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[multiweb (Marc)]

Originally Posted by Larryp

Is it possible NBN could be almost redundant/obsolete before it is completed?

Well it's a valid argument. Wireless has its limitations too. But as you mention mobility comes with it. Maybe the solution will ultimately be a mix of both.

[mithrandir (Andrew)]

Originally Posted by Larryp

The telcos seem very keen to roll out their 4G networks, and that indicates they feel lots of dollars are to be made from it.
Is it possible NBN could be almost redundant/obsolete before it is completed?

Laurie, two of the problems with wireless are it is a shared medium and is subject to weather degradation. 4G does not have a lot of range which means lots of towers. If they used 4G to replace service to the wired households in range of a tower they'd get a small share of the bandwidth they can get with non-wireless. That's why NBN was planned to only use wireless or satellite where cabling was not economic.

[Larryp (Laurie)]

Originally Posted by mithrandir

Laurie, two of the problems with wireless are it is a shared medium and is subject to weather degradation. 4G does not have a lot of range which means lots of towers. If they used 4G to replace service to the wired households in range of a tower they'd get a small share of the bandwidth they can get with non-wireless. That's why NBN was planned to only use wireless or satellite where cabling was not economic.

Thanks for the explanation, Andrew

[Bassnut (Fred)]

According to wikipeadia, there are 7 million odd dwellings in Australia and the NBN all up will cost $44 billion. Generously assuming 90% of householders pay tax, thats $5657 per tax paying house hold .

Really, do you think its worth THAT much over other priorities

Are you happy to pay that much?.

[AndrewJ]

Gday Gary

Whilst i personally agree we should be getting the fibre ( at least ) in the ground whilst we can afford it, i also think we have other priorities
that do require addressing more urgently.

First sign of trouble and an ambulance is on the way.

Down here in melbourne, we are getting more and more complaints re no ambulance to come and get you, as the hospitals cant clear the emergency rooms to allow ambulances to unload.
A computerised call over the internet wont currently change that.


Andrew

[LewisM]

Originally Posted by Kunama

I think most people don't look at it like that Fred, the average person thinks that its Government money so its not costing the householder anything. They don't think of what else that money could do. Businesses who will benefit greatly from the NBN are being subsidised by Joe Citizen once again.....

............ discuss ..............

That is the scary truth. A LOT of "Joe and Joanne Average" believe it is the government paying for the NBN. How wrong could they be. Then again, a lot do not even realise what their taxation is for (that's IF they pay it, seeing how now the Tax Free Threshold was put WAAAAAAAAAY up under the Labor Government... more vote buying). Of course, we all moan about paying tax, but where exactly will the govenment otherwise get revenue... oh, that darned Emissions Trading Scheme...

When I worked in aviation, I paid $0.47 / dollar tax. Yes, almost half my wage went to the government to spend on frivolous things such as an non-essential NBN. Even though I paid almost half my weekly wage to the government for 15 years, when I decided to change jobs, the government REFUSED to give me ANY social security, nor my wife, for 3 years thanks to the bank account I had and the assets I had (still have). So, I contributed to everyone else's, but they won't give me one cent. Not even a health care card. Zilch. Rob the "rich" to pay the poor, and give them fast internet.

No, I didn't vote Labor nor LNP, so don't go judging me there either

[Bassnut (Fred)]

Originally Posted by Kunama

I think most people don't look at it like that Fred, the average person thinks that its Government money so its not costing the householder anything. They don't think of what else that money could do. Businesses who will benefit greatly from the NBN are being subsidised by Joe Citizen once again.....

............ discuss ..............

Oh, and if the Liberals are correct and ittl cost 90billion, that's over $10k per household. Yikes , that's just NUTS

[AndrewJ]

You'll get a 'virtual ambulance' .....

I was thinking more like a Star Trek transporter down the fibre
Now that would require a bit of bandwidth.
But you would still end up on a trolley in emergency.

Imagine if we just put a few Tardis like pods every Km or so,
( think public phone boxes )
we could just hop in and just send ourselves somewhere.
No need to waste money on roads or rail
but that may then put all the auto workers out of a job.

My biggest concern with all this stuff is it is eventually designed
to get less numbers of highly trained specialist people to be able to service "the world". Not everyone can ( or wants to be ) a
specialist like this.
With our population increasing at the rate it is,
but the requirement for lower skilled people being reduced by computers due to cost, it cant go on much longer without imploding somewhere.
Be interesting to see how it evolves.

Andrew

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Originally Posted by Bassnut

According to wikipeadia, there are 7 million odd dwellings in Australia and the NBN all up will cost $44 billion. Generously assuming 90% of householders pay tax, thats $5657 per tax paying house hold .

Really, do you think its worth THAT much over other priorities

Are you happy to pay that much?.

Of course that $5600 odd is spread out over a decade or so and it is actually borrowed money to be repaid by the project as it matures and connections rise, bringing revenue with it. It is far too simplistic to say that it is going to cost each household $5600 and that is that.

Regards spending the money on healthcare etc, refer to the point above, it is borrowed money to be invested in an infrastructure project that is supposed to make a return. How do you borrow money for operating costs of a hospital for example? While you could argue (And not unsuccessfully) that good hospitals and schools are an investment with the profit showing up in social good, it is going to be hard to convince the market of that.

Regards which way is best. A fairly basic examination of data use trends over the years says that 25mbit/sec will be barely adequate by the time the libs project s "Finished" and working in the industry myself, I have my doubts they will deliver even that, let alone 100mbit/sec.

They also raise the spectre of a distinct and widening digital divide where those that have the capacity have the advantage over those that don't. With improved bandwidth (Hopefully to be provided in a week and a half via an NBN fixed wireless connection, given where I live, the best I will ever get) I could work form home significantly more often and with better productivity. Money, non renewable resources and pollution saved. I can't do it very effectively now as the limits placed on my by the upload rate are severe. Stupid to have to sit in a car for two hours a day so I can sit in front of my laptop in an office 5 days a week.

Bandwidth requirements WILL continue to grow, Wireless for everybody is not the answer as there is only so much bandwidth to be had that way and it is a fraction of what fibre is capable of, and FTTN is at the very best a stopgap that will end up taking longer, costing more and in all likelihood, never actually working as envisaged and finally needing to be replaced by FTTH by the time it is completed. Now THAT is a waste of money.

I am actually staggered to see the "Faster access to porn" line trotted out again. I sincerely hoped that it went the way of the dodo with the comms minister who uttered it (Richard Alston) "Just faster movie downloads" is just a slightly less insulting way to express similarly luddite tendencies.

People (Including the previous government) sold this project with a stupidly narrow focus on the populist reasons like faster access to movies. The lack of vision on both sides of Australian politics depresses me. But hey, we can just keep on digging stuff up and selling it to China so we can buy it back in more valuable forms right? That will see us through the next 100 years.

[astronobob (Bob)]

Well, Im like Laurie, no putta expert, I use wireless atm, line speed 2Mbps, enough for us, tho have the fibre optic on our street pole is a faster option !
NBN, would it or would it not be good for say, the CBD areas or all major cities where big data tranfer's are required day in day out, eg, big bussiness, government, banks, international traders, Imports,/exports, schools, colleges, hospitals, science departments, transport, industry etc etc, this would still give Aus a globle competitive streak !
And let the big fish foot the bill, good for the country, and slow the increase of porn download or what-ever, I dont think that FB or Tweeter techs could handle the speed anyway, and I doubt is making Australia a smarter more competitive country
Tho, essier said than done, and wouldnt it create an uproar

[Bassnut (Fred)]

Seems to me fibre to the node and copper to house is the go. If you want more, sure, pay for fibre to house/business yourself.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

City areas already have extensive fibre networks.

Really the debate is on the consumer level. The applications like Gary raised will not come before at least the prospect of reasonably widespread access to sufficient and reliable bandwidth to make it work. If there is not sufficiently widespread access, who is going to develop something that relies on it? No matter how economically or socially positive it is. Health monitoring would probably have kept my mother in law in her own home longer, and the lack of it is likely to force the father in law out earlier than would otherwise be the case too.

Plus like it or not, data consumption is only gong to rise for both productive business, health, education etc and "Non productive" (if you want to call it that) stuff like "Entertainment" in all it's guises.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Originally Posted by Bassnut

Seems to me fibre to the node and copper to house is the go. If you want more, sure, pay for fibre to house/business yourself.

See my above post. And I suppose it is the go, so long as the assumption is that it is good value to build something that will very very likely take longer, cost more, not perform as well as it is supposed to and be near end of life and in need of replacement by the time it is completed.

[Peter.M]

Originally Posted by The_bluester

See my above post. And I suppose it is the go, so long as the assumption is that it is good value to build something that will very very likely take longer, cost more, not perform as well as it is supposed to and be near end of life and in need of replacement by the time it is completed.

When it is completed they will realise they need to go to the home because in 10 years when they complete it *im guessing* people will likely want/need the bandwidth.

In Adelaide we have a one way highway that changes direction at different times of the day. This means that for a few hours every day it is doing nothing, just waiting for people to be clear so that they can send traffic in the other direction. When it was built it was the only one like it in the world. Now they have decided that it needs to go in both directions so they are adding to it (it was 2 lanes). On top of the cost of building gates and lights telling people what direction it is going at every exit and entrance which will be useless. We pay for them to duplicate a road which will likely cost them more than if they just did it in the first place.

If I were buying or building a house and was offered fiber to the home for ten thousand dollars, I would pay it with no hesitation.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Wow, completely off the NBN debate but on your highway. I had never heard of that one! That is pretty insane stuff.

The closest we have to that in Melbourne would be Queens Rd which is five lanes wide, the lane in the middle flows according to the traffic peak, so it is an inbound lane in the morning and out bound in the evening. It works surprisingly well but is not on the same scale of strangeness as as bi directional highway!

[Peter.M]

If you want to see what a dumb idea it is its called the southern expressway google says the duplication is costing us 400 million.

[JB80 (Jarrod)]

This is the only point I'll make about a situation that has been made more complex than it needs to be

Originally Posted by gary

Today household plans providing multiple gigabytes of data allowances per month
are commonplace and the trend curves show that increasing rapidly
over the years and decades ahead.

I have said previously in other threads that unlimited data is the only way forward, anything else is just draconian.
People should not even be mentioning data plans with any kind of cap.
Much of the world now sees access to the internet as a basic human right and in most of Europe(Spain excluded) and the US it's unthinkable to not have unlimited data plans.
Same goes for phones too these days.
NBN might just be a good thing and needed but Australia's internet issues would likely still be not up to first world standards to begin with.

Also while we are at it why not a proper high speed rail network connecting all major cities and at an affordable end cost to the user. I'd never fly again.
The undertaking on a national level would be huge, the sort of grand scheme not seen for years. It would also open up new hubs along the lines. We need to invest in our country properly while we are still on top of things.
How Australia is not bouncing of the walls at this time is just bad management.

And I'd also sack the official bribes committee, they failed on the World Cup and SKA. Lets put some of that Chinese money to better use at least.

Are these the most pressing of commitments?
Maybe not but I'd put them up the list a whole lot higher than playing tug boat with our navy in the Pacific.
They shouldn't even be election issues, they should just be. It's hard to believe in the one country has boomed over the last 20 years and side stepped the economic crisis that questions of basic infrastructure are even being discussed.
Get our priorities in order and keep our nation employed with home grown investment.

[Hans Tucker (Hans)]

Originally Posted by Bassnut

According to wikipeadia, there are 7 million odd dwellings in Australia and the NBN all up will cost $44 billion. Generously assuming 90% of householders pay tax, thats $5657 per tax paying house hold .

Really, do you think its worth THAT much over other priorities

Are you happy to pay that much?.

You sound surprised...the cost of NBN was all over the media and was the basis for the argument against it.

We will have super fast internet, maybe, but sub-standard hospitals and schools. Governments never get their priorities correct.

[noeyedeer (Matt)]

lol I said in another thread the NBN is obsolete. maybe I predicted the future

I do agree ... uncapped broadband is the only way, either fibre or copper might make it not so

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Originally Posted by Peter.M

If you want to see what a dumb idea it is its called the southern expressway google says the duplication is costing us 400 million.

We have only done marginally better in Vic. It was apparently well identified at the time it was to start construction that the Western Ring rd around Melbourne really needed to be at least three lanes form end to end as it would be maxed out almost as soon as it was completed, that was about ten years ago and after five years of ever worsening congestion we have had over five years of constant roadworks almost from end to end to increase it from it's original two lanes and to delete some insanely poor road design. It has largely been completed in the section I drive daily but before that it used to take longer for the last 15KM of my drive than the first 60 did.

I suppose given the arguments put in this thread that still disregard the funding model and posit that the money for the NBN can just be swung over to other uses, which are not borrowed money on what amounts to a lowish return commercial investment any more and would almost certainly instead show up as a cost on the budget. and the fact hat we cant even get a 20KM road right in suburban Melbourne and short sightedly build it smaller than we need it to be to save money initially (Defer it slightly in fact) It is no surprise that the libs plan gets as much support as it does. We would rather save 30% now to get something second rate that will be obsolete pretty much when it reaches practical completion and require replacement, with little of it's infrastructure being useful in its eventual upgrade than to get very basic infrastructure right the first time around. That is without even going into the likely effect of breaking the pricing model too as they are likely to decide to allow infrastructure competition too and that will perpetuate the last 20 years of "Competition" where the competitors cherry pick the profitable areas and the rest can go hang. And Telstra does lovely stuff like not enabling ADSL2+ in an area until someone else does and restricts access to exchanges etc etc etc. Sets retail prices lower than wholesale, etc etc. you get the picture.

People keep on carping on about huge delays, go look up the corporate plans, we are still so early in the ramp up phase that the actual distance behind the 8 ball it is (Which anyone with any knowledge of it will admit that it is) is actually difficult to make out on the graph. You have to change the scale of the graph to make it meaningless in the overall context of the build for the plan versus actual difference to stand out, and most of that falls inside the line made if you move everything to the right by 6 to 9 months to account for the single biggest delay in the project, the Telstra agreement (Which is one of the most complex commercial arrangement in Australian history and which will now need to be substantially renegotiated)


Anyway, this is all irrelevant at this point, what we are going to get is the libs Notional Broadband Network, hopefully, and just like climate change we are going to find out who is right by experiencing it first hand. At least unlike climate change, if the libs are proven as wrong as I expect them to be we don't loose as much in a tangible sense, you can always decide it was all a huge cock up and restart a FTTH build in a couple of years time.

On the climate change front, I am not particularly tarring the libs there, both sides were hell bent on plans that would make pretty much no difference. Just one of them they could call a tax for the purpose if a nice election slogan and the other one they have not told us yet what tax the money to do it with is going to come from, new or old.