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The CRTC kicks off two weeks of hearings next week that place the spotlight on the fee-for-carriage fight. Last night, I participated in an interesting debate on the issue on TVO's The Agenda called A Pox On Both Their Houses: Cable and TV. The program is embedded below. One issue that was not raised - indeed it has not received any real public attention - was noted earlier today by Alan Sawyer. He notes that CTV and Canwest have quietly asked the CRTC to order cable and satellite companies to establish a new policy of "program deletion." The new policy (which is supported in a Toronto Star piece today) would mean that when a Canadian broadcaster buys the Canadian rights to a U.S. program, the U.S. broadcast would be blocked in Canada for a seven-day window.
In other words, rather than the current simultaneous substitution policy, which allows for the programs to air at the same time and for the substitution of the Canadian broadcast on the U.S. channel (thereby leading to the annual complaints about Super Bowl commercials), the U.S. broadcast would be blocked altogether. That would allow Canadian broadcasters to air the U.S. program whenever they like and block the U.S. version altogether. In a world when consumers expect to view programs on their schedule, CTV and Canwest seek a return to a prior era when the broadcaster retains (now illusory) control over access to the broadcasts in Canada.
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Mark Goldberg points to a recent Sandvine broadband report on recent broadband traffic patterns. Goldberg points to the growth of real-time entertainment traffic, such as streaming, which is consistent with what the CRTC heard during the net neutrality hearings over the summer. Most notable, however, is yet another confirmation that P2P traffic is declining as a percentage of overall traffic. Sandvine reports that it dropped by 25 percent as a share of overall traffic. Moreover, in a table on peak-time bandwidth share, Sandvine reports that web browsing leads (34.4%), followed by real-time entertainment (29.1%), and then P2P (16.9%). Sandvine also reports that peak-time usage is narrowing. In 2008, peak-time ran from 6:00 to 11:00 pm. In 2009, Sandvine said it has narrowed to 7:00 to 10:00 pm.
This data is important in considering the test established by the CRTC for reasonable traffic management practices. First, practices that target P2P will be increasingly difficult to justify (many argue application-specific approaches are never justifiable), given its declining share of traffic the application represents. Second, far broader peak-time characterizations - Bell claims that its peak-time runs from 4:30 pm to 2:00 am - are unlikely to meet the CRTC's standard for any harm from traffic management practices being as little as reasonably possible. Slashdot, Digg, Del.icio.us, Newsfeeder, Reddit, StumbleUpon, TwitterTagsShareFriday November 13, 2009 |
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The mainstream media is picking up on the ACTA issue with a growing number of stories, all of which criticize the secret approach. New articles include:
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As public concern over the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement mounts, even Fox News has taken an interest. Slashdot, Digg, Del.icio.us, Newsfeeder, Reddit, StumbleUpon, TwitterTagsShareFriday November 13, 2009 |
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