Your choice is to sign up to the new expensive NBN now, or do so later at a higher cost.

The kicker to this, is that as the NBN Co is buying all Telstra's land lines and will shut them down, there is a government monopoly. Given that the NBN was marginally viable with an 80% take up, and less than 50% were prepared to take the "free installation" the only way Conroy can make the NBN viable is to shut down all the alternatives.

Hey it worked for the tolled tunnels, why not for the internet.

But who cares, you will pay more for a faster cleaner filtered line, that only allows material approved by board of politically correct old f*rts.

http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/connect-to-nbn-now-or-pay-up-to-300-for-phone-line-20101015-16ms3.html
http://news.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/gillard-backs-controversial-web-filter-20101012-16hm0.html

Hmmm, still torn;

Personally, a government monopoly is most definitely better than a private corporate monopoly such as Telstra, due to great accountability (that is, more than zero), and of course the removal of profit and shareholder needs to cut costs.

But with Conroy I would see your concern.

Ideally, the entity would be an independent yet public and apolitical department of infrastructure.

And a Bill of (telecommunicational) Rights that forbid the government from filtering content.

But Telstra being stripped of the infrastructure is good news for me, as far as I'm concerned- that company is among the very worst things to have happened to Australia.

Come on King, fair crack of the whip mate.

Everyone knows Telstra got rid of 60% of the government level of staff, & were still over manned.

They reduced prices by 70% & still made good profits.

I do believe we should have kept the Commonwealth bank, & power distribution not generation, & rail, & water, but telecommunications was a major union rip off, & had to go.

Of course now we need to outsource the public service, to get some real cost cutting.

King Hazza sorry to mess you up with the facts but when the Government (The Postmaster's Generals department) controlled the phones it was ten times the price and it took six weeks to get a phone. Oh unless you were an SP Bookie then you got ten lines within 24 hours after paying a hefty bribe.
The Government have never done anything right or proper. Competition and the market is the only way. Leave the Public SErvants sleeping at their desks and decimate the managers who are paid not only fabulous salaries but pay no taxes and get super of insane proportions.

""" But Telstra being stripped of the infrastructure is good news for me, as far as I'm concerned- that company is among the very worst things to have happened to Australia. """

Well, well great Exalted one. Even before they were sold off you had an option. Why are people so afraid of exercising their right to vote with their wallet? Must we require the loons at the top to do everything for us?

I have been with Optus since they rolled out their cable network for both phone and broadband(very fast by the way, as fast as fiber) and I have been more than happy with them for over ten years! No need for me to require the goons at the top to do things for me. I am quite capable of rejecting tosser corps and their thieving ways!

I will be more than capable of rejecting this lemon being forced on me by a commie red idiot when he tries. He can suck my big toe for all I care!

Sorry people, but free market principles only work when there is competition independent of infrastructure; As Telstra owned the landline infrastructure, there was simply no competition and we had a private-owned shareholder-dependent monopoly; one that delivered extremely poor services, kept us at an exceptionally low standard of telecommunications operation, cut services to rural areas, regularly had outsourced (and market-ignorant) telemarketers harass and canvas us on a daily basis today despite having TERMINATED their services decades ago.

Some success story.

Some questions are left unclear, does anyone know:

1) No time-frame was mentioned - When are the bad-guys coming to take our phones away? (I hope to be dead by then, that will solve all problems)
2) What happens to the phone-network at home when the outside cables change from copper to fibre? does it mean that all phones at home need to be replaced by different devices, or is it possible to get some convertor to copper? (burning down the house is probably the easier solution)

Yuyutsu; I would imagine that the way it works is that your phone is forcibly disconnected, and you must contact the government (by foot of course) and come to an agreement that they will connect you to the NBN line if the government may take possession of all your personal belongings to redistribute as they see fit, and that you display the hammer and sickle at all times?

Although to be fair, knowing the (in)competence and failure to keep election promises of the current Labor Party, we probably WILL be dead by the time they ever get around to hooking our houses up.

One more question, King Hazza:

You said, "and come to an agreement that they will connect you to the NBN line":

Is it going to hurt? at what point(s) of the body will the connection be made?

King Hazza makes some good points.

Hasbeen have you ever tried to talk to a human being in a Telstra Call Centre? Over-manned in the service areas, I think not.

While I agree with the concerns expressed here, I would like to raise the issue again of one of the darker aspects of the government monopoly.

The Labor government has never shied away from wielding its power to enforce its policies. In the event of a monopoly on the NBN, it would be simple to enforce the Network censorship policy it is planning.

This is the most egregious assault on freedom of expression outside a dictatorship, and must be stopped.

While I agree with your concerns, Shadow Minister, the aim of the government is more sinister than mere censorship. The purpose of the NBN is entertainment for the masses, keeping people buried within screens and electronic gadgets in order to remove them from real life. This way the government can do whatever it wants while the citizens are paralyzed with a constant silly smile in virtual-land.

@ Shadow Minister

That's how I've been seeing this push for the NBN of late Shadow. The Americans want a kill switch and wire tapping for the internet. Our Fabian leaders want to watch what we're doing and cut us off anytime we might learn something about them they don't want us to know. A sinister path lies ahead I reckon.

One problem- whose to say the government wouldn't be able to demand the private company holding the infrastructure monopoly to implement the exact same procedures on their behalf?

Hence why a public owned monopoly is better than a private-owned monopoly. Same problems with government apply to a private company- but the monetary issues do not correspond to a public-owned asset beyond expenditure.
That is, beyond both needing to fund the entity, only one would stand from some necessity (or clear right) to implement further charges to profits and returns.

And Yuyutsu- although the procedure does not hurt per se, because they will install chips into you when you are asleep, sometimes the subjects feel great agony even in their dreams, along with the shocks of pain the government sends for free thought that they want to stamp out.

Seriously, can anyone who knows answer my original questions: I tried to ask the same on the ABC site, but it was censored (as usual).

1) When are the bad-guys coming to take our phones away?
2) What happens to the phone-network at home when the outside cables change from copper to fibre? does it mean that all phones at home need to be replaced by different devices, or is it possible to get some convertor to copper?

Technically I could answer 2;

When you change a copper cable to a fibreoptic, the only change is that the electric pulses are converted into light pulses and back into electric at the other side (improving both speed of transmission but also the amount of clear traffic on the line as lightspeed is virtually instantaneous, as opposed to merely lightning fast, reducing the time it takes to hold a line for the signals to pass through) . So for a fibreoptic conversion you would simply need to attach a light-reader to the existing device that converts signals into data- these you could buy in virtually every computer hardware shop, where they have been sold alongside fiberoptic cables for the past many years.

Thank you, I am not surprised you cannot answer #1!

So if I understand correctly, those converters can handle both the low-frequency phone conversations as well as the high-frequency ADSL traffic?

Indeed, I am sorry to disappoint you for 1;

But for 2, my answer is simply no in most aspects- as the ADSL internet and telephone are usually carried over the very same telephone lines- and would therefore have to have been converted into analog (phone) and digital (computer) signals for either to work, and to be able to travel over the lines respectively.

As signal cables generally work by transmitting digital signal (pulses of energy), the only difference would be to get a light that flashes whenever it gets an electric pulse to send a light signal, and for a device that will send an electric pulse whenever it is hit by a light pulse. From there, your computer itself actually turns the signals into information, and the telephone converts them into analog waves and then into sound (and they would ALWAYS be able to do these directly- they need to in order to function).

Another upside to fiber cables is that light tends to be much less potent than electricity- so it generates much less heat and is not an electrical hazard.

Well, I have checked a few articles, and there is total confusion, they certainly contradict each other and your response, King Hazza, confuses me even further.

Some claim you will be able to continue having your phone, others claim it will be so only if you agree to tie-down your phone to the internet (an unacceptable option for me), using VOIP. Some claim that ADSL emulation will be available, others claim not, yet others claim that a different router will be needed (mine is currently heavily programmed to block all advertisement sites).

If I can retain my phone line, with my existing devices, then at least I can still use dial-up for the internet.

Looks like I'm getting myself resigned to the idea of living without a phone. Every now and then I will check my E-mail and do my banking at the local library, of course bye-bye OLO, check my messages at a pay-phone, if there is still any, and it will be interesting to start sending and receiving letters again, with real stamps!

Well Yuyutsu, generally your internet currently runs via your phone line, which would likely be an electric-pulse signal medium (copper axis cable with a fair likelihood)- to install a fiber-optic cable should consist of nothing more than to replace so much length of the copper cable networks with, simply, a different type of cable- along with a signal converter at every point the cable goes back into copper-wire form (if not your house directly).

The line should otherwise work exactly the same as the existing lines we have now.

From a practical point of view (whether or not the Labor Party possesses this aside)- it would be no different than if they were merely replacing the cables with a better kind of cable. Even if the government slack off and refuse to install a signal converter, one could simply purchase one and install it themselves and it should work just fine.

King Hazza, thank you so much for taking the time to explain.

Certainly the issue is not whether the physical cable is made of copper or of optic-fibre: what I am concerned about is the different low-level protocol that will be used along with the change of cable, so just to remove any doubt, let me articulate my worry a bit further:

With most existing phone+ADSL lines, both the phone signals and the internet signals are available at the end-points, with only a small splitter near the phone itself making the difference. This means that everyone (including children) can easily evade the splitter and connect an internet-device to the end of a phone line.

I have gone to great lengths to make sure that no internet signals arrive at the phone end-points in my home. I did so by installing a splitter high in the roof, allowing internet-access only to the office-room and plain phone-access to the other rooms.

My worry is, that if both internet and phone signals use the exact same technology/protocol and are treated as mere "data", then I would not be able to keep blocking the internet to the other rooms, which is unacceptable so I would be forced to lose my phone line.

Could you please clarify whether or not with the NBN there will still be a splittable electric/electronic distinction between phone signals and internet signals?

Alternately, will there be a way to obtain an NBN line WITHOUT access to the internet, completely blocking it - if so, perhaps I could then order 2 separate NBN lines, one with internet and one without. It may be expensive, but at least it would work for me.

I don't see why not, to be honest; as I said, if the NBN plan is merely to replace the fiber optic cables, then you would most definitely be able to keep the same arrangement you have now- the only difference is your splitter and the NBN will need a device to convert the light/electric signals between them in order for you to be able to transmit.
Hence why I point out it truly IS just a matter of replacing the cables- because all it comes down to is every electric digital signal is turned into a pulse of light- and back into electric to be read on the other side.
They work in exactly the same way and send the same type of signals- so if the government are too stingy to give you a converter, you could purchase one of your own and it would work exactly the same.

Well, I would like to believe you that it is all just the physical link, but the more I search I find more conflicting reports, claiming massive changes in the data-link layer (layer 2 of the OSI model) and even mentioning IP multicasts, which belong to Layer 3 (Network).

Some reports speak about forcing users to use VOIP, other reports speak about how difficult it would be to keep the dial-tone going, others mention the use of VPN tunneling for maintaining the security of certain services.

In short, it seems that the end-customer will not have direct access to the fibre-optic cable, and even if they had gained access to the physical cable (illegally), they will not have the knowledge to decode/encode the information.

NBN Co will provide a black-box attached to each house's front wall. On the one side will be fibre, on the other side, a number of interfaces. There are conflicting reports as to what interfaces will be provided, other than the main one: an ethernet socket for the use of computer-systems/routers. Some reports claim that a POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service) socket will be provided - but others deny it. I wish it was possible to purchase/upgrade-to a black-box with a POTS socket, but none but NBN-Co itself could technically provide such a box. It seems that we are helplessly under their mercy (if we insist on having a phone).

Well it would take quite a bit of screwing to get a fibre-optic system to go faulty- as fiber optic systems are specifically designed to fit immediately into a normal binary signal system (or else companies would never have bought them).
They would specifically be designed to only send a light signal when they receive an electric signal- meaning the signals are ultimately exactly the same.
It shouldn't matter either that the data is encrypted, because in the end it's just sending 1s and 0s over the line.

When they get rid of the copper connections, there will be only VOIP. Not that there are any particular issues with VOIP, but the old copper lines had some advantages.

One in particular is that for standard phone lines the 44V power is supplied by the exchange, so that in the case of a power failure at home, one still has a phone. Now with the modem at home relying on power from the house, a power failure means no phone. Great for an emergency.

That is indeed a good point Shadow- both ends of the overall fiberoptic channel would both indeed need their power supply- even thought the transfer modules don't need much.

From what I've read so far, and hope is true, the NBN termination unit (NTU) will be a special outlet called ATA, in fact two of those per home, to which one can connect their ordinary copper phone network. As there will be no power coming through the fiber, an optional backup-battery is suggested. One bummer is that the NBN will also draw about 15 Watts from your mains-supply, whether you use it or not (but then, perhaps I'll be able to switch it off when I'm out or do not wish to receive calls). It is not yet clear whether or not the ATA will support ADSL.

This means that although VOIP technology will be used, it will all be hidden within the NBN, so one doesn't need to have computer-equipment at home, especially old people.

If the reports are accurate, then the NBN is planned as a Layer-2 service (data-link), which means that they significantly change the meaning of light/electric signals. Even if it was legal to convert their signals to copper, bypassing the NTU, then decipher those signals, they would not mean a thing without access to their secret internal protocols and certainly would be meaningless in attempting to operate a phone and/or ADSL.