SonofGloin,

I believe there were also arguments about providing electrical power when gas was perfectly acceptable at the time and when it was gradually installed it was intended primarily for street lighting.

Microwave ovens, TV and everything else we now take for granted was not even imaginable at the time and it was only a matter of years ago when the blistering speeds of 52K MODEMS were thought to be enough (along with 64Meg of RAM).

There's much more to the internet than simple private downloading and email and businesses for example will be able to provide and configure their own internal Virtual Private Networks at minimal cost.

While it's true that maximum speed is only as good as the slowest link, server speeds should likewise increase as technology advances and it would be a shame if infrastructure became the final bottleneck rather than provide an open-ended solution for a long time to come.
I am able to say from personal experience that Telstra are frantically (but successfully) trying to keep pace with burgeoning data capacity demands previously unimaginable only a couple of years ago.

Like all technologies, such as colour TV and Mobile Phones - when a critical mass level is reached, demand will skyrocket and costs will fall.

I also don't agree that the GFC was just a Northern Hemisphere phenomenon when we felt it's effects so directly. All seem to agree that without a stimulus at the bottom level a loss of business confidence at that time would likely have started an unemployment spiral. The political argument has been over how much it should have been, not it's effectiveness.

Finally, "I'm nobody's boy", nor am I an acolyte but put up some more detail and we'll see where it goes. These Forums are becoming nothing but a magnet for the disaffected and those with political agendas to promote. I'm only here for some cheap entertainment.

Wobbles;
You seem to think that Moore's Law is open ended.
Processor speeds are nudging the ultimate limit now.
The type of increases you seem to be hinting at are in fact unreachable.
If businesses want their own virtual networks, let them pay for it.
Applying that capability to all premises is nothing more than an
expensive toy. We have all seen a salesman oversell hardware to an
unknowing customer and this is what has happened with the NBN.
I am tired of hearing stories about how business will not be able to
survive without 100Mbit plus the day after tomorrow.
It is as big a load of BS as the same organisations handed out about
broadband over power lines (BPL) some years back.

We have been sold a mining tip truck instead of a wheelbarrow.

wobbles">>Finally, "I'm nobody's boy", nor am I an acolyte: I'm only here for some cheap entertainment.<<

Good to hear wobbles, so am I china.

PS wobbs:
Our cheap entertainment is going to cost 60 BILLION.

ON top of this we will be paying $60bn for a system that when it nears completion is partially obsolete.

No Shadow Minister it will not become obsolete.
It can be upgraded by just hanging better equipment on each end of the cable.
So, in fact, it is a Rolls Royce that can be updated cheaply to the
next requirement.
However that does not mean that it is not a waste of money.
It has been vastly oversold and you can get to the shops just as
effectively on a bicycle as a Rolls Royce.
If you want to be faster than a bicycle buy a Holden.
It will have the same speed limitations as your Rolls Royce.

That is the crux of the argument.

If the servers cannot dish it out fast enough, the fibre cable will
make zero difference. The delays are not in the copper wire that is
your personal dedicated connection to the internet.

One of the big pushers of ftth did not understand the technology all
that well when he was pushing broadband over power line.
They just would not listen to those that knew better what the
problem was and how unsuitable the system was.
It was an argument between technical people and computer people.
The lesson was they are not the same.

As I said earlier, wireless, ie radio, is not the answer either as we
cannot afford to waste more spectrum than is absolutely necessary on
the internet.