QSat Technologies providing one-way satellite Internet service

QSat, a Quebec company, was brought to my attention this week as a company providing one-way satellite
Internet access in the area. One-way satellite uses a satellite link to receive information,
but uses a phone line and modem to upload sent information. This service seems very similar to the
one-way satellite Internet service that Bell Canada used to provide
through ExpressVu, and which it cancelled in 2005. QSat seems to have improved its offering over that of Bell's old offering, in that it supports v.92 modems on the uplink and it is significantly cheaper than Bell's cancelled service. It is unclear if QSat acts as ISP or just provides the infrastructure; Bell's service required a separate ISP.

While it is my opinion that one-way satellite Internet access is inferior to two-way satellite access, the price of QSat's service may be more in line with household budgets than two-way satellite, which tends to be somewhat more expensive.

PCWorld.ca article: Canadian Internet Service Landscape

Here's a link to an interesting article posted on PCWorld.ca about internet services in Canada. It's not really specific to rural access or to Ottawa, but somewhat applicable nonetheless. It is good to know what is typical Internet service in Canada, if only to know what you can reasonably expect in rural areas.