TRAI Chairman R.S. Sharma

A plan by Facebook to deliver free limited Internet access to India’s poor and rural communities was delivered a blow this morning after the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) declared the plan would violate Net Neutrality and banned it.

TRAI’s ruling focused on the fact the proposed plan would only allow customers to access Facebook and other partnered websites the social network elected to let users access over its free service. The regulator declared no service provider in India will be allowed to offer or charge discriminatory rates for data services based on content.

The regulator relied heavily on the ISP License Agreement in its ruling, which requires subscribers to have “unrestricted access to all the content available on Internet except for such content which is restricted by the Licensor/designated authority under Law.” TRAI went further in its Net Neutrality declaration than regulators in the U.S. and parts of Europe, proclaiming price-based differentiation “would make certain content more attractive to consumers resulting in altering online behavior.” Under those terms, India has effectively banned the practice of “zero rating,” which exempts certain so-called “preferred content” from metering charges or counting against a customer’s usage allowance.

“This is a big win for Indian consumers and Net Neutrality,” said Independent MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar. “This is a very powerful and positive first step taken by TRAI. The days of telcos controlling regulations and regulatory policy is over and it is consumers to the fore.”

Facebook’s Internet.org and its companion free mobile web service, now dubbed Free Basics, offers stripped-down web services without airtime or usage charges, targeting basic so-called “feature phones” that were common in the U.S. before smartphones. Facebook has targeted the free service on about three dozen developing countries including the Philippines, Malawi, Bangladesh, Thailand and Mongolia. India would have been Facebook’s largest market for Free Basics, until the telecom regulator effectively banned it.

In India, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s frequent entries into the debate, including a passive-aggressive OpEd widely panned in India, was seen by many as arrogant and counter-productive. Facebook’s ongoing campaign to enlist users’ active support of the project for the benefit of India’s telecom regulator created a row with the Office of the Prime Minister, that dismissed Facebook’s public relations defense of Free Basics “a crudely majoritarian and orchestrated opinion poll.“

A misleading astroturf campaign only infuriated the government more after Facebook users (including some in the U.S.) were greeted with an invitation in their timelines to support “digital equality,” sponsored by Facebook. Regulators were flooded with form letters, only later to be informed many were misled to believe it indicated their support for Net Neutrality.

Facebook users across India (and some in the U.S.) were invited by Facebook to defend “digital equality,” which critics define as “opposing Net Neutrality.”

“Facebook went overboard with its propaganda [and] convinced ‘the powers that be’ that it cannot be trusted with mature stewardship of our information society,” said Sunil Abraham, of the Center for Internet and Society in Bangalore.

Initially, Internet.org included Facebook and a handpicked assortment of content partners, including the BBC, that were allowed on the free service. Net Neutrality proponents accused Facebook of creating a walled garden for itself and its preferred partners, disadvantaging startups and other companies not allowed on the service.

Unlike in the United States where Net Neutrality was a cause largely fought by netizens, websites, and consumer groups, major media organizations in India helped coordinate the push for Net Neutrality. The Times of India and its language websites like Navbharat Times, Maharashtra Times, Ei Samay and Nav Gujarat Samay appealed to other broadcasters and publishers to remove themselves from Internet.org. NDTV, a major multi-lingual broadcaster running multiple 24-hour news channels, often promoted Net Neutrality on the air and encouraged Indians to support it.

Like in the United States, Indians faced a telecom regulator more accustomed to dealing with government officials and telecom companies. TRAI was quickly swamped with over one million comments in support of Net Neutrality, so many that invitations for future comments were moved to another government website that made it harder for consumers to address regulators. The unexpected level of support for Net Neutrality also led Facebook to change its Internet.org service and relaunch Free Basics as “an open platform.”

But websites included in the service still cannot contain data intensive product experiences, such as streaming video, high-resolution images and GIFs, videos, client or browser side caching or file and audio transfer services.

“Facebook defines the technical guidelines for Free Basics, and reserves the right to change them,” adds the SavetheInternet.in coalition. “They reserve the right to reject applicants, who are forced to comply with Facebook’s terms. In contrast they support ‘permissionless innovation’ in the US.”

In India, the argument has boiled down to whether the country would prefer a usage-limited open Internet platform for the poor or an unlimited experience for a handful of websites. TRAI prefers enforcing rules guaranteeing users can visit any website they want, even if the free service used comes with a usage cap.

It’s a major blow for Facebook and the telecom operators that were some of the service’s biggest defenders.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/NDTV Net Neutrality India 2-8-16.mp4[/flv]

Net Neutrality is now law in India, where the telecom regulator exceeded the United States by completely banning zero rated services, which allow users to avoid usage charges for certain applications or websites. (2:03)

Activists of Indian Youth Congress and National Students Union of India shout anti-government slogans during a protest in support of Net Neutrality in New Delhi on April 16, 2015. (Image: MONEY SHARMA/AFP/Getty Images)

”COAI had approached the regulator with the reasons to allow price differentiation as the move would have taken us closer to connecting the one billion unconnected citizens of India,” said Rajan Mathews, director general of the Cellular Operators Association of India (COAI). “By opting to turn away from this opportunity, TRAI has ignored all the benefits of price differentiation that we had submitted as a part of the industry’s response to its consulting paper, including improving economic efficiency, increase in broadband penetration, reduction in customer costs and provision of essential services among other things.”

In a statement, a Facebook spokesperson said: “Our goal with Free Basics is to bring more people online with an open, non-exclusive and free platform. While disappointed with the outcome, we will continue our efforts to eliminate barriers and give the unconnected an easier path to the Internet and the opportunities it brings.”

TRAI rejected industry claims that differential pricing will enable operators to bring innovative packages to the market.

India has 300 million mobile users but there are still nearly one billion Indians without Internet access. India is an important market for Facebook, with 130 million active Facebook users — second to only the United States.

Allowing Facebook to gain a foothold in rural India using zero rating was compared with British colonialism by Vijay Shekhar Sharma, the founder of PayTM — an Indian mobile payment system. He called Free Basics a trojan horse — “poor Internet for poor people” and referred to it as the colonial-era East India Company of the 21st century.

“India, Do u buy into this baby Internet?” Mr Sharma tweeted in December. “The East India company came with similar ‘charity’ to Indians a few years back!”

“Given that a majority of the [Indian] population are yet to be connected to the Internet, allowing service providers to define the nature of access would be equivalent of letting [operators] shape the users’ Internet experience,” TRAI said in its release.

Telecom operators should be able to adapt to a market that bans zero rating, analysts believe.

“Telecom service providers may not be happy with this notification,” Amresh Nanden, research director at Gartner, told NDTV News. “However, they still have the ability and freedom to create different kind of Internet access packages; as long as content is not a parameter to provide or bar access to anyone. Such practices have already started elsewhere with products such as bandwidth on demand, bandwidth calendaring etc. to create premium products.”

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/AIB Save The Internet 1 4-2015.mp4[/flv]

All India Bakchod produced several humorous mostly English language videos teaching Indians about Net Neutrality and why it’s important. It’s a familiar case for North Americans dealing with our own telecom operators. (9:07)

An update from All India Backchod last summer alerted India to an astroturf campaign underway at Facebook and telecom operators to mislead Net Neutrality supporters. (8:02)

ESPN’s ability to bid for expensive sports rights may be threatened if pay television customers finally get a chance to subscribe to only the networks they want to watch.

A recent consumer survey conducted by Civic Science found 56% overall would remove ESPN/ESPN2, with 60% of female respondents and 49% of male respondents thrilled to drop ESPN to save $8 a month on their cable bill.

Richard Greenfield at BTIG Research has tried in vain to warn ESPN parent company Disney it may be on borrowed time.

“We continue to believe ESPN is in serious trouble as they spent far too heavily on long-term sports rights contracts, given the deteriorating state of the multichannel video bundle and accelerating shift of TV ad dollars to mobile,” Greenfield wrote in a note to investors. “Simply put, ESPN has been the largest beneficiary of the ‘BIG’ cable bundle for decades and is now dramatically overearning, with consumers the biggest losers.”

No basic cable network costs consumers more than ESPN, with $5-9 dollars of every cable TV bill paying for ESPN and its sister sports networks, whether customers watch or not. Each year, ESPN rakes in almost $9 billion from American households and advertisers, much of it used to bid for high-profile sporting events which used to appear exclusively on major broadcast networks. With billions on hand from pay television customers, many who also pay surcharges for sports programming and broadcast/over the air stations, sports teams and their owners are flush with cash. Some cable companies have even resorted to launching expensive cable networks in association with team owners just to secure viewing rights as competitors continue to bid up the price.

ESPN’s business model depends on making every cable customer pay for ESPN, so its contracts prohibit cable operators and satellite providers from placing the network on an added-cost tier.But as new online video providers launch, many are trying to omit expensive sports programming to give customers cheaper options. If consumers choose those providers, expensive cable networks are in big trouble.

ESPN president John Skipper admits ESPN’s secret: It rakes it at least $6 billion annually from cable customers, many who never watched ESPN. (Playing time varies)

Greenfield has tangled with Bob Iger, Disney’s chairman and CEO about the risks to ESPN’s future business model in the recent past. Iger has taken the cord cutting threat in stride, claiming ESPN is even prepared to start selling its networks individually, direct to consumers. Greenfield believes Iger is bluffing.

“As soon as ESPN launches a direct-to-consumer offering, it will remove the ‘protection’ they receive from cable/satellite distributors who guarantee ESPN a certain level of penetration,” Greenfield writes. “So no matter what price point ESPN/ESPN2 launch to consumers, it enables their legacy distributors such as Comcast to offer far more robust channel packages without ESPN.”

In an open market where customers get to decide on the channels they pay to receive, more than half of the country would not pay for ESPN, creating an enormous revenue hit for the network. Without adequate funds to compete in sports programming rights auctions, ESPN would likely lose access to many sporting events, further reducing revenue received from advertisers as ratings dropped. To make up for those subscriber losses, ESPN might have to charge consumers up to $30 a month for a Netflix-like ESPN offering. Civic Science asked how many would pay $20 a month for ESPN and found only 6% of survey respondents willing. In contrast, about 80 percent of Comcast customers now take ESPN, but not because they have a choice.

Cord-cutting may already be taking a toll on ESPN’s bank account. Those dispensing with a cable television package in favor of Hulu, Amazon, or Netflix may be partly to blame for ESPN’s decision to layoff 300 employees last fall.

“The math for a direct-to-consumer offering for a basic cable network does not work, especially for channel(s) with very high monthly fees embedded within the current MVPD bundle,” said Greenfield. “Disney cannot take ESPN direct-to-consumer and they know it, whether they admit that publicly or not. Furthermore, if the multichannel video bundle frays faster than expected and the TV ad market continues to weaken, ESPN’s future growth prospects are dim, at best.”

Every once in a while, a brazen utility service company will come to our attention that is so egregious in its conduct and pricing, it makes Comcast’s business practices resemble Amateur Hour.

Not for lack of trying, Comcast’s worst abuses pale in comparison to the conduct of a nasty little firm called Nationwide Energy Partners (NEP). No customer that endures this pseudo-utility will likely ever forget its name, or the $500+ utility bills the company is known to send to renters in Ohio.

Ohio’s deregulated utility market has opened the door to speculators, multi-level marketing scams, and the new and growing practice of “submetering,” — rebilling renters for utility usage charges on behalf of the property owner. The epicenter of some of the worst abuses is in Columbus, where two “submetering” companies with dubious records and close ties to property developers are getting rich charging customers up to 97% more than other Columbus households pay for basic utilities.

Four families are now taking NEP to court, alleging the company is lying about its rates, overcharging customers, and engineering a monopoly business model that does not allow customers to switch utilities, leaving them captive to the threat of eviction and property liens for those that fall behind on their bills.

Ralph Cantore in Columbus is well-acquainted with NEP. It’s the utility company that has billed him $4oo-525 a month for electricity and water service for his three-bedroom apartment.

“I really enjoy the location,” Cantore told The Columbus Dispatch about Olentangy Commons apartments. “I enjoy everything about it, except the ridiculous energy bills.”

Courtney VanSickle, a registered nurse, says her bills have been as high as $450 a month at her two-bedroom apartment.

Those are two of approximately 30,000 customers served by NEP, many in central Ohio where renters served by these third party companies are often shocked by astronomical utility bills. Another firm, American Power & Light, was founded in 2003 by property developer Don Kenney, Sr. The “energy company” shares office space with Kenney’s other ventures, including Ardent Property Management, Village Communities and Metro Development. Kenney’s companies have built more than 35,000 apartments or condominium units, many coincidentally relying on AP&L as the monopoly provider of utility service.

Nationwide Energy founder and CEO Mike DeAscentis Jr., was frank with investors about the real aim of NEP in a 2010 presentation: “How we make money is we buy power at a commercial rate and we resell it at the residential rate and there is arbitrage in the rate structure,” he said, according to a transcript obtained by The Dispatch.

DeAscentis isn’t an energy man from way back. He’s the CEO of Lifestyle Communities, an apartment developer, which coincidentally contracts with NEP for utility services.

NEP pays developers, owners, and/or managers of condominiums, apartment buildings, and multi-family dwellings for contracts offering exclusivity to provide gas, electric, water, and sewer service to tenants. Tenants are informed at closing or move in that NEP is the only utility service provider available to them and they must sign a service agreement with NEP to obtain basic utilities.

NEP is well aware of the favorable position this puts the company, telling customers on its website:

“At NEP we know you choose us because you have to.”

Under Ohio’s deregulation strategy, utilities are still supposed to be mildly regulated to guarantee quality of service, establish proper disconnection policies, and follow basic guidelines to help manage the competitive market. Except NEP was created at the outset to skirt those rules.

“NEP is the new utility,” DeAscentis said in the 2010 presentation. “We do everything that a utility does except generate power. NEP builds electrical-distribution systems for residential communities, and we were very deliberate when we started the business 10 years ago to put it in a place where it was not regulated.”

That is what has allowed NEP to effectively operate as an unregulated monopoly. If customers can’t or won’t pay, the normal protections extended to customers for utility services that protect life do not apply. NEP and AP&L can cut service at will for non-payment, even during winter when a customer’s safety could be at risk. If residents are late with payments, American Power will sometimes evict them, even if the consumer’s rent is up to date and even though American Power is not the landlord. Another contract provision allows companies to place liens on personal property for non-payment. Both companies have sought hundreds of evictions since 2002. Nationwide appeared to have stopped seeking evictions in 2011.

“Once you enter this slippery slope, where a third party has the ability to order evictions, that’s shocking,” Emily Crabtree, a lawyer with Columbus Legal Aid who has defended American Power customers, told The Dispatch in 2013.

The centerpiece of the Ohio lawsuit is the allegation NEP charges residents substantially more that what regulated or municipal providers charge their customers. A 2013 investigation by The Dispatch found that once all the fees and surcharges were calculated, customers paid up to 94% more than if they had an account directly with the regulated or municipal utility serving the area.

“This rate arbitrage is how NEP makes money,” the lawsuit claims.

The plaintiffs claim NEP won’t disclose its energy charges, making it difficult for customers to compare what they are paying for service in contrast with their non-NEP neighbors.

“NEP’s website falsely states that ‘NEP is contractually bound to match the rates of the host utility for both electric and water,’ that ‘rates [customers] are charged by NEP are the same residential rates that are charged by [their] current utility provider,’ and that customers ‘will not pay a higher rate for [their] electric and water as a NEP customer.'”

Ironically, NEP’s CEO stated that NEP “adds value” to services traditionally provided by public or private utility companies.

“The only entity that benefits from NEP’s business model is NEP,” the lawsuit claims.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/Columbus Dispatch Submetering 10-20-13.flv[/flv]

The Columbus Dispatch investigated submetering back in 2013, and the large spike in consumer complaints that resulted from the practice. (4:24)

Consumers, when they find out about the submetering practice, are shocked to discover it is completely legal under Ohio law.

Guy Fulcher, a former American Power customer who now lives in Galena, got the pass-the-buck treatment when he complained.

“The attorney general back then was Richard Cordray, and his office just rolled over and said, ‘We don’t regulate that,’” he said. “They said to go to [Ohio’s Public Utilities Commission]. PUCO said, ‘We don’t regulate that.’”

When other renters have complained to regulators, attorneys representing submetering companies argue the complaints should be ignored or rejected for lack of standing.

“This complaint should begin and end with the determination that Mr. Whitt lacks standing to bring a complaint concerning utility services (at his condo) because he is not the utility customer,” said Howard Petricoff, attorney for Nationwide Energy, in a filing.

According to the company, the true customer is the condo association, not each resident, reported the newspaper. Nationwide Energy has a long-term contract with the association to act as the exclusive reseller of utility services.

AE&P spokeswoman Terri Flora said the responsibility falls squarely on the shoulders of renters.

“As people make choices to rent in an apartment, they need to be fully aware of what that choice involves,” Flora told the newspaper about the possibility of paying higher prices with a submeter company. “It’s a different environment than consumers are used to.”

Customers in other states beyond Ohio should also be on the lookout because submetering is legal in several other states. Where money can be made, submeterers are sure to expand. NEP is already active in Ohio, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Kentucky. Submetering, with an allowance for charging a substantial markup, was legal in Alabama, Georgia, Kansas, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Utah and Washington as of 2013.

Does Canada’s Food TV need special protection when it made 53% gross profits on the backs of cable subscribers that pay for the network whether they watch it or not?

“If you cut your cable, then your Internet is going to go up,” predicts Gary Pelletier, president of the Canadian chapter of the Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing.

That is just one of several predictions many Canadian cable and phone companies are claiming will come from the “disastrous decision” to allow consumers the freedom to pick and pay for only the cable channels they want to watch. Amidst claims that over 10,000 jobs will be lost, chaos and bankruptcy will stalk minority and niche cable networks, consumers will pay much higher bills, and American programming will boycott Canada fearing a-la-carte could make its way into the United States, Canada is at least having an adult discussion about the future of television and where it fits in the country’s identity.

Big changes are coming as a result of the latest great soul-searching made by our good neighbors to the north, always concerned about the potential of the Canadian Experience being overrun, if not decimated by the United States’ entertainment hegemony. In a moment of clarity, regulators have just realized what the rest of English-speaking Canada already knew: protectionist content regulations don’t work on the Internet. Canadians routinely bypass geographical restrictions and Canadian content laws with virtual private networks that relocate them, online at least, to a home address in the U.S. so they can binge-watch the unrestricted American versions of Netflix, Hulu and other online video services.

Regulators have now adopted the attitude – “if you can’t beat ’em, join ’em,” encouraging Canadian entertainment producers to create fewer, but better shows that will not only attract Canadian audiences, but those abroad.

Only the exchange is supposed to be mutual. High quality Canadian television productions like Orphan Black, Schitt’s Creek, X Company, The Book of Negroes, This Life, 19-2, Vikings, Killjoys, Rookie Blue, and Murdoch Mysteries are all among Canadian critics’ top favorites. But relatively few Americans know these shows exist or assume they are co-productions owned by some American entertainment conglomerate. Only a brief glimpse of a Canadian flag during the warp speed end credits might clue viewers this isn’t the case.

Despite protectionist media policies that have endured since 1970, the Canadians are now boldly going where Americans have so far feared to tread. They are having the conversation about the future of television and online entertainment in all forms while American media barons remain in denial.

For average consumers, the biggest change will begin next spring when the era of Canadian a-la-carte cable television arrives, allowing consumers to take an ax to the expensive 120-300 channel television package once and for all. Starting March 1, all Canadian providers will be required to offer consumers a basic cable package priced at no more than $25 a month, containing Canadian and U.S. over the air stations and networks, educational, and public channels. If you want more, you can have it by buying channels or mini-packages of networks individually to create a personalized cable TV lineup of networks you actually care to watch.

Programmers across Canada, particularly those catering to sports fans, foreign audiences, religious viewers, and minorities are horrified by the idea. So are media critics that fear the change could help bring an end to Canada’s unique multilingual and multicultural identity.

Customers like James Rehor of Hamilton explains why.

“Why would I pay for it? Why do I get it? Why does it come on my TV?” asks the 60-year-old construction worker. He’s ready on day one to purge the large number of French and other non-English channels from his Cogeco Cable lineup. Rehor offers comfort to sports programmers, however. He’s a big fan of the Toronto Maple Leafs, so Leafs TV, Sportnet, and TSN will stay.

Non-sports fans are another matter. They can’t wait to ditch the sports networks that are always the most expensive channels in a Canadian cable package.

“Clearly the most expensive (channels) will always be sports,” Pelletier tells the Canadian Press. “At the end of the day, for sports watchers, their cable bill will probably stay the same or increase, maybe … In the case of someone who doesn’t watch any sports at all, their bill will probably decrease.”

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/CRTC Supporting the creation of content made by Canadians for Canadians and global audiences 3-2015.mp4[/flv]

An Age of Abundance: Canadian telecom regulators are transforming media regulations in Canada, recognizing the way Canadians watch television has changed. Quality, not quantity, is now most important. CRTC chairman Jean-Pierre Blais discusses the new reality. (6:08)

Pelletier and his industry friends are on a mission to convince Canadians to leave well enough alone and not drop the current all-for-one price cable television package for a-la-carte — not realizing the potential consequences.

Some in the cable industry have tried other scare tactics to no avail.

One industry-backed study predicted pick-and-pay could cost the economy 10,000 jobs. Consumers could care less. Unifor, a union that represents many in the television sector, seemed to agree Canada’s cultural heritage will be at risk with lowest common denominator programming dominating from St. John’s to Vancouver, much of it shoveled from the United States. But Canadians still want their House of Cards and Homeland.

Howard Law, a media spokesman for Unifor, predicts less profitable Canadian channels will fold under a pick-and-pay pricing model.

“The introduction of pick and pay will, in itself, lead to a major loss of revenues to Canadian broadcasting system, which ultimately plays out in less Canadian content and less Canadian jobs and less Canadian broadcasting,” he said in an interview on CBC’s The Exchange with Amanda Lang.

Minority interest and religious channels are also worried about their future. Most of those networks are classified as “specialty channels” by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC). Legacy networks that have been around since at least the 1990s have been sitting pretty, protected by their designation as a “Category A” specialty station. Unlike in the United States, Canadian cable networks are licensed to operate by the CRTC, and at least 60 of those Category A networks also enjoy “genre protection,” a CRTC policy that guarantees their channel carriage on Canadian cable, satellite, and telco TV systems and protection from other cable networks that want to run the same kind of programming.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/CBC How New CRTC Rules Will Change Canadian TV 3-2015.mp4[/flv]

For decades, protectionist Canadian content regulations made certain Canadian television reflected its audience. But online video and the Internet has allowed Canadians to bypass traditional cable television to watch they want, not what the government hopes they will. New CRTC rules reflect that reality as Canadian TV rethinks how to get the viewer’s attention. From CBC-TV’s The National (4:16)

CRTC policies have allowed Canadian specialty channels to flourish despite operating in a smaller marketplace with fewer viewers than their American counterparts. That means networks like FoodTV and HGTV in Canada have profit margins ranging from 53-58 percent. Fashion Television and BookTV made an improbable $2.7 million in pre-tax profit, not so much from viewers but from the licensing fees every Canadian cable customer pays for the four networks whether they watch them or not.

From its start, Canadian TV has always faced a looming shadow from the south. Protecting Canada’s identity has been a priority for decades.

“If you’re a specialty channel that’s lived within the protective cocoon of bundling for years, you’ve gotten used to having a full-time job with benefits,” independent technology analyst Carmi Levy told CBC News. “Contrast that with living outside the protective cocoon, you’re essentially a freelancer, you fight for every contract, you have no benefits, there are no guarantees that money will be coming tomorrow or next week.”

It probably won’t be coming from subscribers like Mr. Rehor, who won’t hesitate to drop channels if they go unwatched.

The CRTC is also doing some dropping of its own, starting with genre protection, which could lead many specialty networks to follow American cable networks that today depend on chasing ratings to justify their licensing fees. The unintended result in the United States has been questionable lineup changes like the appearance of Law & Order rerun marathons on WEtv, a network supposedly dedicated to women’s entertainment. Ovation, a fine arts independent cable network that is about a niche as a network can be, depended on weekend binges of PBS’ Antiques Roadshow reruns in 2012 just to attract enough viewers to show up in the ratings.

Lesser known networks like OutTV, Canada’s only network dedicated to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender viewers, may face an uncertain future if it can’t charge a premium price to make up for expected subscriber losses from pick and pay. Other niche channels may have to merge with other networks or more likely relaunch with an online platform and deliver a reduced menu of content to audiences.

Large Canadian mainstream networks and programmers don’t expect too much change from pick and pay, as most Canadians will likely still demand a package with their programming included. But distributors – cable, satellite, and telco TV platforms, do expect some major changes. The average Canadian now pays around $50 a month for basic cable, a price that will be cut in half next spring.

Rogers Cable already knows what is coming. It ran a trial in 2011 in London, Ont., with 1,000 customers who were given the choice of picking and paying for the channels they wanted. It didn’t take long for the cable company to discover customers loved it and TV stations and cable programmers hated it.

“We found that customers like bundles, but want to build their own. They want a basic package and an extra package they create,” Rogers spokesman Kevin Spafford told the Toronto Sun. “We did get push back from TV stations. There was concern about offering this service. They did not want us to proceed with that model.”

After the trial ended, Rogers allowed the pilot project participants to keep their pick and pay packages, something they’ve held tightly for over four years.

Rogers’ pilot offered something like what the CRTC is demanding be available to all Canadians:

ROGERS PICK AND PLAY PILOT

• $20 a month for “skinny basic” TV package of Canadian stations. (The CRTC plan mandates no more than $25.)
• 15-channel package for $27 a month. Other packages of 20 and 25 stations also offered, for more money. (The CRTC wants networks to offer channels individually or in mini-bundles.)
• U.S. major networks offered for $3 a month. (Under the CRTC policy, these stations may appear under the basic or a-la-carte tiers.)

REGULAR ROGERS

• Basic: $40 a month, 190 channels
• Digital Plus: $63, 220 channels
• Sports packages: $77, 230 channels
• VIP TV: $77, 270 channels
• VIP Ultimate: $119, 320 channels

The upcoming changes are probably the biggest in Canadian cable television history, but they still may not be enough to attract cord-nevers — those who have never subscribed to cable TV. Most are under 30 and already watch all their favorite shows online. Some budget-minded Canadians who want to cut their cable bill may consider joining them by cutting the cord altogether or slimming down their cable packages, but Pelletier warns that cable operators will not leave their money on the table.

Supplementing a slimmer cable package with a streaming service or two could increase data charges, Pelletier warns. Plus, you may have to surrender any discounts you get from bundling cable with home phone, Internet and/or wireless service.

Usage capped Internet is also still an effective deterrent for cord-cutting and whether your television entertainment comes over the cable or online, providers will still make a run for your wallet. Some observers predict providers will dramatically increase the retail prices of a-la-carte networks to limit potential savings while also continuing to raise broadband prices.

A 2014 national PIAC poll found 90 per cent of 1,000 consumers polled were willing to pay an additional $1 a month per channel, while 54 per cent would be willing to go $3 a month, and 21 per cent would be willing to pay $5 a month for an extra channel of their choosing. Many don’t realize under the current system the wholesale rate for many channels is under 50 cents a month. Considering what Canadians are willing to pay, it is likely cable companies will price channels according to what the marketplace will tolerate, which could be around $3 for each channel a month.

Suspicion about any cable company offering a New Deal is something Americans and Canadians have in common. Mr. Rehor is already keeping a wary eye.

“I think it’s a good idea, I just don’t know how they’re going to really work it,” he says, fearing it could ultimately end up costing the same amount he pays now.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/CBC Pick and Pay TV 3-2015.flv[/flv]

CBC News offers this extended discussion about the implications of “pick and pay” cable television. (10:11)

One of AT&T’s cell towers in Denison, Tex. went missing last Thursday in the 1900 block of West Crawford St. after vandals cut the tower’s supporting guy wires, causing it to collapse.

Nearby residents woke up to find the remains of the tower crumpled on the ground, with dramatically poorer cell service the result for AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile customers in the immediate vicinity. All three mobile providers maintained antennas on the affected tower.

Denison Police say the incident was a clear case of vandalism. After the guy wires were intentionally cut, the tower lacked sufficient support to stay standing on its own.

Nobody was injured during the collapse, but AT&T says the vandals caused $1 million in damages. A temporary cell tower is now in place. It will take three months to permanently replace the cell tower.

AT&T is offering at least a $7,500 reward for information that leads to an arrest.

[flv]http://www.phillipdampier.com/video/KXII Sherman ATT cell tower felled in Denison 11-22-2015.mp4[/flv]

KXII in Sherman, Tex. reports Denison authorities are looking to arrest the vandal(s) that destroyed an AT&T cell tower. (1:30)