Telecom Trends: Confusing bits and bytes

Monday, June 02, 2008

Confusing bits and bytes

Call me a stickler for details, but there is a big difference between "kb" and "kB".

In CAIP's interrogatory responses to the CRTC, the units seem to be used interchangeably, perpetuating an erroneous statement in one of the attachments that throttled traffic speeds being experienced (around 30kBps) are half of dial-up speeds (56kbps).

Lower case 'b' refers to bits. Upper case 'B' refers to bytes (with 8 bits to a byte). So, 30 kBps means 30 kilobytes per second which is 240 kbps - around four times dial-up.

Of course, there is still a big difference between 240 kbps and 5 Mbps, so the exageration was not necessary to make their point.

Why would the association continue to make such an obvious mistake in its regulatory filings? Is it just me or does this cast suspicions on the quality of the rest of its complaint?

Technorati Tags:
Bell, CRTC, CAIP

Posted by Mark Goldberg @ 6/02/2008 11:25:00 AM

Comments:

> Is it just me or does this cast suspicions on the quality of the rest of its complaint?

It's probably just you and your pro-Bell bias.

Of course we can't really tell if Bell has made similarly (or maybe even more) embarrassing mistakes in their submissions because their lawyers redacted all the good stuff.

Is it just me or does this cast suspicions on the quality of the rest of Bell's response?

Posted by

Anonymous : 2:04 PM, June 02, 2008

You are right. CAIP certainly does not need to exaggerate their case. It is more than sufficient to note that Bell is throttling download speeds by more than 90%.

However, this is a common mistake that more likely reflects the fact that CAIP cannot afford the same high price regulatory, PR and lobbying staff as Bell.

Bell has much more riding on this and will spend anything to win. CAIP probably realizes the cards are stacked against them. There is a practical limit to what they can spend on it.

Posted by