Canadians can't stand going without coffee. Even worse? Not having a team in the FIFA World Cup event for 2014. Absolutely unthinkable, say eight of ten Canadians.

But you know what they really hate? Metered Internet pricing, or Usage Based Billing (UBB) as they call it—letting the dominant Internet Service Providers charge broadband subscribers and smaller competitive ISPs by the quantity of data use.

That's a practice that the government regulator, the Canadian Radio-Telecommunications Commission (CRTC), approved for Bell Canada in September. YouTube is now the place that Canadians go to vent their rage over the decision. Warning: Canadian-style expletive fest in T minus two seconds:

"Hi. I've been hearing a lot about this UBB thing," begins the video commentary of an at first glance mild mannered college student. "And frankly, it's f**king bulls**t!!"

"You can't charge us for using the Interne—" the young lady continues, then loses her composure. "Like, oh my God. I don't know how to say this," she claims, while clenching her fist.

Oh yes she does, it turns out.

"F**king... money... grubbing... a**holes are just f**king trying to put their hand in your pocket one more time!!!"

A free hand

The CRTC has heard from the public on the issue, and today it made a small change to help indie ISPs compete on pricing plans. (Some smaller ISPs want to differentiate themselves by offering flat-rate, unlimited Internet, but since the big ISPs can now impose UBB on the small ISPs, this is more difficult.)

The CRTC "received a large number of public comments, generally opposing UBB," the agency drily acknowledged on Tuesday. And so, to show what good listeners its Commissioners are, the agency has granted indie ISPs who buy broadband wholesale from the big networks a 15 percent discount on the metered rate that the big guys charge consumers.

"Services provided by smaller competitors bring pricing discipline, innovation, and consumer choice to the retail Internet service market," the CRTC's decision explained. "The Commission considers that, in the absence of a discount on carriers' wholesale UBB rates relative to their comparable retail UBB rates, smaller competitors' ability to continue to differentiate their retail Internet services would be unduly impaired."

Reform group Open Media calls this change a "small step in the right direction," but a very small one. "The CRTC has once again left the wolves in charge of the henhouse," declared Steve Anderson, OpenMedia.ca's national coordinator. "It is deeply disappointing that the Commission has decided to give a few companies a free hand to engage in economic discrimination and crush innovation."

Still, even with this development, Canada remains ahead of the United States in some ways. Canada's regulators require big Canadian ISPs like Bell, Rogers, and Shaw to practice line sharing—to open their networks to smaller ISPs at wholesale rates in order to boost competition. Our Federal Communications Commission has shut the door on that prospect for over a half a decade now.

Big Hair Report

But Canadians regard UBB as a means of both ripping off consumers and kicking the line-sharing rules in the knees. Eighty percent of them now report watching some kind of video content online. And it looks like a sizable percentage also use the Xtranormal video animation application to get their anti-UBB message across.

"Don't you listen to Internet radio?" one Xtranormie asks an Elvis lookalike in an office setting.

"Yes," the other replies. "I listen religiously to the Big Hair Report that streams on Follicle Radio every Monday and Thursday. I'm also a fan of the All Elvis Network."

"And don't you watch video online?"

"Yes I do. I just signed up for Netflix. And I like to watch old Starsky and Hutch reruns."

"Well," the first explains, "Usage Based Billing will limit Web innovation to only those who can afford it!"

Other Xtranormal performances get more political, such as this caricature of Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper's response to the concerns of a furious consumer.

"What plans do you have to put a stop to this?" the citizen asks.

"First, the economy is the Conservative government's first priority," the Xtranormal version of Harper replies. "That's why I have personally authorized Mr. [James] Flaherty to give tax cuts to big corporations like Bell. Economics teaches us that if you give corporations lots of money, the wealth will trickle down to everyone and improve our economy."

"Our plan is to give Bell as much money as possible," Xtra-Harper continues. "By supporting the CRTC decision we ensure that Bell's monopoly grows, which will give them even more money and more power . . . "

Yeah—we're betting that those aren't Harper's exact words. But these angry video missives are the digital face of a bona fide citizen revolt against UBB, one supported by Canada's New Democratic Party.

"The large ISP-broadcast entities now have a tool for squashing their main competitors—both in internet and video services," warned NDP MP Charles Angus last week. "We need clear rules that put consumers first."