GATINEAU – Four and a half months after Vidéotron announced it would exempt certain music streaming services from its wireless data caps, prompting two complaints to the CRTC mere days later, telecom companies, consumer rights groups and others are still debating the interpretation of the Telecommunications Act, Internet traffic management policy and the wording of a recent CRTC decision.
The Unlimited Music offer applies to higher-end data plans offered by Vidéotron Mobile. It exempts a list of music streaming services, including Songza, Spotify, Google Play Music and Stingray Music, from having their data count against the user’s data cap. Any “reputable” music streaming service is invited to sign up, but other services, like radio station streaming apps, are not included in the offer.
The Public Interest Advocacy Centre, the Consumers’ Association of Canada, the Council of Senior Citizens’ Organizations of British Columbia and Vaxination Informatique complained that the Unlimited Music offer constitutes undue preference to those services, in violation of Article 27 (2) of the Telecommunications Act.
In addition, because exempting these services requires monitoring the actual content of data traffic, critics argue it may also constitute control or influence of the “meaning or purpose” in violation of Article 36 of the Act, in addition to bringing up privacy and traffic management concerns. The complainants believe they have a recent case that’s on point. A year ago, the Commission ruled that Vidéotron and Bell Mobility could not exempt their own mobile TV services from their mobile data caps. (Bell faces the Federal Court of Canada on that very issue this week when its appeal will be heard in Toronto. Background here.)
“Allowing the Vidéotron Unlimited Music offer to continue in its current form will place (radio) stations at a further competitive disadvantage.” – Rogers Communications
PIAC et al argue that this is the same thing, only with audio services.
Vidéotron parent Quebecor disputes all this, blaming “a significant amount of misunderstanding and misinformation.”
For Vidéotron, this isn’t the same as the mobile TV case because “none of the Unlimited Music streaming partners are affiliated with Vidéotron” and there is no money exchanged between them. Instead, the offer is “open to all reputable music streaming partners that are able and willing to meet Videotron’s technical requirements for participation.”
PIAC and others argue the term “reputable” is not defined, and the exclusion of radio stations means “Videotron is clearly not just picking music as one form of preferred content, but certain music providers, based on Vidéotron’s own arbitrary and subjective criteria.” The cable and wireless firm argues it would be too difficult to add them all.
Another difference with the mobile TV case, Vidéotron argues, is that “in the Mobile TV case, the Commission raised explicit concerns regarding the potential degradation of other services through greater congestion. In contrast, there is no meaningful risk of service degradation to the broader customer base due to the introduction of Unlimited Music service.”
Vidéotron says audio streaming represents only 7.7% of its mobile network traffic.
As for influencing the meaning or purpose of communication, the company mocks that argument, saying that the CRTC would also have to ban plans that offer free long-distance calling because that would encourage people to engage in more long-distance calls. It demeans the arguments as “vague slippery slope theories of a two-tier Internet and demonstrably false accusations of trying to control the music content marketplace.”
The proceeding has attracted several interested parties, with Telus on Vidéotron’s side arguing providers should be free to innovate, and Rogers, which owns 56 radio stations, siding with PIAC.
“Allowing the Vidéotron Unlimited Music offer to continue in its current form will place (radio) stations at a further competitive disadvantage by undermining their efforts to compete with unregulated and largely foreign streaming services for this important demographic,” Rogers argues.
Rogers offers subscriptions to Spotify and NHL GameCentre Live free on some wireless plans, but notes that those services are not exempt from data charges.
