NBN
I note that a lot of comment on the internet about NBN seems to revolve around “it’s NBN or nothing” as in ” if Abbott gets in bye-bye NBN” Silly really, rusted on ALP supporters seem to be treating NBN as a synonym for broadband.
It’s more a synonym for “Rolls Royce”
I’m a bit of a geek and fully acknowledge the superiority of optic fiber but that certainly doesn’t mean I think everyone in the country should have access to it. I don’t need it, nor do millions of other people who use the internet for generally seeking knowledge, communicating with family or generally finding out what is going on in the world.
Several of my children and their friends don’t even have hard wired broadband, they are happy with wireless and over the time it will take to implement the NBN, they will be become happier as technology improves.
The planned NBN will not take advantage of any of these developments in wireless delivery or other developments that we don’t even know about yet. It is, in effect, putting all it’s eggs in one basket.
I might be happy in the metro area but I know my country cousins are less so. A lot of them don’t even get reliable mobile services due to their isolation so they do deserve something better.
However, when I did a tour of Queensland and the Territory in 2004 I kept on bumping into Telstra gangs that were busy laying fiber to Indigenous settlements. That’s six years ago so something may have come of it. It does mean that the bush has been getting some attention but obviously not enough.
For those who think the ALP invented fibre note this map;
People have commented that the copper system we have now is getting old but that only means we should be upgrading on a maintenance programme. It certainly doesn’t necessarily mean we should replace the entire network overnight.
Industry, commerce generally and governments should have access to high speed fiber and I’m fairly sure that a lot already do. There is a case to develop infrastructure to ensure they all have it but I’m not convinced every house in every town should have or needs to have it.
Not immediately, anyway.
People have commented that the copper system we have now is getting old but that only means we should be upgrading on a maintenance programme. It certainly doesn’t necessarily mean we should replace the entire network overnight.
Industry, commerce generally and governments should have access to high speed fiber and I’m fairly sure that a lot already do. There is a case to develop infrastructure to ensure they all have it but I’m not convinced every house in every town should have or needs to have it.
Not immediately, anyway.
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I’m a bit of a rural geek, who is stuck on Satellite BB, and I’d much rather see the Govt pay off its debts and then look at paying for upgraded infrastructure with money they have rather than borrowed money that I will have to pay back.
Like everything else man-made, fibre must have a life which means regular/on condition replacement. $40 billion sounds just the beginning.
I have been wondering about this “new” broadband thing for a while.
As you note, there is already a bunch of fibre links already in the ground and operating. More are currently being laid as I type.
So, just what is this “new” network being talked up by these clowns?
A totally government-controlled system that runs about as well as everything else that government does?
It was only about six weeks ago that I was talking to a couple of blokes who have been all over the country on the existing projects. Their job is to join and terminate the fibres. They have been busy for over a year. So, of which “NBN” do our new masters in Canberra speak?
Just for laughs, I’m 1km from Telstra Fibre Optics, had they put the right electronics on the end of that FO, I could get ADSL 2. they didn’t and I’m stuck with Satellite.
As a matter of interest, Telstra countrywide, just prior to Sol Trujillos time, ran trials on long line ADSL with robust repeaters that were line powered and would work underwater – by daisy chaining them ADSL could be delivered out to 20kms from the exchange. Telstra Countrywide released a press release that this was the way of the future.
Sol wanted wireless, so the rollout ceased and the tech died in Australia, no reason it couldn’t be updated and rolled out now.
“So, just what is this “new” network being talked up by these clowns?”
The NBN is a brand new network duplicating much of Telstra’s fibre.
It will cost well in excess of the $43 billion claimed by Gillard and will be the school-halls of this term (last) of the Gillard Greens alliance.
Telstra was bribed by the ALP with $11 billion of YOUR money not to offer competing products on its existing fibre, coax, copper and wireless network.
Many of Telstra’s customers can already access 100Mbit download speeds and faster and those who need it do – most large organisations, universities, hospitals and so on are already connected into Telstra’s network via fibre.
They need the bandwidth, but average internet users in their homes don’t need 100Mbit or 1Gbit download speeds via a hard wired connection – the new generations certainly don’t as they vote with their thumbs by purchasing iPhones, iPads, iPod touch and wireless USB ‘dongles’ – many members of gen X,Y & Z will never opt to connect to a wired network, they are already committed to a wireless work and lifestyle and cannot comprehend why anyone would choose to be tethered to a wall socket.
For example; it’s a constant refrain from pollsters that their results are being skewed by the number of young people who are ‘off grid’ and can’t be polled via conventional land line telephones.
As a result the whole farcical NBN project will just be yet another unnecessary wasteful Labor budget blown scheme which will lay unused in the ground and strung between power poles as testimony to the ALP’s short-sightedness.
Fibre to the home is as forward looking as A & B push button phone boxes and operator connected ‘trunk calls’.
Anyone got a ‘threepenny bit’ – I’ve got to walk down to the corner to call mum?
The real issue to me is that none of this has been costed. No one has any idea of how much it will cost in the long run and there has been very little discussion as to possible alternatives. The only thing for certain is that the tax payer will be the victims.