With the sad news of the computer world's Steve Jobs' passing it makes one think as to how much we rely on the phenomenon developed by this great man.
The NBN for example. What will happen if a backhoe cuts a cable at a critical time. What back-up is there for a time when there are long power black-outs.
The entire economy of countries can be jeopardised by the heavy reliance on computers. Weapon systems, Medicine & information will be affected. There are people now who can't function without a computer. Air travel, simply everything one can think of involves a reliance on computers to some degree. I think it's both scary & wonderful.
R.I.P. Steve Jobs

Why you'd even bother worrying about what happens if the NBN is completed I can't guess- that project had clearly been aborted.

Appointing Telstra as the primary stakeholder guaranteed it would die.
Aside from their incompetence ensuring that the project will come crashing to a stop as they let their greed, pettiness and simple inability to manage anything; is the fact that the only positive PR the government had with this project was the idea of getting a cutting edge NATIONAL (that is, public owned) network that would have nothing to do with awful companies like Telstra- who are the reason why our nation has fallen so far behind in telecomms to begin with.

This thread is satire isn't it?
Back hoes have from day one cut such things
Water and gas mains too!
Daily hourly cut is just as likely as not.
We all know the world does not stop, people grumble say its a disgrace, but with in hours it is back on.
Now Little Ron, a Foreman from my long ago past.
Angry at the very thought his fill in team leader was about to? dig a hole!
Gave every one of us a heated lecture on being safe, marked the spot white x told the excavator in great detail what he wanted.
First bucket full broke the water main!
Loved Ron,good bloke but laugh? we said his panic button was about 100mm round.
20 years before same story boss took charge I watched him dig up a house water service and leave the job for me to fix Ute wheels smoking.
Ribbon buried these days above item, mapping exists to pin point them phone numbers to ring before digging and still a Ron exists .

When I was in the soil testing game, I busted services regularly. My record was a house in Gerladton, with the world's weirdest piping. I managed to hit a pipe on 3 sides out of four and I didn't dig in the front yard at all! Another big one, although not mine, was the young engineer who managed to dig through the line that controls all the railway level crossings in southern Perth, leading to every one "failing safe" by dropping the barriers. The cops were not happy and Westrail weren't ecstatic either.

I can also recall the fibre between Sydney and Melbourne being cut twice whilst I was working on the Tarcutta Range section of the Hume Highway. The first time, there were no consequences because the marker was actually incorrect about the alignment but the second time it cost, I believe, $40,000 a minute. Helicopters flew the cable repair team in.

I'm not sure what sort of architecture the NBN is going to use, but if it's got multiple redundant pathways, as a modern network should, then cutting one leg won't be a problem.

I think that will be a built in contingency plan to create jobs.

"""
Steve Jobs' passing it makes one think as to how much we rely on the phenomenon developed by this great man
"""

What phenomenon what that be exactly?
The phenomenon of a corporation dictating to you how you may use something you've legally purchased?

The phenomenon of suing anyone that even remotely tries to exercise their right to do whatever they want with their own legally purchased product.

The phenomenon of preventing other companies from selling competing products because they look similar to your product which you copied from another company more than 20 years ago.

Or perhaps the phenomenon of turning a blind eye to the plight of exploited workers who were being made extremely ill working in the factories that made your products even when they cried out for help to you personally?

Or the phenomenon of doing nothing when workers were suiciding in your factories because of inhumane working conditions.

Apple inc are the poster child of all that most people hate about corporations and Jobs was the head maker of that vile corp, he was evil personified! No great loss if you ask me, he was far from a great man!

RawMustard,
I meant the phenomenon of the computer. The phenomena that you're referring to are the same as we have here. If you want to get something made you have to get it made in China because it would be unaffordable if were built at home. Sad yes but also true. Apple are not angels we all know that but Steve Jobs in order to make his ideas reality had to comply with those abhorrent business practices.
I'm not happy that my Mac is made in the places you correctly describe but can you get it made here ? What would these poor exploited people do if that industry were taken from there ? I agree Apple could easily pay more as could many other prestigious companies..
I'm sure Telstra could provide better customer service if their CEO & managers were only paid half of what they get now. They'd still be multimillionaires for doing hardly anything.
I said great man because he really did have the biggest individual impact in the last century.
I can't & do not want to discount your claims.

There is no doubt that Steve Jobs and Apple have made their mark.
Some of the reports have been over the top however.
You would think he invented the computer, and one announcer on the
ABC even said so. Wasn't repeated, so someone must have intervened.

He was there early in the piece of personal computers but he was not
the first by any means.
I worked on what was said to be the first computer that could be
called a personal computer. It had been designed for a programmer or
an engineer to use himself, rather than submitting jobs to the
computer room on paper tape or cards.
It was a Bendix G15 and preceded Apple by many years.
It was not portable and was a valve machine. Them's were the days.

The first computer was Colossus at Bletchley Park, North of London.
It has been rebuilt and the WW2 site is very worth a visit.
I have a picture of it on my wall here and I bow to it every morning !

"""
If you want to get something made you have to get it made in China because it would be unaffordable if were built at home.
"""

"""
What would these poor exploited people do if that industry were taken from there ?
"""

Firstly I find this argument a bit hypocritical. You see we here in Australia would never condone the working practices of China, in fact we have people on this forum bleating constantly about the use of unions and the working conditions brought about by their existence. We have people bleating about work choices and the despicable actions of the ex Howard government and the current leader of the Lib's, Abbot. Yet it's no problem for any of them to promote the growth of China and to praise companies and executive officers that use the exploitation of chines workers for their own gains.

There would be a country wide revolution if workers here were treated in the same manner, people like Belly and lexi would have instant coronaries, yet we're quite ok with purchasing goods from companies we clearly know are in China to circumvent our own laws in the name of profits.

Our very own PM praised this vile man who stood at the top of this exploitation and hypocrisy, yet she has no problem demonising anyone that would try to reduce working conditions in here.

If you place the same restrictions on employers in China that we have fought tooth and nail for in Australia, then those goods would be affordable if made here as well!

There's no reason to take those jobs away from chines workers, simply place restrictions on a personal level on companies that circumvent our own laws and the way we feel humans should be treated. It's up to the individual to act and if they don't they should be shamed for the hypocrites they are, that includes our own executives and government officials!

RawMustard,
It's Australians who are making money by paying the chinese factory workers a pittance.
I keep thinking what would happen if the internet connection suddenly failed. Only the other day our supermarket experienced a breakdown & customers were waiting at the checkout for half an hour. Now that may not sound very long but if you have a plane to catch or the last ferry etc. those 30 minutes could spell big trouble. Imagine if security failed or the banks suddenly lost connection ? Doctors doing surgery over the net could really use a 30 minute break. Too bad about the patient though. Yes there are back-ups but we're now so dependent on internet connection I simply scares me if suddenly people had to think instead of using a keyboard. I have watched barmaids pouring one drink after another & then had to go to till to add it all up. I already added the drinks as they poured them. It's those simple things that make me wonder how the complex stuff would be handled if connection were lost for hours.

*If you place the same restrictions on employers in China that we have fought tooth and nail for in Australia, then those goods would be affordable if made here as well!*

Nope RawMustard, in that case those goods would simply become
unaffordable for most and we would have to do without. At the
same time the Chinese would go back to starving as they used to.

So the present solution is a win-win situaton, unlike any other
solution being presented right now.

*You would think he invented the computer*

Bazz,Jobs did in fact invent the computer which anyone could use,
which is what changed the world. Lets face it, your average
person would not bother with MS-DOS etc.

It was in fact Xerox which came up with the concept of the mouse
and Windows interface. Jobs saw it and recognised its enormous
potential, which Xerox did not. The result was the Apple Mac
and Bill Gates simply copied Apple with his Windows programmes.

Jobs got it wrong, when it came to pricing and being the standard.
Macs were simply too expensive for the average user. Gates
conquered the world by flogging his OS on the cheap. When you sell
10s of millions of copies, its suddenly highly profitable. So
Jobs was banished from Apple and he clearly learned his lesson.

When he came back, lessons learned, he continued with his bright
ideas. Combining technology invented by others and packaging the
whole thing in products which consumers love, at an affordable
price this time.

In the end, people want solutions, they don't just want products.
That detailed thought has gone into today's Apple products and it
shows.

Today Apple understands all this and its market cap of 350 billion
$ reflects that. Meantime Microsoft has clearly forgotten why
they grew so fast in the first place and have forgotten about the
consumer. No wonder they are only worth half of what Apple is
valued at. Consumers have voted with their wallets.

All credit to Jobs for learning from his original mistakes

this topic didnt immediatly grab me to reply
but things change

im upset with the digetal regeme
that sees us loose our vhf and uhf free to air tv[next year]

in the rush to get at the free digetal specrum
[that the nbn now looks like superceeding]
i finally bit the bullit..[and went digetal]

what a costly blunder i have made
[i bought a set top box]..and got no signal
so bought a digetal tv..and got no signal

so i replaced my antena..and cabling
and got channel 7's digetal..AND THATS IT

no 9 ten
two sbs nor abc

im at wits end
i got a perfectly functional landline into my house
but dont ned a telephone..and arnt paying over a dollar per day
just to get 'online'..[im sick of needing built in obsolesance updates]

to stuff i got that works just fine
after spending hundreds of dollars on this digetal lurk
im back to watching the basic free to air..minus briz 31..who are only digetal now.

so if this digetal scam
and c02 tax and nbn..isnt a scam

prove it

cause so far i know
im being shafted

im over the lot of it
[my dodo net acces expires december
and free to air vhf/uhf..expires god knows when

so you wonder why i hate govt serving its mates
well dont worry..when im not amused at my home anymore
im back on the road..hounding you beurorock-rats in person

fix digetal[run its signal through the copper
connect my landline to the web
and pay for the nbn..
by volume of upload and download

the quater gig i use..[per month] costs me 4 bucks
thats all im prepared to pay

al that wasted line maintance/acces fees
[that should have built fibre was gifted to shareholders
make them pay]..anyhow now i go away..but one day i stop hiding

If a backhoe cuts the cable, blood will ooze from the person responsible, The most expensive part of the cable are the joins. Dial before you dig.

Transmission cables are typically arranged in "rings" with their paths geographically separate.

That means if a cable is cut (as they often are) then signals travel in the other direction without interruption.

Some of the more spectacular cuts are when several fibres are cut or when the backbone paths have not been effectively established.

I imagine the NBN topography - being new rather than adapted - will take this into account.

Otherwise, contractors and others really need to be insured.

Oh, and Steve Jobs died of cancer - he didn't cure it.

Some years ago the two fibres going north both crossed the river on the
same bridge at Telegraph point.

Ah well no one has knocked the bridge down.

Ah well no one has knocked the bridge down.
Bazz,
yeah, but what will you do when someone does ? Is there a plan B ?