Comments (0)

By brians, July 6, 2009 11:16 pm

After being caught up today (outside my real job) listening to the Net Neutrality hearings, I almost missed this little bit from the CRTC on Fee-for-Carriage once again being opened up and hearings scheduled. (Thanks Michael Geist).

According to the filing the point of the hearing are to look into:

• providing revenue support for conventional broadcasters by:

investigating alternative support mechanisms for local programming;

protecting the integrity of Canadian broadcaster signals; and

exploring a mechanism for establishing, through negotiation, fair market value for the signals of the conventional television stations distributed by broadcasting distribution undertakings (BDUs);

They also are looking into specifically, how broadcasters can:

• adopt concrete and measurable commitments to the production, programming and airing of local content; and
• achieve a focused and systematic approach to community involvement and reflection, emulating the approach of local radio, which continues to be successful through challenging times.

What is amazing about this is that the fee for carriage is simply a short-term solution to a long term problem. The issue is that people are moving their viewing off the conventional broadcasters onto new platforms, like AppleTV, or simply file sharing through torrents. People are just not watching TV as much any more.

By adding a fee which cable broadcasters will have to add onto their bills, the cable providers will add to their already high bills, and encourage less viewers, not more. Phil Lind, in his response, is right, but only partially right: “I’m fighting mad. We’ll explore all avenues” to contest the move,  “This is such a massive tax grab by the broadcasters.”

He is looking to slow the decline of the broadcast industry by not gouging customers more than they currently are. The grab out of the pockets of Canadians of $50-100M will certainly slow the growth. Slowing the growth of broadcast will certainly not help their second goal, that of assisting the growth of Canadian content.

Comments (0)

By brians, June 29, 2009 12:02 pm

Michael Geist and others have reported that Rogers has again started inserting substitute content into the webpages of its customers. They originally started doing this in Decmber 2007 and backed off due to some media outcry, and perhaps pressure by Google.

Some are saying that this is a big outcry over nothing, but I think there’s a point to be made here. With both this example and their DNS error page, and it’s not just that they are doing this. They are doing it poorly.

If you look at the design and text of the pages they are inserting Rogers could do so much better.

Example 1: Michael Geist’s example page.

The text takes up half the screen. It’s not clean and tight. It even goes so far as to mention ‘if you’ve upgraded already – ignore this message’. If you’re going to take over someone’s screen, shouldn’t you already know if they’ve upgraded?

This could be improved with a small corner box at the top of the page – unobtrusive, which brings up a more detailed message about what they are looking for here. Instead this ugly box takes over much of my page and doesn’t add a whole lot of value – especially since it will have come up somewhat randomly for the user.

Example 2: Let’s take the more relevant example, the DNS error page. In my example here I entered for “gogle’ in my URL bar and reached a page with some ugly ads, bad search links and sponsored results. It’s quite clear what my mistake was here. Quite likely I was looking for Google. Why not just have a simple, clean interface outlining what the DNS server thought I was looking for. Google doesn’t seem to have a problem figuring this out. Even better, why not just send me to Google if the URL was close enough.

If you’re going to do page takeovers (and I’ll leave my comments about this until later), they are a chance to communicate and interact with your customers. Why does Rogers insist on looking like a 3rd tier cybersquatter, rather than craft an elegant and page which adds value to their customers experience? They can’t be making that much money from the URL redirect page, and instead raises the ire of Net Neutrality advocates for diminishing their internet experience.

Comments (1)

By brians, June 24, 2009 1:26 am

Last week Nortel finally pulled the plug on the company and is breaking it up and selling off the assets, likely for less than the value of the debts, leaving many creditors with no collateral. The board has failed Canadian shareholders and should take the blame.

During my time at SeaBoard Group, I spend time with many executives from many companies in the telecom equipment industry, including competitors Avaya, Siemens, Ericsson, Nokia as well as with a few Nortel executives. All my meetings with Nortel always seemed to focus on product details, rather than corporate strategy. It was puzzling, and frustrating. Many of my colleagues at the time agreed, because in order to understand where a technology company is going with products, you need to understand the strategy. It was my feeling at the time, and further confirmed this week, that they had none – a least none defined.

But is this the fault of the many CEOs that passed through the door of the company in the last number of years? In my perspective each of them actually did their jobs quite successfully, but their jobs (and the corporate strategy) weren’t defined and compensated for success of the company and it’s shareholders. As both Mark Evans, and the Ottawa Citizen’s James Bagnall suggest, the board didn’t do their job. I’d go further and say that the board, in fact, again and again failed the company immensly. They set the wrong targets for the executives, and then either blamed them for doing what they told them to do, or thwarted attempts to execute required changes.

Let’s look as some quick examples:

• John Roth – Hired and compensated to grow the company by acquisition (read Bubble and the Bear for specifics on this one) – Mission Accomplished
• Frank Dunn – Hired and compensated to steady the ship and bring accounting into order. – Mission partially accomplished.
• Bill Owens – Board Member who seemed to take over in the crunch when they couldn’t find anyone else. No Mission at all.
• Gary Daichendt – Hired to streamline and focus the company – Mission thwarted by board
• Mike Zafirovski – Hired to ‘turn the company around’ – Mission thwarted, we suspect, by board.

While the media and the shareholders often heaped scorn on the executives, the role of the board was often forgotten. They were the people hiring the executives they then burned later. The board’s job (and it’s a serious job, not a status role) is to hire the best executives to operate the company in the best interest of shareholders. They also should set the compensation for the executives such that as the company succeeds in the defined strategy, (the reason they hired the executive), the executive succeeds and gets paid. In each case the executives walked off paid well, but the company failed. That is the fault of the board, not the CEO who did his job as requested.

The board has been, and to some extent still is, made up with a group of executives and former government employees who knew little about the dynamics of the industry, and far less about entrepreurship. Almost none of them had ever started or grown a company from the ground up. Most were ‘big company’ or ‘big government’ guys from places like Bell Canada, CN, GE, or the US Military.

The world of technology is one where companies in this business have to constantly reinvent themselves. During my career at SeaBoard, I saw competitor Ericsson start from being a major handset manufacturer, move to become an equipment provider, and then build a solid business in carrier services – actually managing wireless networks – leaving the operators only to market their services. A dramatic restructure within a short period of time. This is called Entrepreneurship – reinventing the status quo – not trying to hold the status quo, a trait of big company executives.

So if blame should be heaped for investors losing money on Nortel, and there probably isn’t a Canadian who hasn’t lost money on this company, don’t go pointing fingers at the executives. Examine the board of directors list over the years and wag a finger at them (or file a lawsuit). They are the ones to blame.

Update: Mark Evans reports on a recent Fiancial Post article where Manley, one of the directors, talks about the decline of Nortel. I agree with Mark, his quote is appalling. It’s like he’s talking about a 3rd party tragedy, when instead he was a direct party to the death of the company.

Comments (0)

By brians, June 17, 2009 1:29 am

It’s challenging to think of a topic for the first post of a blog. There’s many things to write about and so much going on in the Canadian landscape.

I have a number of ideas of topics to write about but I thought it best to start with why I’m blogging in the first place. As those who know me know, I’m not short of opinions on technology and telecommunications issues, as well as on the Canadian small business and startup funding situation.

My background and inspiration to write about such topics start with growing up with a father who was deeply involved in building structures in Canada so that small business could find funding. He was the founder of Sharwood and Company,  a small merchant bank, now Spire Sharwood and wrote extensively in his time about the industry in Canada. I remember reading many of his “Sharwood Reports” when I was young – policy and thought pieces that still influence public policy today.

I also am inspired by Iain Grant, the founder of SeaBoard Group, a telecom research house and consultancy, where I worked for about 5 years. Iain is a well known pundit and writer on the telecommunications industry and bring with him a wealth of knowledge about the history of the industry as well as insights and wisdom. Known for being controversial and outspoken, he is not shy about promoting his views on the industry, and working hard for his clients developing thoughts on the industry.

While at SeaBoard Group I also met a number of reporters, writers and analysts who I continue to read and inspire me to put my own stake in the ground. These include Kevin Restivo, who I worked with at SeaBoard Group, and was a technology reporter for the Financial Post, Mark Evans, another great writer and social media expert and long-time blogger, Alec Saunders, an entrepreneur from Ottawa who writes insightfully about the industry, Mathew Ingram, long time and fanatical twitterer and reporter and social media expert from the Globe and Mail and Michael Geist, who I’ve only met once or twice a while ago, but whose opinions shape the Canadian digital landscape.

My current posting is with HomeStars, where I’m inspired every day by a team of great people including the founder, Nancy Peterson. I love the challenge of starting and growing companies, especially in early days. And I’m inspired by the great people who surround me and help the progress every day.

There are many others that inspire me to write and many other blogs and twitter feeds I read regularly and I’ll keep adding them to a blogroll at the side.

Writing a blog like this is a time commitment, and hopefully I’ll put away a few minutes every couple days and add my 2¢ to the digital conversation.