NBN Rollout Scrapped

sptrawler · 18 March 2013

Well drsmith, this article just about sums up my thoughts on the NBN.

http://www.theage.com.au/digital-li...e-worlds-fastest-internet-20130314-2g22s.html

As I've said all along, I can understand it for business, but to the home is an absolute waste of my taxes, at this point in time.
Another Labor stuff up.
It was great to read what a geek thought of bling speed internet.

chrislp · 18 March 2013

So_Cynical said:
SimCity 5 (the new Simcity) The Servers are there for 2 reasons, DLC (downloadable content) and MP (Multiplayer regions) a lot of unhappy people due to the login servers not coping with the demand, happens with pretty much every big game release...The Game publishers want everyone logged in so that its easier to manage their content and thus sell them more content. helps with patching to, and by all accounts Simcity will need a lot of patching to fix the game.

http://consumerist.com/2013/03/09/e...away-free-games-to-people-who-bought-simcity/

There's a 3rd reason. Always on DRM.

sptrawler · 18 March 2013

So_Cynical said:
SimCity 5 (the new Simcity) The Servers are there for 2 reasons, DLC (downloadable content) and MP (Multiplayer regions) a lot of unhappy people due to the login servers not coping with the demand, happens with pretty much every big game release...The Game publishers want everyone logged in so that its easier to manage their content and thus sell them more content. helps with patching to, and by all accounts Simcity will need a lot of patching to fix the game.

http://consumerist.com/2013/03/09/e...away-free-games-to-people-who-bought-simcity/

Yeh, forgot to mention, now we know why So_Cynical wants us to spend $50B of tax dollars on high speed internet.
Well at least it's not pr0n.LOL
Why spend the money on a food bowl in the North of Australia, when you can do it in 'Simcity'.
I wonder why we bother?:1zhelp:

drsmith · 18 March 2013

sptrawler said:
As I've said all along, I can understand it for business, but to the home is an absolute waste of my taxes, at this point in time.

Prioritisation is hopefully where the Opposition will go.

They will hopefully be better prepared this time than "I'm no Bill Gates".

NBNMyths · 19 March 2013

sptrawler said:
Well drsmith, this article just about sums up my thoughts on the NBN.

http://www.theage.com.au/digital-li...e-worlds-fastest-internet-20130314-2g22s.html

As I've said all along, I can understand it for business, but to the home is an absolute waste of my taxes, at this point in time.
Another Labor stuff up.
It was great to read what a geek thought of bling speed internet.

1. As has been explained ad-infinitum, it's not using your tax dollars. The users of the NBN ultimately pay for the build, not taxpayers.

2. You could make the same argument about every utility rollout over the years. Power, water, sewer, telephone. In fact, The Ecomomist (the same one that loudly criticises the NBN currently) also heaviliy criticised the construction of the London Sewer system in 1848. The boss of the British Post Office criticised the rollout of the telephone network as unnecessary.

History is replete with examples of conservatives criticising the construction or deployment of infrastructure that we take for granted today. And so it is with the NBN. The only difference is the century, but mark my words, in 50 years we will look back at "The NBN is an unnecessary waste of money" quotes with the same humour as we do for the sewer/power/phone quotes of the last couple of centuries.

3. It's true that there's not much currently that you can do with 1Gbps broadband that you can't do (albeit much more slowly) with 50Mbps internet.

But are we seriously to believe that uses will not be developed? Although the following is slightly tongue-in-cheek, it's also valid. Consider it seriously, then substitute FTTP broadband for electricity and read it again:

Let's step back ~120 years to the rollout of electricity networks:

Person A:
Electricity is nice and all, but what can I do with it that my current gas light or candles can't do? We should spend the money on better hospitals or the war effort instead.

Person B:
But things will be invented that use electricity, that gas lights or candles can't do. Maybe even things that help the hospitals.

Person A:
Like what? How could invisible energy that simply creates light possibly help sick people? What they need is medicine and more doctors. Anyway, why don't we just wait until those things are invented, then build the electricity networks afterwards?

Person B:
Well, they probably won't be invented until the electricity is there for people to find uses for it. Supply and demand.

etc etc

I guess its lucky for us that the Governments of the day overcame the luddite factor, and they did roll out sewers, electricity and telephone wires.

Now, feel free to explain to me why its not a valid analogy.

Calliope · 19 March 2013

NBNMyths said:
But are we seriously to believe that uses will not be developed?

"If you build it, he will come."

and they did roll out sewers

I would like to see that.

drsmith · 19 March 2013

NBNMyths said:
Now, feel free to explain to me why its not a valid analogy.

It's an emotive analysis, not a critical one.

drsmith · 19 March 2013

Calliope said:
"If you build it, he will come."

That's what Isambard Kingdom Brunel thought. They did eventually, but too late for his defining project to be a commercial success.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Great_Eastern

sptrawler · 19 March 2013

NBNMyths, unlike your examples of electricity replacing gas and candles. Also installing a sewage sytem where non existed prior and installing telephone systems, again where non were present.
All the examples are of new technologies, the fibre to the home is providing the same service, with faster speed.
It is a bit like replacing your Ford Focus with a Porshe, it is fabulous for the first few weeks. Then the Porsche is just another car, to get you from point A to point B.
I thought the article I posted highlighted the issue very well.

NBNMyths · 19 March 2013

drsmith said:
It's an emotive analysis, not a critical one.

How so? Given historical fact, and the incessant march of online technologies, increasing video and image resolution and move to 'cloud' based services, I doubt even the most "non Bill Gates" luddite would agree that it is almost a certainty that uses requiring superfast broadband will soon emerge.

drsmith said:
That's what Isambard Kingdom Brunel thought. They did eventually, but too late for his defining project to be a commercial success.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Great_Eastern

Poor analogy. A railway isn't really an enabling technology. It will always be limited to the transport of goods or people. It may be able to transport them faster or further, but that's the limit.

The NBN (like electricity and the copper network) is an enabling technology.

Electricity was initially a lighting network. However it enabled the invention (and use) of refrigeration, heating, A/C, computers etc.

The copper network was for voice telephony. However, it enabled the invention of telex, fax, fire/security alarm systems, networking, then the internet and all the uses for it.

Think about it. If the copper telephone network was never built, then none of those things would have ever occurred, and I wouldn't be writing this today.

NBNMyths · 19 March 2013

sptrawler said:
NBNMyths, unlike your examples of electricity replacing gas and candles. Also installing a sewage sytem where non existed prior and installing telephone systems, again where non were present.
All the examples are of new technologies, the fibre to the home is providing the same service, with faster speed.
It is a bit like replacing your Ford Focus with a Porsche, it is fabulous for the first few weeks. Then the Porsche is just another car, to get you from point A to point B.
I thought the article I posted highlighted the issue very well.

Put yourself back there.

You already have lights, provided by gas or candles. Or, you spend billions of dollars (in today's money) rolling out a network of wires across the nation to provide lights via electricity. What is the benefit? For such a massive spend, is the minor advantage of electric lights over gas lights really worth it? They both provide light. Remember that all the other uses for electricity must be ignored in any assessment, because those uses did not exist then.

Fibre is to broadband as electric lights were to gas lights.

dutchie · 19 March 2013

NBNMyths said:
Fibre is to broadband as electric lights were to gas lights.

And perhaps

Wireless to fibre is as electric lights were to gas lights.

You just don't know. They probably thought electricity was not possible at the time of gas too.

NBNMyths · 19 March 2013

dutchie said:
And perhaps

Wireless to fibre is as electric lights were to gas lights.

You just don't know. They probably thought electricity was not possible at the time of gas too.

No, a torch is to an electric light as wireless is to fibre.

A torch is mobile and very handy sometimes. But would you replace your electric lights at home with them?

Electricity has never violated the laws of physics, which wireless (radio-via-air) would have to do to achieve anything more than about 1/20,000th the capacity of light-via-fibre.

medicowallet · 19 March 2013

Rollout is way way behind schedule and no doubt way way over budget... the end of this money sink cannot come soon enough...

Perhaps if the government actually sat down and made a plan, and worked out a budget and realistic goals, we wouldn't have this ridiculous money sink.

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/political-news/conroy-wont-commit-to-nbn-target-20130319-2gde3.html

medicowallet · 19 March 2013

NBNMyths said:
The NBN (like electricity and the copper network) is an enabling technology.

It will enable:

1) people to download pr0n faster
2) people to pirate movies faster
3) people to consume to a greater extent
4) an industry filled with golden handshakes
5) businesses to value add to charge the consumer more
6) to game with lower pings

All this is being sold as good for us.

When currently ADSL2 is more than sufficient for the vast majority of home users who have access to it.
When currently people do not even have phone lines and are moving to wireless
When currently important projects with proven export results are hamstrung by second rate infrastructure

It will be all over soon (well mostly anyway).

MW

dutchie · 19 March 2013

NBNMyths said:
No, a torch is to an electric light as wireless is to fibre.

A torch is mobile and very handy sometimes. But would you replace your electric lights at home with them?

Electricity has never violated the laws of physics, which wireless (radio-via-air) would have to do to achieve anything more than about 1/20,000th the capacity of light-via-fibre.

OK NBNMyths I hear what you are saying.

But just to make it absolutely clear to me in this regard -

Are you saying man will never discover/develop a wireless system as quick as fibre?

NBNMyths · 19 March 2013

dutchie said:
OK NBNMyths I hear what you are saying.

But just to make it absolutely clear to me in this regard -

Are you saying man will never discover/develop a wireless system as quick as fibre?

Never say never. However, I do believe it is extremely unlikely, and for it to occur we would (literally) have to change some established laws of physics relating to the known size of the radio and light spectrums.

Even unproven, experimental ideas like DIDO only improve the ability to share the available radio bandwidth better. The total space available is not increased.

Don't underestimate the difference in fibre v wireless capability... To put it into some perspective, 100% of Australia's entire international phone and internet traffic is currently carried on just 36 strands of optical fibre, and those fibres would only be using 1% of their practical capability if they were all running the most recent current electronic technology at each end. In other words, a single strand of fibre could easily carry all of Australia's international phone/broadband traffic at the same time.

Compare that to the very best 4G mobile networks, which already struggle to serve a few hundred simultaneous connections.

NBNMyths · 19 March 2013

medicowallet said:
It will enable:

1) people to download pr0n faster
2) people to pirate movies faster
3) people to consume to a greater extent
4) an industry filled with golden handshakes
5) businesses to value add to charge the consumer more
6) to game with lower pings

All this is being sold as good for us.

When currently ADSL2 is more than sufficient for the vast majority of home users who have access to it.
When currently people do not even have phone lines and are moving to wireless
When currently important projects with proven export results are hamstrung by second rate infrastructure

It will be all over soon (well mostly anyway).

MW

Ahh, the copper phone network. It was the death of society as we knew it. It enabled:

1) People to download pr0n
2) People to pirate music and videos
3) People to consume stuff they don't need via the internet
4) Scammers to con people out of money
5) Women to gossip while they sat at home
6) Criminals to plan robberies

Let's get rid of it.

NBNMyths · 19 March 2013

NBN support rises to 73 percent of Australians

Good to see I'm not alone.....

NBN support rises to 73 percent of Australians

A new poll has shown that support for Labor’s National Broadband Network project has risen over the past few months to a total of 73 percent, adding to a long-term trend of enduring support for the initiative demonstrated over the past several years; with even a majority of Coalition voters supporting the project.

The poll published today was recently taken by research house Essential Media, using a sample size of 1,874 Australians. One of the questions it asked was whether those polled supported or opposed a certain set of Government decisions, including the NBN, the Minerals Resource Rent Tax and the carbon tax.

In response to the question, some 35 percent of respondents indicated they strongly supported the NBN project, while some 38 percent supported it, making a total of 73 percent, up from 69 percent in a similar poll taken on 26 November last year. Only 9 percent of respondents strongly opposed the NBN policy and a further 10 percent opposed it, making only 19 percent in total of Australians which opposed the project. A further 8 percent of respondents didn’t know how they felt about the NBN.

“The decision which has the most support amongst respondents is the NBN, with 73% in favour and only 19% opposed – an increase in support since this question was last asked in November,” wrote Essential Media in its comments associated with the poll.

The detailed results also show that while support for the NBN was strongest amongst Labor and Greens voters (88 percent in both camps supported the NBN), the majority of Coalition voters also supported the NBN, with 61 percent in total supporting the project and only 33 percent against it. Only 18 percent of Coalition voters strongly opposed the project, while a further 15 percent opposed it.

http://delimiter.com.au/2013/03/18/nbn-support-rises-to-73-percent-of-australians/

dutchie · 19 March 2013

NBNMyths said:
Never say never. However, I do believe it is extremely unlikely, and for it to occur we would (literally) have to change some established laws of physics relating to the known size of the radio and light spectrums.

Even unproven, experimental ideas like DIDO only improve the ability to share the available radio bandwidth better. The total space available is not increased.

Don't underestimate the difference in fibre v wireless capability... To put it into some perspective, 100% of Australia's entire international phone and internet traffic is currently carried on just 36 strands of optical fibre, and those fibres would only be using 1% of their practical capability if they were all running the most recent current electronic technology at each end. In other words, a single strand of fibre could easily carry all of Australia's international phone/broadband traffic at the same time.

Compare that to the very best 4G mobile networks, which already struggle to serve a few hundred simultaneous connections.

I guess that most people just don't like the idea of a government (irrespective of private funding) spending so much money on a project without a cost benefit analysis.
Irrespective of the accuracy of a cba (and I would think that they could be done better now than say 10/20 years ago) people would at least be able to see the pro's and con's of the system as it relates directly to them.

The government got a lot of people offside from the get go by not doing one (me for starters!)

To most objectors its overkill and repeats the governments inability to sell a policy.

NBN Rollout Scrapped

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