to the Apple app store on Friday, requires authenticating with Videotron to prove that you’re a Videotron cable TV customer, which gives you access to channels you subscribe to, including a bunch of live channel feeds.

One exception to the rule is RDS, which is the most expensive channel to get the rights to. You can access RDS’s live feed, including Canadiens games, only if you’re also a Videotron mobile customer as well. This is the result of the rights agreement between Videotron and RDS (owned by Bell Media). RDS sells its mobile rights through the mobile carriers.

Videotron’s iPhone app doesn’t allow purchases, so you can’t buy video-on-demand movies. The reason for this is simple math: Apple’s required percentage take of in-app purchases is so high (30%), that Videotron can’t make any money selling content this way.

The Illico Club Unlimited subscription video-on-demand service is also not available yet on the iPhone app.

New prices

Something that’s already making headlines is the prices that Videotron is using to sell them. Videotron is offering unlimited calling and 4GB data for $75 a month, while the Big Three are offering $110 a month for the same plans. Additionally, it’s offering the iPhone at an almost $500 discount for a 24-month plan. That means more than $20 a month of your iPhone plan with Videotron will be going just to pay off the discount you got for your device.

It’s almost as if Videotron has been waiting for this day for years.

| In the news, Technology

Could Videotron become a national wireless company? Maybe

In what a lot of people said was a huge surprise (but was actually predicted by plenty), the end of the 700MHz wireless spectrum auction showed that Videotron bought licenses covering Canada’s four largest provinces, and everyone now assumes the company will go national, becoming that fourth big player that the government and unsatisfied Canadian cellphone customers have been hoping for.

Quebecor is forbidden by the spectrum auction rules from commenting on its future plans in order to preserve the integrity of the process and avoid collusion between bidders. So all we have from them is their press release on the subject. It includes these quotes from CEO Robert Dépatie:

“With the high-quality frequencies acquired in this auction, Videotron is now well-equipped to develop its network in the years to come and to continue offering its customers the best in wireless technology.”

“Given the way the auction unfolded, Quebecor Media could not pass up the opportunity to invest in licences of such great intrinsic value in the rest of Canada,” said Mr. Dépatie. “We now have a number of options available to us to maximize the value of our investment.”

Read into that what you will.

Continue reading →

| Opinion, Technology

28 people who were joking about America turning 2,013 years old

It’s amazing how much of journalism these days consists of someone searching for something on Twitter and then being shocked at finding that thing that’s being searched for.

On Thursday, a few people had the bright idea to search for people who posted on Twitter that the United States turned 2,013 years old on July 4. Of course that’s ridiculous and a sign that the U.S. education system has failed miserably.

Or maybe they were all kidding. Don’t bother checking that, just publish and shame! It doesn’t matter how young they are, they must be ridiculed, post haste!

Here’s a post on something called Twitchy that lists “30 people who say America turned 2,013 years old today.” Wow, those people all sound super stupid.

But let’s go through them one by one, shall we?

Continue reading →

| Media, Technology

TUM TUM TUM TUM, TUM TUM TUM TUM TUM!

TUM pager

In our office, there are a few relics of the pre-Internet era, including pagers similar to the one pictured here. They’re called TUMs, which stand for téléavertisseur d’urgence médiatique. The idea is actually pretty smart, if antiquated: Quebec media are assigned these devices, and all emergency services, whether SQ or local police or fire departments or Transport Quebec or transit agencies, can send short messages about emergency events to everyone at the same time. The messages, written in all-caps, will alert the media to a breaking story, say where it’s happening and give a phone number to call for more information. They even have codes, “rouge” for deaths or life-threatening events, “jaune” for major events that are not life-threatening, and “vert” for information that usually doesn’t relate to an emergency. (You can find the full instructions on its use here)

As the Internet has taken on a larger role, the system has shown its age, and emergency services don’t seem to use it very reliably. So reporters call them up anyway at regular intervals to ask what’s up.

Recently, the group behind this system started emailing those alerts out to journalists using a distribution list. (They’re also on Twitter.) The messages are identical (even still being in all-caps), but email is more reliable, because you don’t forget where you put your email or realize three days later that its battery is dead.

At 1:22pm on Wednesday, an alert went out that said this:

SPVM JAUNE COLIS SUSPECT AU CUSM NON FONDE INFO 514-280-2777

This alerts journalists that a suspicious package found at the MUHC construction site was, in fact, a false alarm.

Two minutes later, journalist Maxime Deland of QMI did a reply-all to the message, apparently accidentally, saying “Je m’occupe de la mise à jour du txt.” Clearly a message that was supposed to be internal to QMI. Except, because it was replied to both the sending address and the receiving one, it went through the distribution list. Which is fine because that list is only one email address.

Normally, a distribution list like this would have protections so that only authorized messages would be sent out. A list run by emergency services that goes out to journalists you’d think would be very concerned about such security. But apparently this one allows any email (or any email from a list member) to be sent through the list to everyone else on it.

You can imagine what happens next: Three minutes later, a Reuters journalist says “Please take my name off these messages.” Ten minutes later, one from Le Droit: “Moi aussi SVP. Je suis en Outaouais… Veuillez me retirer de votre liste d’envois.” Two minutes after that: “Moi aussi svp. Je suis à Québec.”

By 2:12pm (the messages abruptly stop at that point), I count 38 messages sent to this list, including about half a dozen reply-all messages asking people to stop doing reply-alls, a few jokes about how technologically illiterate we all are, and one reply from CJAD asking to ignore a previous reply from CJAD asking to remove it from the distribution list.

Annoying as hell for a bunch of journalists, but for most it gives them something to talk to each other about around the water cooler. (Do they still have water coolers?)

| In the news, My articles, Technology

CRTC’s Wireless Code vs. Quebec’s Bill 60

On Monday morning, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission issued its final Wireless Code, a set of rules all wireless service providers in Canada have to abide by. I was curious how this code compares to the rules the Quebec government put into place in 2009 that similarly protect consumers in cellphone (and other) service contracts.

The result is this story in The Gazette, which appears in Wednesday’s paper. It lists point by point the provisions of both. In general, they’re very similar in terms of how cancellation fees are calculated, how major elements of contracts can’t be changed unilaterally, and how renewals are done. Bill 60 also includes a prohibition on late-payment fees or additional fees for pay-as-you-go services. But most of the advantage for the consumer is in the CRTC’s code, which specifically deals with wireless service. It includes a de facto two-year maximum on contracts, a 15-day trial period, a right to unlock phones, notification of data roaming and caps on data overage and data roaming fees.

You can read the CRTC’s decision here setting the Wireless Code into place and explaining its reasoning. Quebec’s Bill 60 became law in 2009, and the text of it is here (PDF).

The Wireless Code comes into effect with contracts signed on or after Dec. 2, though providers can start applying the new rules to new contracts as soon as they’re drawn up. Since it’s not really in their interest for people to wait, I would expect the code’s provisions to be in new contracts by the major wireless companies before then.

If your main concern is contract length, by the way, you can go ahead and sign now. As of two years from now, all contracts must comply with the code, which means in two years you won’t have a cancellation fee, even if your contract right now says you will.

How will this be paid for?

The big question now is how these changes (particularly contract length) will be reflected in the marketplace. Having phones subsidized over two years instead of three will mean one of three things:

  1. Higher prices for new handsets. I’m guessing this is the most likely option. Instead of getting, say, a $360 subsidy on a phone, which works out to $10 a month for 36 months, the subsidy might only be $240, which means the phone will be $120 more expensive. Expect fewer $0 smartphones.
  2. Higher monthly rates. If subsidies are done over two years instead of three, then they have to be 50% higher on a monthly basis. So that $10 a month subsidy now has to be $15 a month if the total subsidy is the same. But in my experience there hasn’t been much flexibility in monthly pricing based on device subsidy, and monthly fees have much more competitive pressure than initial handset cost. Prices might inch up slowly, but only if all the major providers agree their profit margin at the lower price is unsustainable.
  3. Lower profits. Yeah, go ahead and laugh. But wireless providers make decisions all the time that result in lower profits, hoping that they might result in higher profits down the road. Acquiring new customers has a large price to it (beyond just the phone subsidy), but if you can lock them in for three years or longer, you’ll make much of that money back. Reducing the contract to two years will mean less time to recoup this acquisition cost. We may see an effect on the bottom line here.

Because, in two years from now, all contracts will have to have zero-fee cancellation after two years, expect new handset costs to go up quickly. Which means even though it sounds like it might be a good idea to wait until December, now might actually be the best time to get a new phone.

| Media, Technology, Video, West Island

“A credible delivery system”

It’s never not awkward selling yourself. It feels so vain, so self-important. And at times it can feel like you’re kidding yourself, giving yourself too much credit for minor accomplishments.

I take the humble route. When people praise me and my blog, I pretend they’re exaggerating. (But deep down we all know this is the greatest blog to have ever graced the Internet. Right?)

Anyway, I stumbled upon a YouTube channel in which some local radio people are selling themselves like they’re on an awkward video dating service. I don’t want to make them feel too embarrassed about it, but it’s too funny not to post:

Sharman Yarnell

Peter Anthony Holder

Andrew Peplowski (see him in action selling a USB drive)

The videos were done by KEMEdia, a West Island video production house run by Mike Reid, who judging from the website is trapped in the late 1990s.

(Note to KEMEdia: If you’re selling people as voice-over talent and yourself as a video production house, maybe don’t have their pitch videos done in the echo chamber of doom.)

| Montreal, Technology, TV

Colba.Net applies to expand IPTV to major cities in Quebec and Ontario

Colba.Net's proposed IPTV service area in greater Montreal - the green zone has already been approved by the CRTC

Colba.Net, the Montreal-based independent telecom provider, has applied to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission for permission to expand its new IPTV service to greater Montreal, including the south shore, St. Jean sur Richelieu, Châteauguay, Île Perrot, Vaudreuil, Valleyfield, Laval, the north shore and St. Jérôme.

It’s also looking to setup service in Granby, Sherbrooke/Magog, Sorel/Tracy, Joliette, Trois-Rivières, and the greater Quebec City/Lévis area. You can see maps of those proposed service areas on its website.

In a separate application, Colba.Net is also looking to introduce IPTV to the National Capital Region (Ottawa/Gatineau) and cities in Ontario, including:

  • Barrie
  • Orilla
  • Peterborough
  • Benneville Belleville
  • Kingston
  • The Greater Toronto Area from Oshawa to Newmarket to Hamilton
  • London
  • Stratford
  • Brantford
  • Kitchener
  • Niagara Falls

Again, Colba.Net helpfully provides maps on its website.

Colba.Net launched its IPTV service in Montreal in December, after having received CRTC approval for a network covering the island in October 2010. But it’s still in its infancy. It’s only available downtown, on the Plateau and in Westmount, and it offers only 28 channels, four of which are in HD. Even popular cable channels like CBC News Network, LCN, Discovery Channel and Space are listed as “available soon”.

But the proposed programming grid for Quebec lists just about every cable channel any Canadian could have access to. It’s essentially the same as Bell’s Fibe TV service, including Bell’s community channel, Bell video on demand and Bell pay-per-view. The grid for Ontario is similar. Both would notably take their U.S. network stations from Detroit (and Rochester, N.Y., for Fox) instead of Montreal’s usual Burlington/Plattsburgh.

The technology used is similar to Bell’s Fibe service, and will use ADSL2+ and VDSL2 to squeeze voice, Internet and television data through twisted-pair phone line.

According to the CRTC application, the IPTV service would cost $24.95 per month for base service (which would include mandatory channels, U.S. networks and a few non-mandatory channels like MuchMusic, CMT, YTV and CTV News Channel), plus a $75 installation fee. The service currently costs $34.95 a month, but when bundled with voice and Internet that comes down to $19.95 a month. Service also requires a special router at $109.95 and a set-top box for $149.95.

The application doesn’t specify how many channels would be available in high definition.

Plenty of Montrealers like to use third-party resellers for Internet and phone service, but the lack of alternatives to Bell, Videotron and Shaw when it comes to TV service is a major deterrent to switching. If Colba.Net can offer a competitive television service with as many channels available (including high-definition channels) for a reasonable price, that might be enough to get many people upset with the big players’ prices or poor customer service to switch over.

UPDATE (April 15): Colba.Net has applied yet again to expand its IPTV service, to major cities in every province but Prince Edward Island. Applications can be consulted here:

| Opinion, Radio, Technology

Technology is abandoning AM radio

The only portable AM radio I could find at a huge electronics store - a $10 radio with analog tuner

I did some Boxing Week shopping Thursday night. Despite the cold, I went wandering for about three hours around various stores, though for the first time in years I didn’t have any big-money purchases in mind.

One thing I had been looking for was a portable device capable of receiving AM radio. Ideally it would have had a digital tuner, an antenna of some sort and an internal memory capable of recording the radio. As someone who writes about radio a lot, it helps to be able to record as well as listen.

But going through the aisles of iPods and other MP3 players at Future Shop and Best Buy, I discovered that such a device does not exist. Well, actually, it does, but it’s kind of expensive and you can’t buy it in one of these stores.

In the end, I bought the radio you see above, a Dynex (read: cheap as hell) FM/AM pocket radio. It has an analog tuner and cheap plastic parts (and obviously no recording capability), but it has an antenna and a headphone jack, and though it’s a bit noisy it receives CJAD and CKGM.

It used to be, even as little as a decade ago, that no one in their right mind would try to sell something as a “radio” and not include one of the two bands. But as portable CD players were replaced by smaller MP3 players with lower power demands and no moving parts, FM has become less of a priority and AM has been all but abandoned.

A portable CD player sports a ferrite bar AM antenna (left) about 4cm long and 3mm thick.

There are a few technical reasons for this. For one, because the AM band is at a much lower frequency than FM (centred around 1 MHz vs. around 100 MHz), the antenna has to be much longer. For older portable devices (like my old CD player pictured above), this is accomplished by coiling a long antenna inside the device. Ideally it would be strung out in a straight line for maximum reception, but coiling it is a compromise that works here, though its reception isn’t as good and it’s highly directional (which is why the angle at which you’re holding a portable AM radio affects its reception).

In smaller devices, such an antenna – about the size of a AAA battery – becomes prohibitively large. Smartphones and iPods don’t even have room for that AAA battery, much less an antenna for what has become a secondary function. For FM reception, portable devices ingeniously use the headphone cord for an antenna, but that doesn’t work for AM.

In addition to the size of the antenna, AM radio is more susceptible to interference, requiring even more electronic real estate being used for filtering and amplifying.

"AM RF IN" marks where the AM antenna connects to the circuit board ("RF" means "radio frequency")

And then there’s the simple matter of demand. Music stations long ago moved from AM to FM, as has CBC and Radio-Canada in Montreal. We’re left with only three large commercial AM stations (CKAC 730, CJAD 800 and CKGM 990) and a handful of smaller AM stations that would be very difficult to capture with a portable antenna anyway.

That’s about to change. The CRTC recently awarded two new frequencies (the previously dormant 690 and 940 kHz), and two new AM stations will be on the air at some point in 2012. Two others, who lost in the bidding for those frequencies, may also reapply for other vacant frequencies. By the end of 2013 we could have four new high-power AM radio stations in Montreal, at a time when most broadcasters have all but abandoned the band.

But can these stations survive if there’s nobody left who can listen to them? It’s not just iPods and smartphones. Even larger desktop alarm clock radios have started to abandon AM in favour of iPod connections. Unless a device’s main function is broadcast radio, you’re much less likely to find AM on it. And people like multifunction devices.

The one big thing keeping AM alive is the same thing keeping most radio alive: cars, which are so large there’s no need to worry about space for an antenna. Entertainment for drivers obviously can’t be visual in nature, so radio has become the perfect source for them. And radio has responded in kind by catering to drivers, focusing on rush-hour programming and having regular reports on traffic.

The industry has also responded by offering online streaming as an option, via apps for iPhones or other smartphones. Rather than capture a noisy signal through the air with a big antenna, smartphones can download a high-quality audio stream through the cell network they already use for phone calls and checking their Facebook.

But switching to the Web opens up these broadcasters to competition from all over the world. For people who don’t care as much about local content, there is a seemingly infinite choice of things to listen to.

Five years ago, when asked by Forbes about why its MP3 players didn’t have AM radio, a representative of SanDisk explained the technical reasons behind it, but added that “SanDisk is exploring the possibility of adding an AM receiver to some of its MP3 players.”

I’m still waiting. Hopefully AM radio will still be around by the time a solution is found.

UPDATE (Jan. 9): La Presse has an arts section cover story today about the future of AM radio, which discusses this issue as well as the larger market for the band. It includes quotes from broadcasting consultant Michel Mathieu painting a dire picture for AM radio, which is kind of ironic because Mathieu was hired to get many smaller community stations their broadcast licenses, including stations like CJLO on the AM dial.

There’s also a story about Paul Tietolman and his upcoming French-language talk radio station, with some thoughts from experts about its viability.