Canada Worse than 3rd World Countries when it comes to Mobile Data Access
Here’s a posting about Canada’s data access rates here.
I saw a link to it on Michael Geist’s blog.
Of course, the mobile carriers don’t actually expect us to pay those exorbitant rates. It’s mostly about controlling and monopolizing the Internet. It’s about locking out all third parties so that their subscribers have no choice but to get all their internet services (music, video) from them or not at all (VOIP).
There’s also a bit of the “used car salesman” business model. Some people don’t realize how expensive it is, connect their laptop to their phone to browse the web and check email and get a $1000 bill at the end of the month. At that point, the carrier has lost a subscriber forever but they’ve made a big pile of cash and can move on to the next sucker.
2 Responses to “Canada Worse than 3rd World Countries when it comes to Mobile Data Access”
I just got a SMS from Rogers which says that they going to apply long-distance rates on top of my current air time rate to all long-distance incoming calls.
This is just ridicules.
In Canada we have worse mobile service in the world and this is not a joke. Most developing countries have lower price rate for much better quality mobile service. I will vote for anyone on next election who can promise that we will have the mobile service provider that can deliver high quality service with a reasonable price rate. There is no one country in Europe has so high price rate and so poor quality service!!!
Hey angryman, I hope those charges are for incoming calls when you’re away from your local area, otherwise it’s insane. Data will travel anywhere on data networks for cheap, local vs long-distance just seems restrictive.
There are serious plans to have a fourth wireless carrier in Canada. I say let’s do it. Let’s put our nationalistic pride aside and allow foreign companies to bid in the spectrum auction.
Things are marginally better now for data plans, but I’m staying away from them. There are too many restriction and clauses – if you stray beyond the precise terms of the contract, the rate for 1 GB is between $3000 and $50000 depending on your carrier; yes that’s 50K, we’re talking about personal bankruptcy here.