Me thinks the Government, Telstra and the G9 Group know nothing, they have not done their homework.

How does FTTH work?
The Internet "backbone" is made up of fiber optic cables (very thin glass filaments) that have enormous bandwidth and use light pulses to carry information. Most customers, however, connect to the backbone through copper-based technologies like twisted pair and DSL or Hybrid Fiber Coax cable, which have limited bandwidth and limited capacity to carry integrated voice, video, and data services. This creates a speed and service bottleneck in the "last mile," the distance between the fiber optic backbone and customers.

Some providers are beginning to deliver integrated services over fiber optic cables that go from the Internet backbone directly to customers' homes or businesses. These cables may be buried, strung overhead or run through existing structures like sewer lines.

Providers primarily offer FTTH through two types of architectures, point-to-point and passive optical network (PON). Point-to-point requires providers to install an optical transceiver in the provider's central office for each customer. PON uses a single transceiver with a splitter to serve up to 32 businesses and residential customers who share the bandwidth. The splitter is located up to 30,000 feet from the central office, and a single strand of fiber can carry the signal another 3000 feet to the customer. Once the fiber reaches the customer's home or business, an optical electrical converter (OEC) on the side of the building converts the optical signal to an electrical signal that can interface with existing copper wiring. The current standard for PON is the Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM)-based ITU-T G.983.

Some providers are also using Gigabit Ethernet over fiber to provide customers with broadband access.

How fast is FTTH?
Fiber optic cables can currently carry information at speeds greater than 2.5 gigabits per second. Residential/business FTTH typically offers speeds from 10 mbps to over 100 mbps, which is a hundred times faster than most cable or DSL service and over twice as fast as a T3 connection.

The way that FTTN is used is that fibre is run from the exchange to an
area near a group of customers. A box on a pole or presumably underground
connects to the copper of the customers telephone copper line.
The much shorter distances enables the use of VDSL on the wires.
50 to 100 Bits is possible to distances of about 300 metres.

I agree with Bazz; the benefits of super high speed internet have been hyped. I didn't say (or mean to imply) in my post that FttH is the best option for new estates: it's simply too expensive for most consumers for the benefits they would get over FttN. I think that puts me on the same page as Bazz and rstuart.

A basic rule of Economics is limited resources and unlimited demand. At least in while costs are high the best services must be delivered to the places of greatest, the capital cities and major (100,00+ people plus regional centres). No commercial retailer would build a superstore in a town with 800 people. Apart from inter-city links, the best of the best needs to be provided in a concentrated to high population areas in national terms geographically small.

It is good to wait a while for the best technology of the time, but too long. as with PAL TV.

I am writing from Asia and have a 10 Mb connection. Works brialliantly [as do the trains, but that's another story].

When I hear people saying that Telstra or some other group should have the rights to develop FTTH in this country, it begs the question "How much are they paying you."

The Scandinavian approach, where all providers work together, that the service can be provided across the nation at a cost around the same as ADSL+2.

If you think that Telstra or some other group should have the sole right, than what you will find is:
1. The service will be bundled.
2. A lack of competition.
3. The unsuccessful group will create its own service. In other words we will have several providers with their own form of FTTH just as in America.
4. Because we have a small population, around 21million, than only business will take it up.

It will in fact be beyond the reach of Families.