The Forum > Article Comments > 1000Mbps is sexy, it’s cool, but is it worth $43bn? > Comments
1000Mbps is sexy, it’s cool, but is it worth $43bn? : Comments
By Jeff Hosking, published 17/8/2010There has been a lot of hype about the national broadband network but do we really need its speed and capacity now?
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I am old enough to remember the first calculators it was basic and cost me the equivalent of $250 in today's money.
When mini mainframes first come out they were the size of two large refrigerators and sold for $4-8000000they had 128 k of ram and were driven by multiple low end 80386. Functionally they were extremely limited. In fact one office unit had separate boxes for different functions. WP, accounts, etc.
Few in those days would recognized the potential of both today.Those who did ranted and raved drawing up spreadsheets of costs(another discrete box). of how computer were going to be the doom of economies.
I even remember the same tired rhetoric being trotted out about the net. Guess what today better calcs are given away; today's lap tops are orders of magnitudes more powerful than those minis.
Add to that many of our competitors already have this technology NOW.
The point is you supply the bandwidth (and entrepreneurs WILL fill it with uses people will want.
Oh yes, and technology will get cheaper.
It is clear that SM and others are more concerned with proselytizing their party dogma than discussing the issue objectively.
BTW I am limited by my speed because I am subject to a commercial monopoly ....I can't get enough bandwidth to run functions/services that exist Now. Frankly the objections to the NBN and the inadequate alternative are a crock.