A professor at York is battling Bell Media as one of the few individuals who took to the courts last week in a showdown between the little guys and the giant media conglomerate.
Bell is appealing the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission’s decision, which imposes restrictions on their mobile television application.
David Ellis, a communications professor, was defending fair competition and the practice of net neutrality alongside Benjamin Klass, a graduate student at the University of Manitoba, who filed a complaint with the CRTC, claiming Bell was “unfairly stifling certain types of mobile content over their wireless networks to give their own content a speed advantage over content not owned by Bell.”
The CRTC declared that Bell should remove its restrictions on prioritizing their own traffic of content in comparison to their competition such as Netflix.
Bell and Virgin Mobile cellphone customers can have this application pre-installed in their devices.
Bell’s original market pricing would ask for an add-on of $5, while the user would receive up to 10 hours of video streaming that does not affect the user’s data cap.
“Bell has abused its powers as a vertically integrated conglomerate and is prioritizing its own content on a network that Bell has a large control over (infrastructure such as pipes and internet cables),” Klass says.
Ellis addressed the CRTC decision on Bell’s mobile TV service during an exclusive interview.
“Consumers should be critical of Bell’s mobile TV service as it is a service based on incentive to give Bell an unfair market advantage over competitors,” says Klass.
The Bell TV app is a service based on a motive and an opportunity that only vertically integrated conglomerates have the power to fulfil, Ellis adds.
The reason being, Bell is in the business of providing content (mobile TV) and is in the business of being an internet service provider.
Klass and Ellis raised concerns from the end-user perspective.
“Bell is attempting to escape regulation and creates unfair competition and harms consumers by creating pressure to buy into Bell’s mobile TV service instead of the competitors’ since it is more than 800 per cent cheaper,” says Ellis.
Someone might think $5 is a great price for mobile television, but they should keep in mind it will only cost the user $5 until there is no competition in the market, adds Klass.
“That is the true price of convergence of media,” he says.
Jason Laszlo, Bell media relations, says they cannot provide comments about this because the matter is currently before the courts.
Ali Al-Hallak, Contributor
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