Helpful piece in the Globe and Mail this morning for people like me, struggling to understand what all this fuss about a metered Internet means to them. Count me among the large number of Canadians who, up until all of this became big news, never even knew I had a limited plan. (The "explainer" link at the bottom of the story is also very useful.)
It's been barely a month since I figured out how to stream Netflix onto my TV and I'm totally enthralled, having been completely frustrated and furious over the consistently lousy programming that my pricey cable subscription gets me. So I'm deeply interested in this story line.
The issue looks like it's about Internet providers' right to charge heavy users more, but it's actually about Canada's non-competitive environment. Unlimited internet plans are standard in the U.S.
 Man, this country has some strange ideas around where we'll draw the line on competition. We eat foreign-grown food, work for foreign-owned companies, dress in foreign-made clothes, drive foreign-made vehicles - but damn it, when it comes to our internet and airlines, we're proudly protectionist. And never mind that such industry-driven positions work against Canadians.