Seriously. This just might be a thing. Vodacom and MTN can’t handle the fact that over-the-top (OTT’s) services such as Whatsapp or Google Hangouts work at comparatively lower rates than the traditional telephone calls or sms. So they are going to use all their power and influence to get it regulated.

This was confirmed yesterday by the Portfolio Committee on Telecommunications and Postal Services when they announced a scheduled hearing on 26 January. apparently, they have been set to discuss “necessary policy interventions on how to govern OTTs, regulatory interventions on the guidelines to regulate OTTs” and the “impact of OTTs on competition”.

What competition? The competition for the big guys to make money? Urgh. Over-the-top services are those which allow users to send messages or make calls over data networks, such as Wi-Fi. Such services have skyrocketed in South Africa with over 10 million users in the country.

 The hearing are planned to be open to the public and there is yet to be a venue set, but more details will arise closer to the date. Yet there has already been backlash – obviously – from experts in the industry. One such spokesperson is Dominic Cull, a communications regulatory expert at Ellipsis Regulatory Solutions, had this to say:

It looks as if mobile networks still have some lobbying power in terms of getting these matters before bodies like Parliament.

WhatsApp is obviously in the forefront. You know why the mobiles (mobile networks) are upset: It’s a revenue question. But we’re also talking about TeamViewer, Google Hangouts, Viber etc.

A challenge about regulating OTT is that just about everything provided over the network could be regarded as an OTT.

Once you can’t divide them up, it obviously becomes ludicrous to try and regulate them.

But what’s interesting is the MTN and Vodacom aren’t going for the small fish, like they did with Mxit back in the day…

The parties which are in the firing line here – in terms of the regulation – are not the usual suspects such as ISPs (internet service providers) and smaller players looking to compete. We’re talking about Facebook, Google, Microsoft and the like.

So, we’re talking about substantial multinationals that have an interest here.

And the second thing is that this is one of the rare telecommunications issues which people get. So, they understand WhatsApp. They know what it means to the spend on communication

Surely this is not the way to go about earning more cash. If you want to increase your revenue you have got to get with the times. It’s like taxis versus Uber: don’t try shut them down, you got to either raise your game or admit defeat.

[source: timeslive]