The Lesser of Two Evils: Shaw or Telus in Victoria?
January 28th, 2008, 51 Comments »
UPDATE: After some confusion (see the comments), I’ve established that the cable provider is in fact Shaw, not Rogers, in Victoria. I’ve adjusted this post accordingly.
Maybe it’s just the plodding web access here in Morocco, but today I visited both Shaw and Telus’s websites today to scope out Internet access when we settle in Victoria in April of this year. They both offer a premium service at 5 or 6 MB/s and a 60 GB maximum per month for about $40 to $45 (before all those ridiculous extra fees). I assume there are discounts when you package Internet access with a landline (unlikely) or TV (likelier).
This is like voting for a prime minister in recent elections. Which is the least distasteful choice? I’ve complained (and heard many complaints) about both services in the past. Which is, uh, less worse? My criteria would probably be:
- How long does it take to get service after signing up?
- How reliable is the service?
- Who’s less likely to penalize me for exceeding the 60 GB maximum (a real concern, now that you can download HD movies that might average 4 GB)?
- Who’s less likely to filter network traffic and selectively decrease download speeds for bittorrent traffic and the like?
- Whose corporate policies are less repugnant?
What would you recommend? Maybe I should just go with carrier pigeons?
When we lived in Yaletown, I could circumvent this sort of red-state, blue-state problem by voting independent and signing up with Novus. Are there any such alternatives in Victoria?