Shaw's Movie Club will be exempt from data caps. Is this a step forward or a leap backward?

Update: Shawinfo has since tweeted, "Shaw Movie Club over your internet connection does count towards the your data, just like netflix and other services."

Shaw's upcoming Netflix-rivalling service, Movie Club, will be exempt from the company's home internet plan data caps.

Effectively splitting its internet service into two tiers, Shaw has its crosshairs on out-doing Netflix's Canadian video stream offering, which is affected by internet providers' data limits.

This certainly favours any consumers eyeing up Shaw's platter. However, Vancouver's OpenMedia has come forth saying that Shaw shouldn't be allowed to provide its service on an unrestricted basis while choking Shaw users who prefer Netflix by retaining its data ceiling.

“It’s unfair for Shaw to restrict access to competing services by making them more expensive to use than Shaw’s own services,” says Steve Anderson, Executive Director of "pro-Internet group" OpenMedia.ca. “It clearly demonstrates that Internet metering isn't about paying for use; it’s about prioritizing Big Telecom’s services in order to hogtie the competition and assert dominance in multiple markets.”

OpenMedia believes this move "threatens internet openness and the digital economy" and is encouraging Canadians to continue to send messages to Shaw and the CRTC regarding this issue.

I don't necessarily agree with their take. It's certainly a sticky situation, but Shaw is offering a flat-fee for a data-intensive service and not putting a data cap on the service. If Netflix didn't launch in Canada, this never would have happened. Netflix came in, and Shaw has responded by creating a competing product. That's a sign of a healthy market, at least in some respects. Let's not get too angry that a telco is actually offering unlimited data for something—it doesn't happen very often.