durham@handel.mpr.ca (Paul Durham) (02/28/90)
In article <4366@accuvax.nwu.edu> sl@van-bc.UUCP (Stuart Lynne) writes: >In article <4300@accuvax.nwu.edu> "Robert P. Warnock" <rigden!rpw3@eddie.mit. >edu> writes: >>It's just a commercial e-mail service. Happens to be run (indirectly) >>by the Canadian government. Fees are charged for connect time, >Very indirectly. It's run by a company called Telecom Canada. Which in >turn is owned by the government. The Canadian Telco's are involved as >well. >Telecom Canada is apparantly being put on the block by the government >(as of last Tuesday's federal budget). OK folks, let's set this one straight. I quote from a Telecom Canada brochure: "Telecom Canada is composed of Canada's major telecommunications companies. Together, these companies provide a fully-integrated voice, data, and image network". I.E., the long distance system, Datapac (X.25), Envoy 100, and other such services. It was called the Trans-Canada Telephone System up to a few years ago. They're being a bit subjective with the "major" label. In fact the members are simply Canada's telephone companies. They are not interested in admitting interlopers such as CNCP or the cable companies. Apart from the network services, Telecom Canada's other function is to produce propaganda and intervene legally for the telephone companies (fighting alternate long distance carriers, for example). By far the largest member of Telecom Canada is Bell Canada (Ontario and Quebec) which is bigger than all the others put together. _Telesat_ Canada (which provides satellite services) is the one that is owned by the gov't. It's a member of Telecom Canada, to add to the confusion. P. Durham