Dear Houellebecq,

I agree that the country probably needs the infrastructure more. I also think that many of the problems we are facing within urban areas are because of lack of planning, particularly of infrastructure. It seems the governments both State and Federal adopt the approach that the loudest protests over lack of public transport, telecommunications, schools and hospitals should tell them where the greatest need is.

The NBN seems to be one of the few times we are seeing real investment into future needs, many of which probably have not been invented yet. Access to the data superhighway is going to matter as much to most businesses as access the telephone did in its time again in ways we likely cannot envisage right now.

It is difficult not to conclude that if we leave this until the pressures become too great many parts of the world will have left us behind. I understand the proof will be in the pudding but it seems the time is right for this kind of infrastructure building. I will even concede I probably would have preferred the Lib’s having the control over the rollout just in terms of governance. Something like this should have been their baby but their attitude at the moment is deplorable.

Dear spindoc,

I should have been clearer. The 200GB is my download data quota at “20Mbs promised, 12Mbs actual.”, dialled back to 256kbs speed if I go over.

Dear Yuyutsu,

As I’m a little lost with your regard to your particular situation all I can offer is sympathy. As the signal from your copper line is converted to fibre at the exchange perhaps the opportunity will be available to have a purely copper connection to the fibre outside your house.

@Houellebecq: The thing that stands out for me is the attempt to eliminate competition by forcing the decommission of the copper network.

Among the reasons I can think of for buying the copper:

1. To get at the ducts, otherwise they would have to rent space off Telstra.

2. To fix the mistake made by the Libs, when they privatised a monopoly.

3. Eliminate the competition.

I think that's roughly the right order, with the 1st being by far the most important reason. As I understand it, the costs would have exploded if they didn't have access to the ducts. Besides, if the NBN gets off the ground I think Telstra will be glad to have gotten rid of the copper network at price they did. It will be worthless. So will optus's and telstra's cable network for that matter.

@Shadow Minister: While fibre is technically better, it is becoming functionally obsolete.

Even liberal party shill's should not write rubbish like that. Your mate Turnbull can't stomach that line any more. His preferred story is Fibre To The Node is the right strategy. I don't know whether that is right or wrong, but I suspect that if Labour were rolling out FTTN, he would be saying they should be going for Fibre To The House. Back to your "functionally obsolete" claim. We added 1.6 million services with speeds between 8 Mbps and 24 Mbps last year.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/04/04/open_letter_turnbull/

We have what, 10 million homes. And we added 1.6 million services. Not bad for something that's functionally obsolete.

Yuyutsu: I really need my copper connection

Really? Can you tell me what you can do with your copper connection that you won't get able to do with the fibre connection that replaces it? The current proposal is the fibre with provide a voice channel, for free.

Dear spindoc,

Wireless is certainly are getting cheaper but so are telecommunications across the board. With or latest switch we managed to get unlimited calls to mobiles, unlimited national calls, 20 times the data allowance, over 20 times the download speeds along with $10 off the mobiles and line rental per month all for 2/3rds what we had been paying.

I see the physics of bandwidth being the future bottleneck for wireless but as you say new technologies may change the landscape. From all I can gather fibre seems the best option with what we know now and I’m happy the government has at least found something they are prepared to get on with.

I did warn you csteel, some confusion about your speed upgrade,well just 40ks away it is available too.
I understood seems spindoc did not.
Towers can not always help base or mobile, not even in my hobby ham radio.
SM the mobile is because most use it at work or play portable.
My tower stands and taunts me, built after my installation it is atop a W shaped hill.
I can see it, theory says it should be full strength, it is not.
A side to cable is a contract to upgrade these towers, to get service to those who like me can not get cable or radio.
Many wrongly think radio is easy or cheaper .
No, it can never give me hard line speeds and in the east coast of NSW the great dividing range even sees police and Ambos have blackspots, no communication.
Last no one paid for csteels it comes via land line and the costs are not funded.
Sorry Pensioners get free home phone incoming calls only.
This will not stop in NBN maybe more free service and a set top box.

Dear Rstuart,

"Really? Can you tell me what you can do with your copper connection that you won't get able to do with the fibre connection that replaces it? The current proposal is the fibre with provide a voice channel, for free."

(sigh) How can the fact that it's free help me if I cannot use it?

The one thing that I cannot do with fibre, which is an absolute must for me, is to physically separate the phone's voice/analog signal from the internet traffic.

At the moment, on copper, these two services (phone and ADSL) come at completely different frequencies, so I installed a simple, passive switch that splits the low-frequency and high-frequency signals into two separate cables before they reach my house. There is no equivalent in fibre, where all transactions are encapsulated into the same low-level digital protocol.

(just for completeness of answer, though it's not my biggest problem, fibre also cannot supply 40V power to the phones as the copper does)

'I’m happy the government has at least found something they are prepared to get on with.'

This is an important point. Everyone bitches and moans constantly that governments only think 3 years ahead, and when they finally do something 'for the future', it gets caned.

Hmmm. Wonder why they only think 3 years ahead.

I still think on balance, if it wasn't to the home, I'd be in favour. I think it's a slight overkill at the moment.

rstuart,

'I think that's roughly the right order'
Maybe you're right, but the cynic in me thinks it's political suicide if people don't take it up and prefer their copper 12MB lines based on cost. It all smacks of desperation to me.

I think there's a big market of people who only really need email and online banking speeds and are happy with a 1MB line at $20 a month. But they cant offer fibre at that price as it will blow out their costs too much. So, better to force people to have it, and take away the $20 option. I always look to the political motivations first when it comes to politicians.

Sure, the ISPs can loss-lead and wait for people to upgrade and work on market share, but if there was a company still using the wire they would blow them away really. And the stats for connected homes would be an embarrassment for the governmnet. I think I've just worked out the reason for 'to the home' right there.