Re: Sympatico Petition

[Toto <toto@sk.sympatico.ca>]

john smith wrote:
> 
> Please tell me everything Sympatico has done to make you think they
> moniter your email. Everything please and i can make something of it.

  When I first saw your email re: Sympatico petition, I assumed
that Sympatico would be monitoring activity surrounding the
petition. I visted your web site on Oct 28 and surfed around.
When I got to the petition-signing page, I decided not to sign,
in order to see if those merely visiting the page were being 
monitored.

I pretty much forgot about it until I got an email from Sympatico Admin
which dealt with what appeared to be bogus concerns, and containing
vague threats of loss of access.
I checked out the headers on my past incoming and outgoing email
and found changes in the way it was routed and dealt with--changes
which started shortly after I visited your website. I confirmed
the results of my traffic analysis on my own account by checking
them against those of another Sympatico account whose records 
I have access to, and which is used as a 'control' because it is 
used only for very normal and boring communications by a very regular
jane/joe.
(The changes started late on Oct 28th, and I got the threat from
 Sympatico on Nov. 4th.)

As well, my follow up communications with Sympatico Admin resulted in
replies which contained further evidence that the claims they were
making in regard for the reasons for their actions were askew.

Sympatico is little more than a company that acts as a front for
the Canadian Telecos, so that they can continue to operate what are
basically monopolies, without appearing to do so.
SaskTel charged outrageous connect charges of ~$5.00 an hour out
in the boonies, as long as they could. When it became apparent that
they couldn't get away with it for much longer, Sympatico appeared
on the scene, as SaskTel's 'competition'.
The two entered into a sweetheart deal which effectively allows
Sympatico and SaskTel to operate a dual monopoly, by making it
difficult for small operators in the boonies to get a cut of the
action.

You may have noticed that 'Sympatico Admin' is pretty much synonymous
with the SaskNet Admin. Their bum-buddy relationship is covered by
only a thin veil of pretension.
SaskTel still manages to maintain a semi-monopoly in the big cities,
but their real power comes in the boondocks, where the Sympatico
deal allowing no toll-charges effectively cuts out the smaller
providers who can only offer services to a handful of in-area
customers.

The bottom line is that there are advantages to the basic infrastrucure
of the system being developed by a single entity, such as SaskTel, but
if that entity is allowed to pick and choose who receives preferred 
treatment, then they tend to do so in their own interests, and not in
the interests of the end users.
SaskTel charged $5.00/hr connect time in the boonies until there were
enough complaints that they made a deal with Sympatico to control the
market at slightly less monopolistic rates. People tend not to figure
out that the change from $5.00/hr to around $1.50/hr, practically
overnight, merely reflects that SaskTel charged over twice what was
reasonable, for as long as they could get away with it.

I checked the numbers, in regard to bandwidth costs, etc., to hook up
and provide an InterNet service, and found that the types of rates
you quote on your website are not out of line, but are not possible
if one cannot get the type of deal Sympatico gets.
  e.g. - I charge you $20/month for total access, but you pay $6.00/hr
        to SaskTel for long-distance charges, to connect.

SaskTel/Sympatico will continue to maintain a monopoly whose prices
will reflect how much they can charge before complaints force them
to move toward more truly competitive rates.
I applaud your efforts to make some noise in this regard, and hope
that they have the effect of forcing SaskTel/Sympatico to maintain
their monopoly at more reasonable rates than at present.

I am somewhat notorious in certain areas of the underground computer
movement, having been involved in the dissemination of a number of 
subversive on-line manuscripts, so I often get hackers and phreaks 
sending me confidential information from my ISP's.
I found it rather humorous that the original email from the Sympatico
Admin:
> Please note: this note is being sent to our security dept. as we
> deem this type of activity to be mis-use of the mail system and
> as such you could loose your access privileges.
...contained an 'additional' note from a hacker named the Evil-1,
who added:
> [And I'll make sure you get a copy! (;>} ~~ Evil-1]

Toto
~~~~
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"The Final Frontier"
http://www3.sk.sympatico.ca/carljohn