More good news: we still have 12hrs in our fundraising drive and Teksavvy and Acanac have generously offered to provide additional matching funds if we raise another $5,000 dollars.

Please chip in here: http://openmedia.ca/drive

This support will help us deepen our policy work and step up our outreach even further, at a key time.

We’ve received word that the CRTC is planning a set of invitation-only meetings with “stakeholders” on March 23-24 in Ottawa, where online broadcasting will be a major issue. Without the watchful eye of the public, these meetings could become yet another big telecom lobbying bonanza. We’ve seen this movie before and it doesn’t end well.

With your support we’ll do our best to ensure someone is representing Canadians at those meetings. You can help by getting us to our goal today.

Some key updates on our campaign:

CRTC Process begins

Check out our first submission to the CRTC’s UBB proceeding – remember, this is the one that you forced them to hold. Along with several other groups, OpenMedia.ca is calling for the CRTC to overhaul their entire pricing regime. To stay updated on the process, bookmark our website, Facebook page or Twitter.

Stop The Meter National Day of Action

Get involved with our National Day of Action this Saturday at 1 PM. Check out this video explaining what some people are doing. Help us reach half a million signatures on our petition!

More info here: http://openmedia.ca/local

If you can’t make it out on Saturday you can still take part by writing letters to your local MP, creating educational videos about StopTheMeter.ca, reaching out online, passing the petition around your office or school etc. – anything that helps educate Canadians about these new Internet fees. We’ve got some educational resources to help you out.

*If you take pictures, post videos or do anything else online please tag it with “StopTheMeter” and link back to the petition at http://stopthemeter.ca

This is where Canadians take a stand against the big phone and cable companies that have been gouging us for years.

In closing, check out Rick Mercer’s hilarious bit about our “Gouge-Based Heritage”. Share it on Facebook via this link: http://on.fb.me/gMzrl5.

For the Internet,

The OpenMedia.ca Team — Steve, Lindsey, Reilly, Shea, Glyn, and all of our volunteers

PS. Please don’t forget to support us today while we have matching funds available.

*OpenMedia.ca is a registered non-profit organization that relies on donations to operate.

New comment on your post #1841 “WOT Trust seal of Doom”

Comment:
I had the same thought after using WOT and seeing how webmasters could purchase the seal of approval, but I’ll use the add-on until I notice its rating system becoming spammed, if users can directly affect a site’s rating in the first place.

I won’t raise your site’s approval from the red because it makes your site more noticeable being in the red and it cites a potential hate system by the WOT businessmen. Plus, you show a distaste with them anyway. Your concerns are legitimate and I can only hope that WOT’s rating system can’t be corrupted by spamming.

New comment on your post #1841 “WOT Trust seal of Doom”
Author : Jacob (IP: 68.113.116.103 ,)

Comment:
Very solid points on WOT. I 100% agree that they should indeed address false claims when the website that was rated reports it.

Out of around 40-50 ratings on our website we had several people stating our remote computer repair company was a fraud and that we just steal money while not making any computer repairs. These are not customers, just people who troll sites. When we confronted WOT about the ratings and provided our BBB record and business licences to prove we were a legit busienss we simply got a generic reply stating they do nothing to change user ratings and people can say whatever they want to about us.

this really does turn WOT into something it was not meant to be. In the end we were able to contact all the members who rated us negatively and after showing proof to everyone who actually responded they removed their negative feedback realizing we were a legitimate company. however two ratings are still there that are clearly false and because those members aren’t checking their board in WOT our rating will never change.

WOT would be great if everyone who rated sites gave honest and informed desicions. The fact that a site owner has no recourse (or at least very little) really takes away from the site.

At the very least site owners should be able to rebuttal any comments with notes.

To add to this there are many services out there that make purchasing ratings very possible and easy. As stated in this article it would be very easy for a criminal to get positive ratings on their site while negatively rating other sites in their niche. Not something I do or condone but there current system is broken.