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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 17/8/2010

There 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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Frankly this article is more Luddite than accurate.
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.
Posted by examinator, Wednesday, 18 August 2010 12:58:52 PM
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Examinator,

The difference between the coalition plan and the NBN is the last fibre cable from the street corner to the home. If an entrepreneur wants the 100Mbps broadband, all he needs to is to get the short length of cable installed. Any businesses or CBDs will get it installed anyway. The only people getting an increase to 12 Mbps instead of 100Mbps will be families, 99% of which don't need any where near 12Mbps.

FYI, the new codec H264 being rolled out enables full HD live streaming that uses 8Mbps, or 4Mbps for interlaced. This means with 12Mbps you could watch 3 HD channels at once. This of course requires more powerful computers to decode, but standard dual core PCs are perfectly capable.

A decade or so ago 12Mbps could just give you live streaming of just one ordinary TV channel. So new technology does not simply require more everything. Sometimes it enables you to do more with less.

Labor's field of dreams philosophy (build it and they will come) displays ignorance, arrogance, and hubris.
Posted by Shadow Minister, Wednesday, 18 August 2010 1:51:44 PM
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Dear Examinator,

"It is clear that SM and others are more concerned with proselytizing their party dogma than discussing the issue objectively."

Please don't count me among those "others". There are many things I dislike about the Liberals, but one of the main reasons that I give them my preference over Labor this time, is this NBN. If it goes ahead, then in a few years I will be left without a phone at home. No thanks!
Posted by Yuyutsu, Wednesday, 18 August 2010 2:03:43 PM
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SM,
You have adroitly avoided my points
- technology will come with the band width not the other way around.

- I can't get or won't be given the option of ADSL2 other than through telstra's ridiculously high rates. They have a *monopoly* and under your system that monopoly would remain. There is no competition.

- Technologies will get cheaper as there is more up take. When I went on line I was paying 10C per minute for the internet at 1200BPS!
Now I pay $42 for 30 gigs.

- There will be technologies that we don't know about by the time it's implemented.

- Competitors of ours have the faster tech now.

- You are arguing politically myopic arguments to win this election for the Libs not the topic.

Yuyutsu,

By the time telephone go out we'll have screen phones or the like. Your fears are unsustainable.
Posted by examinator, Wednesday, 18 August 2010 2:49:07 PM
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At the moment the market is deciding which technology will be the winner for a given situation/requirement and demand/cost.

The governmnet has decreed that the winner is fibre to the home, for all, and forever more, and at whatever cost and regardless of demand/requirements. In fact it is so confident, it has done no cost-benefit analysis at all.

As Sir Humphrey would say, that's a very brave policy.

PS: 'Policy' is being generous. As I said, it's actually a tantrum at Telstra, a discarded PM's thought bubble.
Posted by Houellebecq, Wednesday, 18 August 2010 2:55:42 PM
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Hey Examinator,

"By the time telephone go out we'll have screen phones or the like"

But I don't want a screen phone (I am nude at home most of the time and don't need my Mom to ask me why I haven't cleaned my ears), never wanted, never will. I am just extremely happy with what I've got: 3 telephones conveniently placed in 3 different rooms, plus a small caller-ID device, all connected to the same copper wire-pair.

I conscientiously oppose to mobiles, and so far, what the experts on OLO told me is that with the advent of NBN, I will not be allowed to keep my little peaceful hide-out. I don't want to be disconnected from friends, family and essential services - so are you, or Labor for that matter, able to promise me otherwise?
Posted by Yuyutsu, Wednesday, 18 August 2010 3:16:18 PM
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