afransen
Senior Member
I think rural fibre is DOA. Satellite internet is already mostly good enough, and it will only get better.
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PM Mark Carney's Canada
- Thread starter Richard White
- Start date
afransen
Senior Member
Not used to seeing EU written as E-U. It is mapped in my brain as États-Unis (aka the US).
lenaitch
Senior Member
We are with Starlink. It is stupid fast . . . but not cheap. We pay about $160/month and that just for Internet connectivity. Subscriptions for phone, TV, etc. are on top of that. I haven't found any reference where the government defines "affordable" in their policy statements but suspect that many would find that cost to be anything but affordable. They do define "high speed" as 50 Mps down.
afransen
Senior Member
I find it unlikely that the government can deliver rural internet cheaper than this. Subsidies to a Musk company may not be popular, but it is probably more economic than untold billions in grants for laying fibre past cornfields and muskeg.
I also expect the cost of satellite internet like Starlink to come down with time. It's not inherently expensive. They are charging what they can to get good utilization of the bandwidth/capacity they have available. Their endgame is to provide service to mobile phones, and that will be a massive market. They plan to scale up by several orders of magnitude. To sell that capacity, prices will have to come down.
guavadelic
Active Member
eh, that's doubtful. Those countries couldn't even band together and coordinate a response to Trump's tariffs, leaving Canada to go it alone.
Admiral Beez
Superstar
This reminds me of the Victorian era race to lay undersea telegraph cables, all while Marconi was about to make it all obsolete with his wireless. Of course today telegraphy is no longer a thing. Technology comes and goes.
PL1
Senior Member
C.f. so-called developing nations bypassing wired phones and skipping directly to cellular service. As long as there isn't a monopoly in the satellite Internet game, it seems likely that is the best route
lenaitch
Senior Member
The concepts of 'rural' and 'remote' have a wide range. I'm not a telecom expert but I suspect a terrestrial cable makes sense if there are enough customers along the line. Fixed wireless requires a tower (plus power) at about $1mn a pop.
I'm also not a satellite-ologist but the process strikes me as somewhat expensive or everybody would be doing it. No doubt costs are coming down, but so are the Starlink satellites. Because they are in low earth orbit and have to expend fuel to stay on station, they have an expected lifespan of about five years. They currently have about 5000 in orbit and are planning on about 12000 (some say 37000). That's a lot to maintain.
Yet the successors of those cables are still carrying most of the intercontinental data traffic.
AlvinofDiaspar
Moderator
The limiter is radio spectrum - there is only so much of that resource to go around. Telecom is such a fundamental thing that I would loath to cede control to any non-national entity - much less one with a track record of using that power to deleterious ends.
AoD
AoD
kEiThZ
Superstar
And that perception is among a sliver of voters who won't make a difference at elections. Anybody who is going to be really upset about this was probably not open to voting LPC. They should get candidates who can win their ridings.
kEiThZ
Superstar
Canada woos US H-1B visa holders: PM Carney says he will soon roll out an offer - The Times of India
Rest of World News: Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney announced plans to attract skilled foreign workers, particularly those to be impacted by the US's new $100,000 H-1timesofindia.indiatimes.com
If I was Carney I'd be more worried about keeping talent in Canada, since with the changes to the H-1B Visa, if Silicon Valley can no longer easily bring in Indians and Chinese to do their high skilled tech work, they'll look to Canada's skilled workers who can be easily imported with a much simpler and cheaper TN Visa. If I'm a smart tech worker in India, I'd come to Canada on Carney's tech Visa program, get my Canadian citizenship, and then book it for the high income, low taxation USA under a TN Visa.
1) TN is not a real visa. Has to be renewed often and most working long term simply end up on H1B.
2) The US is cracking down on TN abuse too. Just ask tech folks.
3) They heavily scrutinize people who naturalized as Canadians and pursue TN. In fact, a lot of their visa rules look at country of birth, not just citizenship.
On one hand, good on Carney for trying to get more talented immigrants. But given the backlash against immigration, this is equally dangerous. Indeed, I'd argue that a lot of the radicalization in the US against Indians started with all the stories of Indian students in Canada.
kEiThZ
Superstar
Which will never happen. Everyone loves to hate on the US. But loves the dollars Americans spend. The American consumer holds up a huge chunk of the global economy.
picard102
Senior Member
Based on what?
kEiThZ
Superstar
Common sense. You can say it's anecdotes. But show me one poll that says a substantial chunk of the voting public pick their actual candidate, in their riding, based on gender.
The LPC needs to get back to winning instead of worrying about social signaling. Pick the most popular candidate in the riding (through the nomination process). Be it woman or man. Straight or gay. Black or white. Whoever can get people out to the polls and get them the win. Enough with the party headshop imposing candidates.
Richard White
Senior Member
THIS!!!
This is why I gave up on the NDP for a long while.
The one thing I hate about the NDP is how they force riding associations to put in candidates to meet gender parity and minority requirements. Putting in an unqualified candidate to meet a quota is not going to win you an election.
If you want to win an election, you get the best candidate for the riding not to meet a quota. I am sorry if people are offended by a caucus that is full of old white men but if those old white men win a majority so be it.
Running a slate of candidates that is 50% women, minorities, etc and losing the election is nothing to be proud of.