I saw a Pontiac Vibe with truck balls a few days ago, but I didn't have a picture of that to share.


We have Telus where I'm living now, and the internet cuts out if the phone rings.

We've got shaw at this house, and it's impeccable, despite having four+ computers running on it at once and phone service. Two years and no problems aside from one thunderstorm cut-out when the whole neighbourhood was in danger of being blown away and our cable wire was dancing in the wind. (it held fast though, and connectivity returned to full effect when the wind died away)

I had telus at the house previous to this one (for a year) and it took them over half a week to come out and fix the downed phone line in our back yard (internet and phone, bastards), AND they weren't all that interested in upgrading our lines so that we could actually GET service when I initially signed up.

My folks have run Shaw for years (since dial-up went away, pretty much). When our internet connectivity started to falter, I was on the phone with a technician within 20 minutes during peak hours. Once we'd exhausted all the remote-in options he and I could do in synchronicity over the phone, they sent a technician out to our house. The cable connecting our house to the grid had decomposed, apparently, and they quite happily replaced it in the spring once the ground had thawed.

Over all, I would have to say that the on-the-ground service from Shaw has easily surpassed Telus, by miles. Over the phone, I don't really know, I didn't talk to Telus all that much besides getting a lippy operator asking me why I was able to use my phone if the line had been knocked down in a storm...

My vote's Shaw.

anonymous = Leo

We're running Telus, and a few months ago they upped speed from 3Mbps to 6Mbps without changing the cost. Speed never fluctuates, never had anyone come over and have to fix anything. There's the rare time when it's been down for a couple hours or so, but I can count the incidences on one hand over the last 10 years. There's the occasional downtime that's fixed with a modem reboot but I can't remember the last time I had to do that. The only time it was down was when they cut us off for hitting close to 400% our download limit (which I have to say they don't enforce too well)

I've liked shaw over telus for a long time too, although I haven't used telus in a long time so I don't know their current level of service, I'm still happy enough with shaw internet.

This is a debate I have to get in on. I consider Telus to be the most basic form of corporate evil out there. When I need examples of their evil I tend to refer to them. Most of that however comes from their cell phone end of things so I'm not sure how fair it is to extend that general distaste for the company to their internet services as well.

I've had Shaw at home now for probably 15 years. We've had some issues in the past, but usually Shaw is really good at dealing with them if you just give them a call. They will send out their people to help you with whatever you need at your earliest convenience, including weekends. The last Shaw tech we had out to help my mom get cable into her bedroom was not just working on a sunday, but was also really useful in helping her get a much better deal on her digital cable box despite what she had tried to buy, and was also very helpful in suggesting how to set the system up, even telling us where the best wall mount brackets for the tv could be found.

Their service record aside, I used to have some issues with internet connectivity before we got the last modem upgrade. About once a month or so the internet would crap out randomly for a few minutes to a few hours. Often this could be solved by resetting the modem, suggesting hardware issues, the modem was 12 years old. For once however, the advertising is actually accurate, if you want to download anything, their new highspeed is very fast. I'm grabbing movies these days in about 40 minutes with only 5 or 6 seeds. I reach the unheard of download speed of about 1 meg regularly.

Oh, and their home phone service has been flawless for us.

Anyway, for me it's a matter of going with a company that I really do want to go unibomber on versus one that while imperfect, has been impressing of late.

I had Shaw at my dad's place (or, rather, he did) and Telus here. I would have to say that I prefer Telus. Fewer technical issues and more consistently a fast connection. (Shaw's would slow down a whole bunch in the early evening.) I am comparing two different time periods, of course. Telus may have been worse before and Shaw may have improved.

oh, and... Apparently the Great Gatsby, Revolutionary Road, All the Pretty Horses and Casino Royale belong on the list of America's 40 worst books. These people were seriously smoking something...

The reasoning goes something like this: "If badness is related to perceived greatness, then I offer "The Great Gatsby" (1925) as the worst novel in American literature. I haven’t read it for many years, since the only time I used it in a Modern American Fiction class, but I remember it as incredibly smug about its relationship to the traditional realistic novel." And so on.

James Lipton is a CHOREOGRAPHER???
wtf?