Telecom Trends

Pity poor Cybersurf. They know that the Rolling Stones taught us that you can't always get what you want, but these days, Cybersurf must be feeling like it is having trouble ever getting anything that it wants.

They thought they had won a major victory with the CRTC when the Commission ruled in their favour to permit wholesale access to all the same speeds of ADSL service that the incumbents offer.

I thought the executive summary of the Decision was pretty clear in the Commission's intent:

that incumbent local exchange carriers be required to provide speeds for wholesale asymmetric digital subscriber line services that match the speeds made available to their retail Internet service customers.

I read that as meaning that if an incumbent sells a retail internet service rated at X Mbps, then a reseller can buy a wholesale version of that service to be able to offer the same speed. I'm pretty sure that most people read the decision that way.

Nay, nay, says Bell.

In a letter to the CRTC on Monday, Bell argued that the Commission did not intend for the Decision to apply to all of Bell's retail internet services. In Bell's view, there is some kind of special mystique behind the Commission's use of the term "copper" in paragraph 22 of the Decision, where it says:

With respect to the submissions of Bell Canada et al. and TCC that the relief sought by Cybersurf would dampen investment in alternative facilities (Bell Canada et al.) and broadband in general (TCC), the Commission notes that this proceeding is limited to addressing the issue of matching service speeds of the ILECs' aggregated ADSL access services, which are provided over copper facilities.

Bell says that its higher speed services are provided over "FTTN" technology and so it feels that the CRTC

explicitly excluded next generation services, such as those that are not pure copper facilities provided over the fibre to the node (FTTN) network.

I'll observe that the word "pure" doesn't appear anywhere in the Commission's decision. Equally, I would note that FTTN is hardly "pure" fibre.

How does Bell think the connection goes from the Node (the "N" of "FTTN") to the customer premises? Is it a magical mystery connection or maybe the last little bit is using ADSL over copper? [Apologies for mixing the 40 year old musical references]

Further, paragraph 22 is a descriptive paragraph, not a determination. The conclusion of the Decision was pretty clear.

The Commission directs that the ILECs ... consult with their aggregated ADSL customers and file, within 45 days of the date of this Decision, proposed revised tariff pages to include any matching-speed with respect to existing retail service speeds offering where there is demand by any such customer.

Customers aren't being sold technologies - they are sold high speed internet service. And this whole process started when Cybersurf asked to be able to resell Bell's 7 Mbps service.

The Commission should dispose with this clarification right away, register the original Decision 2008-117 with the courts. The clock is ticking - the telcos have 45 days from December 11 to file matching tariffs. Absent a stay, they need to file matching rate tariffs or face the consequences.

Patience Cybersurf. If you try sometime, well you just might find, you get what you need.

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