The IT Nerd

Following up on this story where I point out that Bell is slashing jobs, not rolling out fibre and scaling back their speed offerings, and selling radio stations along with slashing jobs at what used to be called The Source, Bell also reported their Q4 and full year results. You can read that here, but here’s the TL:DR:

• There was a a 3.9% increase in wireless service revenue as Bell got 170,831 net subscriber activations.
• There were 55,591 retail Internet net subscriber activations in Q4. Which according to Bell is the second best Q4 result in nearly two decades.
• Bell’s net earnings fell by 23.3% to $435 million in the quarter.

And whose fault is that that their earnings fell 23.3%? Here’s who Bell blames:

While it’s clear that we are continuing to execute with discipline in a competitive marketplace, we need to take additional measures in response to increasingly unsupportive federal government and regulatory decisions, legacy business declines and a macroeconomic environment with higher interest rates and continued inflation. As our business is hampered by regulatory decisions that discourage investment, we are slowing the pace of our network expansion and capping fibre speeds. 

Really Bell? I find it hard to be sympathetic when they still made money. And I find it even harder to be sympathetic when Bell decides to slash all these jobs after they finish their “Bell Let’s Talk” mental health campaign. Because slashing these jobs is sure to cause some mental health issues for those who are losing their jobs. But maybe I am looking at this wrong?

In any case maybe Bell needs to better “execute with discipline” given the environment which includes an “increasingly unsupportive federal government and regulatory decisions”. That might make their balance sheet look better. But again, maybe I’m looking at that wrong as well.

You might recall that I posted a story about Bell allegedly slowing down the rollouts of their fibre projects. And that when I asked Bell about that, they said that they had nothing to announce at the moment.

That changed with this press release:

Bell today announced its intention to reduce capital expenditures by over $1 billion in 2024-25, including a minimum of $500 to $600 million in 2024, money the company had planned to invest in bringing high-speed fibre Internet to hundreds of thousands of additional homes and businesses in rural, suburban and urban communities.

This reduction is in addition to Bell decreasing its 2023 capital expenditure budget by $100 million in anticipation of the CRTC decision to unrelentingly pursue wholesale access at the expense of critical network investment.

Bell’s fibre network is now available to over seven million homes and businesses. Prior to the CRTC’s decision, Bell’s near-term plan was to build high-speed fibre to nine million locations by the end of 2025. Bell will now re-consider pending builds in all communities where it had planned to expand, and will reduce its 2025 build target from nine million to 8.3 million locations.

Rolling back fibre network expansion is a direct result of the CRTC’s decision. Today’s decision forces Bell to open up its fibre network in Ontario and Quebec but does not mandate access to fibre-to-the-premises networks in western Canada where there are over three million fibre locations passed. If the intent of the decision is to benefit consumers then it is arbitrary and capricious to leave western Canadian consumers behind. When Bell enters a community with high-speed fibre Internet, it increases competition, and customers benefit from better service, better value and lower prices.

The CRTC decision that Bell is referring to is this one. The TL:DR is that the CRTC is going to make Bell and TELUS give access to independent competitors to sell internet services over their fibre networks in Ontario and Quebec. And clearly Bell doesn’t like that. And as a result, you get this situation. And to be honest, this press release has the feel of a two year old throwing their toys out of the baby carriage.

Bell can have an issue with something that the CRTC does, and that’s fine. There are ways of expressing that displeasure that Bell can use. But holding their customers and potential customers hostage should never be on the list. The fact that Bell immediately went to the hostage option is pathetic. It really doesn’t paint them in the best light and they should really reconsider their choices when it comes to this CRTC decision. Bell may have the best tech around, but as I have said previously, their customer service needs work, and this tendency for Bell to make their present and future customers hostages when they aren’t happy with the CRTC needs to stop. Otherwise they may find that this may come back to bite them.

Bell has been known for having “shady” door to door sales practices. CBC a few years ago caught them doing really shady things by going undercover. And there was this story where an ex Bell sales rep said that they were trained to lie to customers when they went door to door. This is a main reason why I have suggested to my clients that you need to call Bell directly if you want to sign up with them. This might be about to change as a class action lawsuit in Quebec has been allowed to proceed:

Quebec’s Court of Appeal has on Friday denied Bell’s request to appeal a ruling that authorized a class action against the company for alleged inappropriate door-to-door sales practices.

The lower class action certification court approved in July a class of plaintiffs to take Bell to court over allegations it violated the province’s Consumer Protection Act by instigating a service sales using a door-to-door salesman but concluding the contract over the phone.

Bell alleged that the evidence in front of the certification court meant that there was less than a simple possibility that the plaintiffs would win the case.

But the appeal court sided with the trial judge.

“Perhaps the hearing on the merits will make it possible to demonstrate that the respondent does not meet its burden of proof of the alleged facts and offenses; similarly, perhaps the hearing on the merits will make it possible to demonstrate that the composition of the group must be restricted and that certain types of contracts are not covered by the request for collective action: this is the aim of the defense and hearing on the merits,” the appeal court said.

“However, given the simple filtering role of the request for authorization and the even more restricted role of the judge responsible for authorizing appeals of judgments authorizing collective action, the applicant does not convince that the judge has, on the face of it judgment, erred in a manifest and decisive manner or committed a simple error of law,” it added.

Here’s the thing. If telcos in Canada want to be seen as something other than companies who take advantage of their customers whenever possible, this is the sort of behaviour that needs to stop. While Bell is seen as the worst at this sort of behaviour, all Canadian telcos do door to door sales and they all do it in a way that is suspect as best. If they all either stopped doing this, or did it in a way that doesn’t result in people wanting to sue them, they would be seen in a slightly better light. Then they can work on lowering their prices to something reasonable and having better customer service.

Bell Canada, Verizon, Vodafone and Matsuko successfully conducted the first live transatlantic collaborative meeting connecting multiple holographic people in Canada, the US and the UK using 5G and multi-access edge computing (MEC) technology.

Interacting with holograms of humans rather than avatars can provide a more personal experience for many applications such as remote healthcare, collaborative working, and education. The call was enabled by the speed of 5G combined with the quick response times of MEC, which moves the necessary computing closer to the edge of the network. This ensures a more reliable and consistent hologram by removing delays resulting from multiple hops between different locations and across the internet.

Holograms of employees located in three different countries were connected from Toronto, Canada, using Bell’s 5G network; New York in the US using Verizon’s 5G network; and from London, UK, using Vodafone’s 5G network. They were created using MATSUKO’s real-time software and just a single camera and were then streamed thanks to spatial computing, an immersive technology which combines virtual and augmented reality. MATSUKO’s patented technology uses its presence app on a smartphone coupled with a XR (Extended Reality) headset to stream holograms instantly, creating the feeling that people are in the same room as you.

Bell Canada, Verizon and Vodafone came together under the auspices of industry body, the 5G Future Forum (5GFF) for this first-of-its-kind demonstration. They are showing the transatlantic conference meeting and the technology behind it at the Mobile World Congress exhibition in Las Vegas (Booth #1533, located in GSMAs Open Gateway Zone).

MATSUKO was able to connect to the fast 5G networks of Bell Canada, Verizon, and Vodafone by using 5GFF’s Application Programmable Interface (API) – called 5GFF’s Edge Discovery API – which allows developers and ISVs like Matsuko to discover the nearest edge to their end users, so their applications perform optimally with a consistent service across mobile networks. Network APIs are a set of interfaces based on industry-wide open standards that allow developers to plug into and use the low-latency benefits, speed, and scale of 5G and MEC.

The 5GFF is inviting independent software vendors (ISVs) globally, who either currently use 5G MEC or have it on their development roadmap, to apply to join the organization’s acceleration program and work closely with some of the world’s leading telecommunications companies to shape the API development process. The program is designed to expand and interconnect the global MEC ecosystem by partnering and engaging with developers.

In addition, the 5GFF works closely with GSMA’s Open Gateway initiative, which launched earlier this year and now has over 30 signatories. Open Gateway is a framework of common network APIs designed to provide universal access to operator networks for developers and works closely with Linux Foundation’s CAMARA which develops API specifications.

For more information, visit https://www.5gff.org/5g-mec-acceleration-program/

A few years ago, I wrote this article about how Bell had the upper hand against Rogers, and at the time I said this:

Whatever choice Rogers picks, they have to get it done quickly as Bell is on a full court press to take this advantage that they have from a technical standpoint and turn it into something that makes Rogers an afterthought when it comes to Internet access.

What I meant by that is Bell at the time was rolling out fibre as fast as it could which Rogers couldn’t or wouldn’t match. Those days may be coming to an end based on this Reddit thread where it appears that Bell is either slowing or stopping rollouts of fibre.

Now many have commented in this thread about the reasons behind this, and the one reason that has been getting the most traction online is this. The TL:DR on this is that operating revenue is up but net earnings are down for Bell based on their Q2 results. And some speculate that until that changes, Bell is taking action to slow or stop their fibre rollout to save cash. To add to this, there are claims from people who claim to be contractors that Bell was using to roll out fibre confirming in this thread that this is actually happening. But for me, this is all speculation. What matters to me and what should matter to you is what are the facts behind this? Assuming that this is true of course.

To find out what the true answer is, I reached out to Bell as I have a decent relationship with them at the moment. And the TL:DR of my email exchange goes something like this. While Bell is always looking the pace of their network deployment and rollout plans, they don’t have anything specific to share with me at the moment. But when they do have something to share, it’s typically posted on their social media channels as well as via news releases on BCE.ca.

I’ll be monitoring this story to see if there are any developments in a positive or negative way regarding this. But I for one hope those developments aren’t in the latter category. Bell has really done a great job of bringing fibre to a lot of people over the last few years, which in turn helps them to push the competitive advantage that they have over competing telcos. And it would be a shame if that changes for the worse.

Earlier this week a firmware update that was pushed to my HH4000 modem that powers my Bell Fibe Internet broke the ability for it to use the Advanced DMZ functionality that I have been using for almost a year now. That forced me to resort to a  double NAT setup which was not ideal. But it kept me from being killed by my wife.

At the time I figured that there was some sort of issue between that firmware, and an ASUS firmware update that came out in May that caused similar issues. Now I am not so sure about that. Instead my current theory is that Bell might have been doing something to how the Advanced DMZ functionality works that caused this setup to break. I say that because Bell doesn’t put out release notes for their firmware updates. And even if they did, there’s no way to block firmware updates from happening or roll them back if you don’t like what you read. So you’re kind of at the mercy of Bell. But to be fair, that’s true for Rogers as well as any other ISP.

In any case, back to my experience since this firmware update came out. I have things working now. And this is how I did it:

• Go to 192.168.2.1 using a browser and be prepared to type in your HH4000 password
• Click on “Advanced Tools and Settings”
• Click on “DMZ”

At this point I removed my router from the “Active Device” section as illustrated from the picture below by clicking the “x” to the right of the device:

Once I did that, I removed the checkmark next to “Advanced DMZ” and turned off “DMZ” and clicked save. Then I rebooted the HH4000. Once I did that, I then did the following, which by the way, will eventually become my new recommendation in terms of how to enable the Advanced DMZ functionality. Once I get around to rewriting the instructions:

• Go to 192.168.2.1 using a browser and be prepared to type in your HH4000 password
• Click on “Advanced Tools and Settings”
• Go to “DHCP” and ensure that your router has a 192.168.2.xxx IP address.
• Click “Cancel”
• Click on “DMZ”
• Turn on “DMZ”
• Put a checkmark next to “Advanced DMZ”
• Under the word “Device”, find the MAC (Media Access Control) address for your router. That address is usually looks something like this: 2C:54:91:88:C9:E3. And it is likely located on the back or bottom of your router. Once you find it, click the “>” so that there is not only a checkmark next to it (as is the case with the first item in the screen shot), but it also gets copied to the right as pictured in the screen shot under the words “Active Device”. Alternately, you can look for the IP address that you confirmed earlier to find it.
• Click save.

At this point, pull the power to the HH4000 and wait a minute or two before plugging it back in.

That’s what enabled me to get my setup working without issues. Again, that implies to me that Bell changed something in this firmware. But like I said earlier, I have no way of confirming this. Thus why this happened in the first place is still a bit of a mystery to me.

A request to Bell users who have the Advanced DMZ setup and who have an HH4000, did this firmware update break things for you? Or was it a non-issue? I’d love to know to see if I am an edge case, or if there’s something going on here. Please leave a comment share your experience.