Journal shepd's Journal: Rogers Cable Investigating Satellite Stores? 3
A most unusual thing happened today. My business partner tells me today we received a visit from someone who purports to represent Rogers Cable of Canada.
Rogers Cable is one of Ontario's (if not Canada's) largest cable television services.
For a laugh, you can see a satisfied Rogers customer's site right here.
Rogers main competitor, Shaw, owns Cancom, who run the StarChoice brand of satellite systems in Canada (I bet they have a good laugh at customers who threaten to switch to StarChoice!)
That out of the way, the Rogers Representative, I'm told, purchased a copy of Norton AntiVirus. After this he explained to us he just helped shut down the pirate satellite shop on Courland Ave. (the only one left that I knew of in this town). He then proceeded to explain he's investigating our store, and wanted to know about what we had for sale. Being that we sell no illicit items, my business partner was happy to oblige.
I figure he's been here before -- otherwise why bother mentioning he's investigating? Seems a little bit like defeating the purpose.
It's amazing the amount of money the Canadian government wastes investigating legitimate satellite dealers; and now Canadian cable users are paying twice for the privelege. More than that, the amount lost by Canadians to "pirated" but paid for subscriptions is even worse (conservative estimates put it at over $100,000,000). There are numbers that show 1 in 10 Canadians receive "pirated" programming.
For those that are a little confused about what "pirated" means, in Canada "pirating" a satellite signal involves paying DirecTV for the signal, and watching it. While it can involve circumventing their control measures, you needent do that to break the law here -- you can still do it while paying for the service! Yes, in Canada you may only watch government authorized television stations. Thanks everyone who voted for Jean Chretien for making this happen (you know who you are)! Oh wait... that's not a good thing.
Seems, as I (sadly) expected, he was confused about the idea of Free To Air satellite receivers. Perhaps being from such a large corporation he is surprised that anybody actually gives away their programming (the majority of programming on major satellites, such as Telstar 5, is actually unencrypted and intended for free private viewing).
He picked up one of our flyers and explained that he'd take it with him and let us know if Free to Air is something we're allowed to sell (I suppose, since we do sell Rogers Wireless products, we'll have to take some interest in what he says).
When he gets the "OK" from head office, which, unless they're particularly clueless, he will, I think I'll ask for it in writing. Nothing beats a framed plaque to prove you're legit.
But this is an unusual occurrence.
For your reference, the Radiocommunications Act (specifically section 9.(1)(c)) outlaws the viewing of unauthorized encrypted programming; and the CRTC (when their site works), in general, gets to do the authorizing. However, obviously no law prevents the viewing of unencrypted programming.
Re:Rogers Cable Investigating David Shepherd? (Score:2)
For someone with so many rocks to throw, the simple fact that you have the time and desire to flame somebody for a half an hour in this fashion would indicate to all but the most obtuse of us that you're in fact the only lifeless chode around here...