The five NBN misconceptions of Tony Abbott

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analysis Yesterday Tony Abbott took to the airwaves on Sydney’s 2UE radio station to discuss Labor’s flagship National Broadband Network policy. But unfortunately, aided by a rather sympathetic host, the Opposition Leader got a few facts about the project wrong. So it’s up to us to correct them.

Before I begin this dissection of Abbott’s comments, let me state that I don’t see this article as being an opinionated one or one biased towards either side. As I have previously noted, there are many things to like about the Coalition’s more minimalist telecommunications policy which it is promulgating as a response to the NBN, and at Delimiter we strive to report fairly on the national NBN debate so that both sides of politics can have their say.

However, that discussion must be based on facts to be useful and move forward, and Abbott’s comments yesterday demonstrated either a lack of knowledge about the subject which he was discussing or a willingness to mislead the public about several of the underpinnings of the NBN project and the recent debate surrounding it. While it’s important to report their views, it’s also important for the media to point out where politicians have published misleading statements. With that out of the way, let’s go through some of Abbott’s statements, which can be heard in full online here.

1. “The news today that there’s about 2500 fibre subscribers and about 1500 wireless subscribers just confirms that this is going to be one of the all-time great white elephants.”

What Abbott appears to be alleging here is that NBN Co is progressing too slowly with respect to its ability to attract subscribers to its network infrastructure; the numbers, the Opposition Leader is implying, are not high enough.

However, if you closely examine NBN Co’s corporate plan, it seems relatively clear that the company is actually more or less on track with respect to the numbers of “active subscribers” which it has signed up, through retail Internet service providers, to use its network. As we detailed yesterday, NBN Co had not, by June 2011, planned to sign up any customers, apart from those who are using fibre networks in areas such as new housing estates — networks that may have already been built by other companies and used by NBN Co.

By June 2012, NBN Co is planning to have signed up some 116,000 customers in total — but again, the vast majority of these will come from so-called ‘greenfields Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT)’ networks. Only a small handful will come from customers on its own networks, and given that NBN Co only launched commercial services on its networks in October, and that those networks have so far only been rolled out to a fraction of the population, we’d say that having some 4,000 active subscribers at this point is pretty much a decent result for NBN Co, especially given that 2,300 of those are on fibre. That’s why NBN Co issued a media release with the news. It was proud of it. However, it appears that Abbott has misconstrued NBN Co’s numbers.

2. “Vast amounts of money spent. $50 billion plus, and going up all the time, to give us something that most people don’t want, don’t need and don’t want to pay more for.”

In actual fact, the Coalition’s own telecommunications policy aims to provide Australians with very much the same outcomes that Labor’s NBN policy does; the two policies simply vary in the ways that they seek to achieve this aim.

The debate over the need for higher speeds has virtually disappeared over the past six months, and it has become common for Shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull to highlight how fibre to the node and HFC cable technology (as opposed to the fibre to the home rollout of the NBN) can provide similar speeds to the NBN — higher than 50Mbps and even up to 80Mbps and beyond. By releasing such a policy, the Coalition is directly suggesting that Australia does need higher broadband speeds than we currently have access to, in contrast to Abbott’s statement. It’s just that the Coalition doesn’t want to spend the same amount of money as Labor on this kind of scheme.

In addition, there is ample evidence that Australians do want higher broadband speeds and consider telecommunications infrastructure important. A Liberal Party report handed down by former Howard minister Peter Reith in July to the Federal Executive of the Liberal Party, for example, found that a failure to adequately respond to Labor’s NBN policy was a key reason for losing valuable votes in the 2010 Federal Election, especially in the sensitive Tasmanian electorate, which is receiving the network before the rest of the nation. Abbott received that report and surely read it.

3. “… there’s about a thousand people working for the NBN, that’s one employee for every four subscribers, and the average wage of the NBN is $165,000. Now this is the best remunerated company in Australia, and one person earning $165,000 people per year for every four subscribers, and the billion dollars that they have spent so far on the rollout works out at $250,000 per connection.”

Actually, if you examine the salaries of NBN Co’s top-earning staff, you’ll find that NBN Co is one of the poorest-remunerated major companies in Australia’s telecommunications sector, despite the fact that over the past several years it has poached high-quality senior staff from all of Australia’s major telcos.

NBN Co chief executive Mike Quigley, for example, earned $1.9 million in 2011, less than half of what Telstra CEO David Thodey did (he earned $5.1 million) and Optus CEO Paul O’Sullivan ($3 million). Similarly, other top NBN Co executives such as Patrick Flannigan (who has since left the company), Gary McLaren, Tim Smeallie, Jim Hassell, Kevin Brown and others are all earning less than $1 million per year — usually around the $700,000 to $800,000 mark. The details are in NBN Co’s latest annual report (PDF).

To say that these salaries are laughably low compared to what many of these executives could pick up by working for Telstra, Qantas, or other companies (as several of them have) is an understatement. Telstra’s top management, for example, are usually on at least $1.5 million per year and often higher — up to $3 million or $4 million a year. You can check these details for yourself in Telstra’s latest annual report (PDF).

We don’t have as much transparency with respect to the rest of NBN Co’s staff, and certainly the company would have had to pay a decent rate to head-hunt Australia’s top telco engineering talent the way it has. If you’re revamping Australia’s entire fixed-line broadband infrastructure, you need the best. Even so, I’m betting many of NBN Co’s employees took a pay cut to altruistically join what they see as a worthy national project.

4. Tim Webster: “I don’t think my family’s very unusual, we’ve got a couple of computers at home, a laptop, an iPad, we’re wireless, quite happy with the speed, quite happy with the service, and people will shop around, Tony, that’s the thing, and you will get the best deal. You won’t go to the NBN because it’s the government’s organisation, will you?”

Tony Abbott: “Well exactly right, in fact many people I think will shun the NBN precisely because it is the government organisation. Why do deals with a dodgy government. But look, everyone is connected these days.”

Um … firstly, Tim, your home connection is likely Wi-Fi hooked up to a fixed-line ADSL or HFC cable broadband connection. It’s not “wireless” in the sense that the Coalition usually talks about broadband. “Wireless” in the NBN debate means 3G or 4G mobile broadband networks — and I’m betting you don’t have that.

Secondly, it is factually incorrect for Abbott to state that many people will shun the NBN infrastructure because it is a government-owned organisation which built it and operates it. For starters, no Australian will buy broadband directly from NBN Co; under the law NBN Co can only sell services to retail ISPs, which will sell those services to consumers. It will be the same ISPs offering services over the NBN as currently operate in Australia — Telstra, Optus, iiNet, TPG and Vodafone — and they won’t be “shunned”.

But the most important issue here is that both Abbott and Webster are presenting NBN sign-ups as though Australians will have a choice. They won’t. If you want fixed-line broadband infrastructure, in future you will buy it through the NBN fibre connection to your house. Under current policy, both ADSL and HFC cable networks in Australia will be shut down for broadband. So yes, you WILL go to the NBN. Because you will have no choice.

5. “All the NBN is doing is slowly digging up streets to connect fibre to 93% of Australian households, whether they need it, want it, or can afford to pay extra for it. And that’s why it is such a monumental waste of money and such a misdirection of resources.”

In this sentence Abbott appears to be suggesting that Australians will pay extra for the NBN. This statement is factually inaccurate.

In November last year, Optus released the first tranche of its pricing for NBN services. The plans were interesting because in virtually every single aspect, they represented better value than the telco’s current ADSL plans — and for exactly the same price. And increasingly, this is not an unusual situation. iiNet, Internode, Exetel and Primus have also released NBN pricing, and in all cases the pricing was pretty similar to current ADSL broadband pricing — but offering vastly better services over the NBN’s improved fibre infrastructure.

In summary, I have to say that I am pretty disappointed with Tony Abbott’s knowledge of the National Broadband Network debate, as demonstrated during the radio interview with Tim Webster on 2UE yesterday. At several points, Abbott uttered statements which were pretty much in direct conflict with his own party’s voter research and policies, his comments about NBN Co salaries are highly debatable, and on several points — buying services from the NBN and the price of doing so — he made clearly factually inaccurate statements.

To be fair on the Coalition, Malcolm Turnbull is their telco expert, and he usually does a very good job of debating the issues. Perhaps it’s time for Abbott to stop talking about the NBN — before Conroy starts issuing his own corrections to the Opposition Leader’s false statements.

Image credit: Screenshot of Tony Abbott on the 7:30 Report talking about the NBN, believed to be OK to use under fair use

403 COMMENTS

        • Renai, again I must come out of the woodworks and correct you again. Another article you have written on your blog based on your ignorance and ignorance has a way of finding company.

          Point 1 – it is unclear to date how the rollout will go, from your chart we will have to wait for 2013 when NBN thinkings it can connect 250,000 customers in the space of a year of infrastructure build. This will be its do or die, or reality hits home.

          Point 2 – despite what you want to believe most people do not want fibre broadband. People who live in cities and many regional areas are happy with their ADSL or broadband services, and are unwilling to spend this large amount of money providing something they already have.

          Point 3 – the average employee salary of NBN is quite high, then again you would expect that as simple market supply and demand, if you have deep pockets and want labour and materials fast from an existing market in equilibrium, you expect wages to rise and to pay more. In fact, NBN’s hiring of its 1000 or so many telco staff from the existing Telco labour force in Aus cities have driven up my wage, and I dont work for NBNCo. It just means I have more bargaining power.

          Point 4 – the NBN would be highly susceptible to corruption and poor tendering processes. I dont doubt the similarities to big budget gov. projects eg. BER and Insulation. Why live in a fantasy world? In reality the NBN with its big dollar value would be a very likely target for corruption.

          Point 5 – it is true that NBNCo is doing something that no one in the world has attempted, now before people start pointing to Verizon in the USA, Japan , Sth Korea, for the scale and scope of this Australian project, it is a one of a kind , never attempted in history of telecoms, and its been driven by politicans to please a few independents. Good luck. Thats why I call BS.

          • Point 1: When the NBN rolls out in the future, the copper will be switched off. If you want fixed broadband then you have to connect to the NBN.

            Point 2: if you look at the Optus and Internode plans for the NBN, they are much better value for the same price point. I don’t know where you get the idea that it is much more expensive.

            Point 3: NBNCo don’t have the army of customer support people (as opposed to the engineering people). This alone will increase the average wage of employees of NBNCo

            Point 4: just like any other big project (private or public).

            Point 5: what is wrong with being a world leader in the delivery of FTTH?

          • We can look at the mining boom for example in terms of wages and costs. Not only are mining companies required to pay much more for trades people in a time of boom, it causes an across the board skills shortage as it absorbs labour from across other sectors.

            The only way for NBNCo to maintain its costs is to import skilled labour from overseas eg. Thailand and Malaysia. In addition, its materials cost would be quite substantial. But one problem is, as it stands the building and construction capacity is firmly in the hands of a few large contractor builders, eg. Leighton. We really do not have a market based supply contractors who can tender for work, for the most part it falls under the same umbrella.

          • “Point 2: if you look at the Optus and Internode plans for the NBN, they are much better value for the same price point. I don’t know where you get the idea that it is much more expensive.”

            Just one quick point. Where do you think the infrastructure costs come from? Believe it or not, working Australians pay the government in taxes… Which they do with as they wish. So whilst many WoW playing dole bludgers here won’t pay more I will.

            Yes, I realise the NBN is the bees knees technology wise. Cost Vs Benefit should be the sole argument here.

          • Who are all these people who do not want fibre broadband? Have you actually asked everyone in Australia? I haven’t met anyone yet who thinks it will be a bad thing. As bandwidth demands increase and the availability of streaming online TV, audio and video feeds continues, fibre will become more and more necessary. The faster speeds and greater bandwidth availability will enable more people to communicate using Skype and other similar services, without having to tolerate the current patchy quality and screen freezes that are often encountered today. Many Australians have relatives abroad and clearly it is more satisfying to be able to talk to them and see for yourself that they are doing well. I have personally used most kinds of internet connection, wi-fi hotspots, mobile broadband, and fixed line ADSL and frankly I wouldn’t be able to manage without my fast fixed line service at home. I am lucky now as I live near to the exchange, but when I move as I will have to soon I fear the speeds will drop dramatically and I will notice the difference. At least once the fibre is installed there will be much more parity in service quality and availability regardless of one’s proximity to the nearest telephone exchange (I accept that those people in very remote areas may be restricted to wireless and satellite services, but nobody has ever claimed 100% availability, and sometimes people in remote communities have to make certain sacrifices in order to live where they do – for example higher fuel prices etc.).
            Please stop speaking for some imaginary majority. Unless of course you actually have asked everyone and actually received and documented their responses. Just in case you think that opinion polls are truly representative, I haven’t yet come across anyone who lives around here who has ever heard from pollsters, so I suspect they carefully pick their “random” areas and demographics.

    • Your statement about Abbott and his Gates statement MW is totally ironic seeing Gates had this to say about the NBN.

      “Yeah, I don’t know enough to really take a side on this issue. It’s definitely good to have a broadband network, and how you get there, whether you use private company competition, like Korea did, or whether you use government policies like some countries are, that’s a tough one.”

      http://delimiter.com.au/2011/12/15/bill-gates-backs-away-from-nbn-debate/

  1. ‘NBN Co chief executive Mike Quigley, for example, earned $1.9 million in 2011, less than half of what Telstra CEO David Thodey did (he earned $5.1 million) and Optus CEO Paul O’Sullivan ($3 million).’

    Of course the key difference is that Telstra and Optus both run at a profit.

          • You’re the one who raised the issue!

            Did Optus make a profit in their first few of years?

            No – because as any intelligent person will tell you, it takes money to establish a business, and the first couple of years will almost always see more expenditure required to get going, than will come in in revenue.

            I just wanted you to tell me so you could see how stupid a comment your “the key difference is that Telstra and Optus both run at a profit” comment really is.

          • lol, if ever there was an example of someone having their argument demolished then behaving like a dick once he realises what the other much smarter person is doing to his argument, this has to be it.

            /golfclap

          • You raise a valid point Michael that only an ignorant twit would fail to see.

            In 5 years time when NBN’co has ‘matured’ in terms of its revenue and business model (matured from the reality of doing business in reality and not just on paper), I’d be extremely surprised if its CEO isn’t paid 3-5 times what Mike Quigley is currently getting. Using the CEO’s current low salary as a point in any NBN debate is completely pointless.

            And of course when NBN’co is sold off to the highest bidder, as far as the CEO salary goes, the sky is the limit. This is what worries me most about the NBN. Replacing one monopolistic behemoth in Telstra who currently provide most of the wholesale comms services in Australia, with an unknown.

            Is it just me worrying about that? I’m worried that as soon as NBN’co lands in private hands, prices will be jacked up, up, UP and UP like every other utility these days, because that’s what internet access is. It’s a utility service, just like power, gas and water. If anyone argues otherwise, they’re a fool.

          • You are probably not correct in assuming the pay will increase significantly at NBNCo, that salary will likely expand at regular head of GOE rates (which isn’t as much as the private sector), and in fact there would be a distinct possibility that Mike may just be here for the build and will then move on, at which point they would possibly even decrease the wages.

            Look at the wages of state gov owned electricity companies, granted this will be larger than any single power company but will likely have significantly less on-going costs than our power companies.

            But I agree with you about the sell off, if that happens I am concerned, even though the price would be regulated I still don’t like the idea of it one bit as private companies tend to like to fudge the figures so they can increase costs by the maximum amount.

            I’m not sure what to make about Labors silence on this issue recently, are they mostly silent on it because the independents/greens both support government ownership and they agree, or because they just want to ignore it so no debate on the issue occurs and in future they can just go, “well we always said we were going to sell it”.

            Also The Nationals will support gov ownership once the project is complete too, which I’m sure the coalition just loves… “What do you mean we have to buy your support again!!!!!” when they go to sell it.

          • My argument is that the NBN Co runs at a loss from Day 1 and it will NEVER EVER run at a profit and will be propped up by the taxpayer until it is sold off at the great garage sale where the taxpayer will once again take a massive bath on the markdown sale price.

            Telstra and or SingTel will be the only companies interested in taking it on, even then that’s a big bloody ‘if’, they will too busy making massive ARPU’s from wireless data and using the millions gifted to them by Conroy to enhance their wireless infrastructure.

            Making reasonable ARPU’s from new build fixed line BB infrastructure with pricing set by the ACCC as in the glory days of piggy backing off the established PSTN with ADSL/2+ where all you had to do was wack DSLAM’s into racks in already built Telstra exchange buildings and resell using ACCC artificially set low LSS and ULL pricing are over.

            Have no doubt, the Labor NBN is going to be a massive white elephant, I expect the Labor NBN spin machine to be a full stretch between now and the election of 2013.

        • Don’t play dumb. You know exactly where Michael is going, and he’s spot on. Perhaps you’re just not willing to admit what a stupid statement you made, having realised that Optus’ CEO was very well remunerated long before Optus turned a profit.

          • I totally agree. Alain knew where michael was leading and didnt follow, whether to dodge a troll or just because he plainly was to daft to see it; is debatable.

            The key difference tho, in Optus AND Vodafone’s case – they have massive leading parent companies that have endlessly deep pockets; ones that can afford to run at a loss while either the network recovers (in Vodafone’s case) or can go toe to toe with the incumbent (Optus). While this doesnt change the fact that it does take alot of startup collateral to get the company going, it really does highlight what abbott missed – which is that Optus and Vodafone CEOs and management staff are very well paid during these periods.

          • As does NBNCo Apollo ; D

            In fact, it has a MUCH larger parent company than both Optus and Vodaphone, they aren’t even in the same league really ; D

      • Indeed they are established and mature. However this has not stopped either of them from providing very expensive services (yes I know Optus looks cheap on the face of it – but just wait until they hit you with the fine print) along with diabolically poor customer service (and yes, I have had dealings with both and indeed with many other companies also). Time and again I hear from people that they have been let down badly and are deeply disappointed with both of them. If their services were so wonderful they wouldn’t need to lock customers in to 12 and 24 months contracts. Happy customers keep coming back, so they don’t need to be locked in. I don’t have a locked-in contract, I pay month to month and I am currently very happy with the services I receive. If I wasn’t I would be shopping around for another no-contract service in no time flat.

    • Huh? I thought the deal was that NBNCo would deliver a return on investment comparable to money earned on bonds. I’m pretty sure NBNCo is out to make a profit for it’s shareholders (taxpayers), too.

    • Mike Quigley apparently gave his salary (however much that was) away to charity – that is right isn’t it…

  2. What a biased piece. The fact is that this will be another Labor disaster. I am really uncomfortable letting Orwellian type Governments control vital infrastructure such as a broadband network….it stinks of censorship.

    • I heard occy straps are excellent for holding tin foil hats in place, you should give that a go.

      • using a leftwing website to denounce john howard…. em GEE that’s not baised at all!!!

        • And what was not accurate in the article?

          Or more importantly, was there enough factual errors or logic missteps in the article to make they point invalid?

        • Heh heh you don’t even need a left wing website (if there is such a thing) to denounce John Howard. His atrocious record speaks for itself if you bother to do the research. Of course this does take time due to his insistence upon extreme censorship in order to cover up all his little peccadilloes and gaffes. For example just try to access the Hansard reports pertaining to his time as Treasurer – that should keep you busy. They are not available to the public.

    • Tony Abbot is a complete idiot.There is no balanced view about anything as far as he is concerned.Don’t let the facts stand in the way of a good headline Tony.Remember this guy leads a party that happily lies about things if it helps win an election.(omg they threw the babies overboard!!!!!)

    • Yes indeed, how dare they invest tax money into the country. Anyone would think that taxpayers pay their taxes so that the government can asset strip everything that’s not nailed down and make their rich mates even richer – oh, wait – too late! That was already done just before Labor got in. They HAVE to rebuild the country (this requires tax investment) due to the neglect and privation of the Coalition years. Or perhaps you are happy that Australia remain in the IT dark ages. BTW a large budget surplus usually means neglect of public services by means of funding cuts.

  3. Tony is a great opposition leader: Predictable, boring, constantly attacking, offering no better solutions etc. He will never be a Prime Minister though. Just an interim man.

    My dad gets wireless and wireless confused all the time but that’s ok because he is not talking about $50b worth of high speed networks. He does ask me for advice though, maybe Tony should ask Malcolm for some.

    • Yeah I recently had great trouble explaining the wireless/Wi-Fi/mobile broadband differences to my mum. But that’s pretty much par for the course with parents ;)

      • I think there is lot more substance to the NBN debate than confusion about Wi-Fi and 3G, as if that is a key point of confusion out there in punter land that underpins the viability of the Labor NBN.

        :)

      • For what it’s worth, I found the simplest way to explain it is to compare it to a cordless phone vs a mobile phone – most people I encounter are familiar with these concepts.
        Your cordless phone uses a base station that connects to a wired phone line, with limited range. Similarly Wifi needs a base station nearby, that connects to a (usually) wired internet connection.
        Your mobile phone connects directly to the phone company’s towers. So does MBB/3G internet/wireless Internet/ whatever you want to call it. You can take it away from your house or office and still use it as long as the phone company you use has a tower within range.
        I’m yet to find anyone I can’t explain the concept to using this example.

        • Ash,

          I wish you could explain to my wife the difference between making a call to a land line using Skype and a Skype to Skype call.

  4. Great article. It’s the closest to being unbiased and factually correct article that I’ve read in ages.

    It’d be great to also see the comments that Tony Abbot made that were actually correct (if possible, just for bias sake)

    • Cheers! Actually I didn’t think Tony said much that was accurate, but judge for yourself — here’s the transcript:

      [Question: the NBN, I have to say, it doesn’t surprise me, there were a few of us, me included, who were questioning it from the beginning, not only on the technology side of it, but on the money side of it, and now the chickens are coming home to roost.]

      Dead right, and the more we learn about this national broadband network the worse it gets. The news today that there’s about 2500 fibre subscribers and about 1500 wireless subscribers just confirms that this is going to be one of the all-time great white elephants.

      Vast amounts of money spent. $50 billion plus, and going up all the time, to give us something that most people don’t want, don’t need and don’t want to pay more for.

      The interesting thing, Tim, is that there’s about a thousand people working for the NBN, that’s one employee for every four subscribers, and the average wage of the NBN is $165,000. Now this is the best remunerated company in Australia, and one person earning $165,000 people per year for every four subscribers, and the billion dollars that they have spent so far on the rollout works out at $250,000 per connection.

      By any measure, this is a monumental ripoff, it’s yet another sign that this is a government which is utterly incompetent and just can’t be trusted when it comes to spending taxpayers’ money.

      [Question: on the fair dinkum side of it, I mentioned to the listeners, I don’t think my family’s very unusual, we’ve got a couple of computers at home, a laptop, an iPad, we’re wireless, quite happy with the speed, quite happy with the service, and people will shop around, Tony, that’s the thing, and you will get the best deal. You won’t go to the NBN because it’s the government’s organisation, will you?]

      Well exactly right, in fact many people I think will shun the NBN precisely because it is the government organisation. Why do deals with a dodgy government. But look, everyone is connected these days. We live in a linked up world, but more and more people are using wireless. Now fibre has an important place. The base stations which are so important in our telecommunications networks are all linked up by fibre, but that’s all happening anyway. It didn’t need the NBN to happen.

      All the NBN is doing is slowly digging up streets to connect fibre to 93% of Australian households, whether they need it, want it, or can afford to pay extra for it. And that’s why it is such a monumental waste of money and such a misdirection of resources.

  5. Renai,

    Not to be too picky, but it is important to understand that the NBN is rolling out Fixed wireless, not Mobile. The two are very different in how they behave.

    • hey Loriden,

      I am aware of the difference. In this case I was referring to the difference between Wi-Fi and mobile broadband. The NBN’s fixed wireless does not come into the debate.

      Renai

      • Renai,

        After i re-read i believe i misinterpreted your statement about 3g and 4g networks as being apart of NBN’s network, not the operator. The reverse may be the case.

        Can we start using Fixed and Mobile wireless to differentiate? It’s doing my head in.

    • Um … what background? I’ve been a tech reporter for most of the past decade. Before that I was a sysadmin. I’m not a member of any major party. If you’re referring to my habit of playing StarCraft II constantly, then that’s not relevant :)

      • Here is one example of bias without trying, your comparison on pay. 1.9 million dollars for the NBN CEO is a huge amount by any standard. Also both Telstra and Optus are much bigger, have greater numbers of staff, many more customers and do not rely of taxpayer hand outs and a givernment monopoly. It does explain why their CEO’s are paid more, even I find these amounts obscene. And I doubt they would get a bonus if they had 4,000 subscribers against the NBN’s own target of 35,000. That is a fail everywhere but at the NBN.

        • Eventually NBN Co’s infrastructure will be the foundation stone of virtually all of Australia’s fixed-line telecommunications. We need to get this set up right, and I don’t think $1.9 million to hire an executive of Mike Quigley’s global stature is a lot. In fact, it’s paltry, a fact well illustrated by the fact that Quigley tends to donate his salary to charity. He’s used to being paid much more at his former employer Alcatel-Lucent.

          Telstra is only a hop, skip and a jump away from its previous history as a government monopoly, while Optus is owned by a government monopoly.

          And yes, I would bet, that when Optus was formed several decades ago, that the CEO would have gotten a bonus for the first tranche of customers. You need to start somewhere. I know that NBN Co has incentive schemes built into its remuneration structures. I’m betting they won’t come into play until the rollout really picks up the pace.

        • How is doing basic comparisons of salaries biased?

          By that logic, Sol Trujillo should have paid, not been paid, as Telstra shares plummeted. Yet he strode off with many millions.

          Let’s be real here, for Renai to be considered unbiased in some people’s eyes, he would need to actually be totally biased in Abbott’s favour.

          • If you have a problem with Sol’s package take up with the Telstra Board, they approved it and also when they reinstated him again for another term.

            Perhaps they got their benefit as Sol as fast tracked the NextG rollout, Telstra is reaping millions from NextG and will do so with Telstra LTE and upgrades beyond that.

            I am sure Telstra is looking forward to pumping the taxpayer millions Conroy is giving to them so their customer base is forced onto the NBN into the wireless infrastructure upgrades, not only that they can now market NextG as a NBN substitute, thank you ACCC.

          • “If you have a problem with Sol’s package take up with the Telstra Board, they approved it and also when they reinstated him again for another term.”

            interesting that you should say this when you are so against the fact that the telstra board (and in fact the telstra shareholders) approved the decommissioning of its copper and HFC networks in favour of the NBN.

          • You are confusing the argument, I understand why the Telstra Board recommended and the shareholders subsequently approved the deal, it is rare the shareholders go against a Boards recommendation, especially a blue chip relatively conservative shareholder base company like Telstra.

            Doesn’t mean I don’t like the NBN viability totally depending on the shutdown of competitor infrastructure, it makes a total mockery of the basic premise underpinning its reason for being, that everyone needs the NBN FTTH because it is faster.

          • So you dislike the NBN because it is government funded, yet love Telstra?

            You are pulling our legs.

            This leads me to refer you to this phrase from Ayn Rand (I’m sure “you of all people here” would know of her)

            “Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong”.

          • So you dislike the NBN because it is government funded, yet love Telstra?

            No, that’s not what I said at all.

          • Abbott talked about the average salaries of all 1000 employees.

            Renai talked about the top tier salaries and goes on to show that the NBN CEO’s salary is lower than the CEOs of some other companies. He also suggests (without comparison) that other top level employees are poorly remunerated. He suggests that this means the whole company is poorly remunerated.

            This is not an apples to apples comparison. Abbott talked about the average salary of all the employees, not the top tier. End result: Renai compared about 6 employees with the 1000 Abbott talked about.

            Renai draws an illogical conclusion, that because of the relatively lower CEO remuneration that the whole company is poorly remunerated.

            “Actually, if you examine the salaries of NBN Co’s top-earning staff, you’ll find that NBN Co is one of the poorest-remunerated major companies in Australia’s telecommunications sector”

            “NBN Co chief executive Mike Quigley, for example, earned $1.9 million in 2011, less than half of what Telstra CEO David Thodey did (he earned $5.1 million) and Optus CEO Paul O’Sullivan ($3 million). Similarly, other top NBN Co executives such as Patrick Flannigan (who has since left the company), Gary McLaren, Tim Smeallie, Jim Hassell, Kevin Brown and others are all earning less than $1 million per year — usually around the $700,000 to $800,000 mark. “

          • But you can’t just compare the average salary of two different companies and expect to get a meaningful result. Compare the average salary at Goldman Sachs with that of McDonald’s, for an extreme example. Obviously NBNCo vs. Telstra are not as dissimilar as Goldman Sachs vs. McDonalds, but they’re definitely not directly comparable, either.

            The only meaningful comparison would be individual employees (or groups of employees) doing similar jobs. But I still that that’s fairly meaningless. In any professional/high-skilled role, an individual’s salary is largely a function of his own negotiation skills.

        • Who says Telstra is not subsidised? Who paid for most of the original network? And does Telstra pay rent to local councils for the subsoil which houses it pits and pipes? Years ago, superannuation funds got a tax break if they invested in loans to build the network Telstra inherited. Subsidy, no?

      • I think by bias he means you understand the difference between a startup and a mature business, have the ability to read and analyse reports, have an open mind, and actually have a clue about the technical issues. Those traits certainly smell of bias to me…

      • “If you’re referring to my habit of playing StarCraft II constantly”

        Consider yourself invited to my next LAN party :-)

  6. I thought you said this article would be free from bias… I know it says ‘Written by Renai LeMay’ but I got a good feeling that this could be Julia Gillards alias… I like how this article tries to make light of Tony Abbots assertions, but it does a pretty good job of making a few of its own… Thanks Julia

    • If you read his entire body of work in regards to the NBN, Renai is one of the least biased tech journalists on the subject going around.

      A little context goes a long way.

      • Reni,

        Didn’t you know that any fact is biased against Tony “Mr No” Abbott?

        (this comment may be biased itself :-P )

    • Dont worry Renai you have not been biased just stated the facts

      Unfortunaly the facts are in terms of politics centre not left of right wing.
      Its just from so far on the right wing everything is left.

  7. The facts are still the same, Abott charged Turnbull to destroy the NBN, because of bad labor decisions like carbon tax, independence, greens etc. the sheep majority will blindly follow libreal into the next election so all these debates are probably in vain as the liberals will destroy the NBN as soon as in power and offer a severely watered down version that will not even start construction for 2-3 years once all the dishonored contracts, re-negotiations have been sorted. With liberal you’ll have nothing, not even one worker commencing with any sought of NBN for years, is this the type of tech future Australia wants ?

  8. This site is always good for brazen bias for the NBN. 4,000 subscribers against their own stated target of 35,000 is appalling anywhere but here. IT where over promising and chronic under delivery are just business as usual.

    • Actually as of june 2011 the actual number of people prediceted to be connected to the NBN in their plan is 00000.

      The 35000 are people connected to already existing infrastucture which after negotiations will be bought by NBN Co.

      • Renai, i LOVE that piece. you can try and better it if you like but i reckon reposting that link is probably the better course heheh not a journalist myself but always been interested in the process and that writer has really nailed down thoughts that have occurred to me many times reading comment threads….

    • Try looking up some facts, liberal has been creating blocks and delays ever since the NBN began, not to mention Telstra & starting the project in small rural communties. Guess what with the Liberals version of NBN you’ll have 0 people connected for 2-3years, stop being a blind liberal puppet cause that is all you appear to be.

  9. When writing an article tearing down others for factually incorrect statements, I think it is a massive assumption when you say “your home connection is likely Wi-Fi hooked up to a fixed-line”.

    I visited my old man up on the Sunshine Coast over xmas and he uses NextG via a Bigpond 3G/Wifi gateway to totally replace their fixed line@Home (and when they are out grey nomading in the caravan, 2 for the price of 1).

    Multiple computers/ipads/iphones on the web and watching youtube simultaneously with no problems at all. Works like a dream.

    Real users using wireless as an alternate access mechanism, not complimentary.

    Granted this is shared bandwidth at the radio interface, but just like PON, it will evolve and the shared bandwidth will increase.

    • He doesn’t say “your home connection is Wi-Fi hooked up to a fixed-line” he says it is “likely” one, which, if you look at the stats, is a very fair assumption to make.

    • It is statistically 100% accurate to say that most people who say they are using “wireless” as their home broadband connection are actually using a Wi-Fi ADSL or HFC cable modem. Fixed-line replacement with mobile broadband is an increasing trend, but it’s very, very far away from being mainstream.

      • … or you could have lots of people deliberately buying into residences close to a McDonald’s.

        :)

      • You can argue semantics till the cows come home, but you portray your own biases when you assume (and make a point of it in your article) someone is likely incorrect to suit your own argument. How do you know that the interviewer isn’t using NextG, or Vivid or any other of the number of wireless broadband providers?

        • i have to agree with this.

          it is one hell of an assumption.
          granted the odds are in your favour that you’re correct, but the basis of your article is facts, not odds.

          i don’t however think that this is bias. just a poor example to use in this particular article.

        • But then if he assumed it was 3G (a less likely scenario) he would be biased also, right?

        • Because the interviewer said “I don’t think my family’s very unusual”. If his family had all of that gear running off 3G/4G then they would be unusual, because the vast, vast majority of households have a fixed-line connection with a Wi-Fi modem.

          So either the “I don’t think my family’s very unusual” comment is a lie, or the interview doesn’t understand what “wireless” means in this context. I would suggest the latter is the most likely.

        • He doesn’t – but statistics suggest that it is likely that the interviewer is using Wi-Fi with a fixed connection (while at home at least).

          • Statistically, with over 8 Billion web pages, I am very unlikely to be posting on Delimiter, but here I am ;) Lies, damn lies and statistics.

            To quote Renai:
            “discussion must be based on facts”

            The NBN takeup statistics don’t make for pretty reading, but maybe using statistics in that context doesn’t suit your bias?

            I’m all for healthy debate on the NBN (and neither side is afraid of using porkies, surprise surprise), but if someone is going to claim to be purely factual, then they cant make assumptions that may or may not be correct, just because those assumptions support their argument(s).

          • The point is, the interviewer is factually not correct. Either he is using 3G/4G in which case “I don’t think my family is unusual” is incorrect — he family is unusual since most people are not exclusively 3G/4G wireless. Or he’s using a fixed-line connection with Wi-Fi, as Renai assumed.

            Renai assumed he’s using fixed-line with Wi-Fi because that’s statistically more likely. But even if that’s not the case, the interview is still objectively, factually incorrect.

          • And the facts are that most “wireless” connections are indeed a wifi connection from a wireless modem. I don’t think it’s a stretch at all considering how many facts Tony and the Interviewer got wrong…

            It seems to me that most of the Liberal supporters have been left with very few (if any) facts to argue with, so they now must try to throw mud, create fear, and point the finger at any intelligent debate calling it “biased”. This is truly a very sad state…and I still don’t understand why the Libs don’t swallow their pride and finally admit that this is an excellent project. It seems to me that by being in a constant state of denial like this, they do nothing but weaken their own case for election, much more so than if they just acted like grown-ups and admitted the mistake and moved on.
            I want a grown-up in government myself…

          • ‘and I still don’t understand why the Libs don’t swallow their pride and finally admit that this is an excellent project.’

            Probably because it isn’t maybe?

          • Give it a couple of years Chas.

            After all, the opposition criticised the current government’s initial NBN policy, which was mostly FTTN orientated and a few years later adopted a very similar policy for their own.

          • No they didn’t.

            If you can’t convince them, confuse them – Harry S. Truman

      • It does not matter whether there is bias or whether the statement is right or wrong or a guess,everybody here knows the point that was being made. 3g/4g versus wi fi from ethernet.You dumb f**ks should look up obfuscation.

      • “It is statistically 100% accurate to say that most people who say they are using “wireless” as their home broadband connection are actually using a Wi-Fi ADSL or HFC cable modem”

        100%? Really? You went out and took a poll of a people who make that claim? (from a statistically relevant portion of the population)….

        Anecdotes, anecdotes…

        (note: I do agree with you – anecdotally speaking)

        • Nice. Ignoring the “most” in that statement. He worded it badly by including the “100%” but his point still stands, it is accurate to say that most people when referring to wireless in their homes actually mean WiFi, not modem services.

          • Perhaps you misinterpreted or misread what I wrote.

            I didn’t ignore the “most” – I was pointing out that using terms like “100% accurate” and then not having anything other than anecdotes to show that accuracy is a funny situation.

            I also clearly point out that I agree with his statement (i.e. since most people have ADSL at home shared by wireless (802.11x), then if they are referring to their wireless they are probably in fact hooked up by ADSL – but this is still anecdotal since we haven’t measured it).

  10. Your comment about “under paid NBNCo personnel is interesting as you set out to discredit Abbott’s lack of facts.

    I only know of three people who have moved from their jobs with Australian carriers to the NBNCo.

    Each is now being paid considerably more than (up to 50% more) than they were by their previous carrier employers.

    Two have jobs that require no work to be done until much later in 2012 – although both were employed in mid 2011.

    Also, to compare the remuneration of a CEO in a start up carrier with that of the CEOs of the long established Telstra and Optus is laughably irrelevant.

    I don’t have any idea as to what will happen with the ‘NBN2’ in the future (and as far as I can see – neither does anyone else) but what has happened so far is not at all impressive.

    From a buyer’s perspective (which I have some direct experience compared to your zero) NBNCo, unsurprisingly, has a very, very long way to go to begin to be an effective provider of wholesale telecommunications services.

    You may say that will be addressed over time – you may well be right. However if you want to attack Abbott over his command of facts you might like to better inform yourself on the subjects you address before you put text to screen.

    • I only know of three people who have moved from their jobs with Australian carriers to the NBNCo.
      Each is now being paid considerably more than (up to 50% more) than they were by their previous carrier employers.
      Two have jobs that require no work to be done until much later in 2012 – although both were employed in mid 2011.

      I know of more than 3 that have left other carriers, and all of which are being paid considerably more (I don’t know about 50% more, but around the 30% mark) for a similar job.

      Linton is right in that comparing the salaries of the chiefs of the companies is flawed, compare the salaries of the indians themselves, and you’ll find there is quite a jump from standard telco salaries to what NBN is paying.

    • hey John,

      thanks for your comment!

      You are correct, stories about high salaries at NBN Co when they’ve been head-hunting staff are pretty rife throughout the industry, and I’m sure there is quite a lot of truth to this. As I noted in the article, when you’re on as tight a schedule as NBN Co is on, you need the best, and I’m sure at times they have been paying through the nose for that. You’re also correct about NBN Co being a startup and not an established carrier.

      However, I think two factors mediate the situation.

      Firstly, we’re looking at NBN Co as a whole, compared with other companies as a whole — not individual salaries as a whole versus individual salaries at other companies. And on this basis, NBN Co’s remuneration structure likely sees it come out cheaper than other companies. Don’t forget — NBN Co is typically hiring engineers rather than management, and technical talent in this area tends to top out at a certain level, of a few hundred thousand. In this sense, NBN Co is probably overweight with mid-level staff compared to other companies, which are likely to have more high-level managers with disproportionately high salaries (see Telstra, Optus etc).

      Therefore, the mid-level salaries at NBN Co are likely to look quite good, as they’re hiring the best engineers, but there’s not much higher-level excess going on. It is likely that NBN Co is paying very few of the top-level performance bonuses to top executives which tend to push out upper-level salaries so much. The top execs are in fact likely, as I have demonstrated, taking pay cuts compared with their potential earnings in the commercial sector.

      This scenario is consistent with both your argument and mine. In short, it is likely that NBN Co’s top execs are being paid less than industry value, while the rest of the mid-level and potentially the bottom level is being paid more, because they’re the best the industry has to offer.

      Secondly, I want to address your startup argument.

      I run my own startup and talk frequently to other startup owners. The difference between NBN Co and those companies is that typically salaries are lower in startups because they allocate equity in the company to early employees — when you sell your company, list etc, or even make a profit, you make your money back that way.

      Let’s not forget that this is different at NBN Co. Early employees are not receiving equity. They are simply receiving salaries. And so, necessarily, some of those salaries are going to be higher as a result. However, I still believe that as a total package, NBN Co is doing pretty well on this front in terms of conserving its funds.

      I can’t argue with your buyer’s experience of dealing with NBN Co — I hope they lift their game! Personally I have always found all of their staff very competent, and certainly in many cases the best the industry has to offer. I have a lot of confidence personally in Mike Quigley especially, as well as Gary McLaren and Kevin Brown. They are solid.

      Cheers,

      Renai

      • @Renai

        ‘I run my own startup and talk frequently to other startup owners. The difference between NBN Co and those companies is that typically salaries are lower in startups because they allocate equity in the company to early employees — when you sell your company, list etc, or even make a profit, you make your money back that way.’

        The NBN Co is not a normal start-up company in any way shape or form, how many start-up companies you know of:

        1. Is funded and backed by the Government, even if the NBN bleeds millions it doesn’t matter, this start-up company will never fail in the normal way a private start-up can because of lack of cash flow.

        2. Has the Government on their behalf buy out and shut down all competition forcing everyone to use the start-up company facility.

        It is politically motivated project the gestation of which was the failed Labor RFP in 2007, it cannot be seen to fail even if it drastically goes over budget and over schedule, it’s not as if the Labor Government has to front up to their bank for a extension to their overdraft or loan facility to keep it on the rails.

        • “The NBN Co is not a normal start-up company in any way shape or form, ”

          then why is it being held to account in the same manner?

        • alain,

          you are right in your posts. If you read the comments on Business Spectator vs. Whirlpool, you will see the mature vs. the kiddies.

          The Liberal and Labor PR machines have been riding this strong for a long time. In reality, no one knows how to fix the telco problem in australia. But it seems now that people will buy into anything the gov. pushes.

          Of course you know my jaw dropped when they announced a $43bn plan to replace the 2007 plan, which replaced the liberals OPEL plan, every new one need to be more extravagent than the next.

          Again, I was online bagging the 2007 Rudd FTTN plan, and lauged at people who thought the consortiums like ACACIA, AXIA, FANOC etc. etc. and their proposals. An of course that telstra invalid submission. It was all just fluff. But there were a lot of people on whirlpool who seriously bought this hook line sinker.

          Id give NBNCo till 2013, for
          1- they have to delivery 500,000 subscribers
          2- coincide with an election

          1- will almost certainly fail, and 2- we will see if Labor holds power

          business cases being that, it does not mean they can actually achieve want they plan, nor did they ever intend on doing so, but while the music is playing, everyone must dance.

          • I’m just curious, if NBNCo manage to achieve over half a million connections by June 2013, will you then consider actually endorsing the plan, or are you one of these people who are happy giving them mandates because you are so confident that they won’t achieve them, or that it won’t matter because you are so confident the Coalition will get into power and throw out the plan anyway?

      • On the point of hiring engineers — NBN don’t have employees in retail or call centres. They are hiring Network Engineers and other Professional roles. Of course they will have a higher cost per employee than Telstra. For the extreme case — Compare Google and Walmart.

    • “I only know of three people who have moved from their jobs with Australian carriers to the NBNCo.
      Each is now being paid considerably more than (up to 50% more) than they were by their previous carrier employers.”

      what sort of roles do these people perform?
      are we talking management?
      network engineer?
      shit kicker?

  11. This article reads like it came straight from Conroys blog on alp.org.au in response to Abbott! Amazing!

    **By June 2012, NBN Co is planning to have signed up some 116,000 customers in total**
    – Planning does not equal reality! They planned much earlier to have much higher numbers signed up to the service, but the fact remains that the take up rate is less than 5%, equalling a total of 20x higher cost of installation per user! A cool $60,000 per home connected at this take up rate, and that rate will only slow as time goes on and the ‘excitement’ of the NBN has worn away and other technologies are inplace, eg, Telstra replacing copper ADSL2 tails with VDSL2 tails, removal of pair gains and installation of additional tails in RIMS. You cannot count BOT in customer conversions because they are locked into a monopoly, it is not a figure counting success. Basically, a company (say Village Building Company) would be approached by the NBN saying ‘we will install fibre for free because we have tax payers backing’, whereas traditionally under a standard free market (remember folks, this is what our capitalist country is built on), the developer would have to pay the telecommunications provider as an incentive for people to come. So you can clearly see why counting BOT is a bit of junk. I’d like to see BOT vs. transfer statistics.

    I believe it is you who has misconstrued the NBN Co’s number by not providing indepth, through analysis and just reading the press release (as you said, you were proud. Journalists are meant to be subjective and analytical, not ‘proud’).

    ** Vast amounts of money spent. $50 billion plus, and going up all the time, to give us something that most people don’t want, don’t need and don’t want to pay more for. **

    In actual fact, the Coalition’s own telecommunications policy aims to provide Australians with very much the same outcomes that Labor’s NBN policy does; the two policies simply vary in the ways that they seek to achieve this aim.

    – The Coalitions OPEL plan was to increase backhaul to regional centres and remove pair gains for the installation and provision of ADSL2+ tails (and with time VDSL2, and subsequent technologies). It was to cost, from memory, in the order of $4 billion, with the rest being met by Optus and Telstra who were in full support. Fibre from the POP, to a super node, with fibre drunks to nodes and copper to the premises is the much more intelligent way to handle this, even the original NBN had this plan but they got self endulgent and wanted to be the ‘best in the world’. Who cares about the best in the world, I care about better healthcare, better defence, better policing, better education not the ability to torrent faster.

    One of the arguments against my ‘ability to torrent faster’ will be talking telemedicine. I’ll touch on that briefly now. I have decades of experience rolling out private IP services to hospitals, regional bases, military hospitals etc. I have many industry contacts with the CIOs of hospitals. None, if any, care for the NBN as they all already have gigabit+ connectivity to Telstra, PACNET, Optus, etc. To change all this infrastructure to the NBN would cost hundreds of thousands in connectivity, skilling and resource charges. It is definitely not a viable option, and the telemedicine point is moot.

    Secondly, about the torrenting faster. Have a indepth non-comment discussion with anyone who claims they need higher speeds and you’ll quickly work out that they are pirates, gamers etc. Eg, they do not add to the economy. I don’t give 2 hoots about pirating, or gaming etc, they are a wonderful vice for people and if it keeps the youth interested in computing I’m all for it. But there is scant legitimate reason for requiring 100mbit speeds into every household. It’s like changing the speed limits then increasing road registration fees because you can now drive faster. Noone will go the new 300km/h limit on the Hume Highway, but ‘it’s there, so you pay more’.

    ** NBN Co chief executive Mike Quigley, for example, earned $1.9 million in 2011, less than half of what Telstra CEO David Thodey did (he earned $5.1 million) and Optus CEO Paul O’Sullivan ($3 million). **

    – David Thodey and Paul O’Sullivan are responsible both for multi-billion dollar companies with hundreds of thousands of shareholders. As members of their relevant boards, they are both personally responsible for the success of their companies. Mike Quigley on the otherhand is only answerable to the Commonwealth Department of Broadband and the Digital Economy. His responsibility is many magnitudes less than that of David and Paul that I personally believe he is getting overpaid. A role with his equivilent responsibility, say the Secretary of Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet is on $800,000. The head of FAHCSIA is on just $370,000. FAHCSIA looks after peoples lives, their income and their housing. A lot more responsibility than ensuring people can watch Youtube at 1080p.

    ** We don’t have as much transparency with respect to the rest of NBN Co’s staff, and certainly the company would have had to pay a decent rate to head-hunt Australia’s top telco engineering talent the way it has. If you’re revamping Australia’s entire fixed-line broadband infrastructure, you need the best. Even so, I’m betting many of NBN Co’s employees took a pay cut to altruistically join what they see as a worthy national project.**

    – I do agree that they need the best, but to be a viable, sellable enterprise they needed to grow. It’s basically like I’ve opened up Tropico 4, did the ol’ pesos for all cheat to buy staff then built the infrastructure straight away. This is not the way to run a business, and am amazed that Mike QUigley, based on his previous experience decided to do it this way. $165,000 is about correct for a high-end telco engineer, and I have no issues with that. I have issues with the $165,000 being between 4 subscribers. You state that ‘we don’t have as much transparency with respect to the rest of the NBN Co’s staff’, well, that’s because you didn’t do a Freedom Of Information request that the Coalition did to get their information. If you want to be unbias, please research your article throughly and not just read the NBNCo and ALP media releases!

    ** But the most important issue here is that both Abbott and Webster are presenting NBN sign-ups as though Australians will have a choice. They won’t. If you want fixed-line broadband infrastructure, in future you will buy it through the NBN fibre connection to your house. Under current policy, both ADSL and HFC cable networks in Australia will be shut down for broadband. So yes, you WILL go to the NBN. Because you will have no choice! **

    – Utter milarky! As private property land holders, they can elect to not have the NBN installed and continue to use Telstras infrastructure. Under Government legislation, there is a requirement for a fixed phone service. Given the take up rate is less than 5%, come the date of transition when the copper network is shut down, I can GUARANTEE you that if that rate is any less than 99.999999%, the copper network will not be shut down. Because they say it will happen does not make it so.

    ** Secondly, it is factually incorrect for Abbott to state that many people will shun the NBN infrastructure because it is a government-owned organisation which built it and operates it. **

    – Incorrect, they will. The installation of the NBN is not mandated by law for every premises. There is the free installation option when they roll around, after that the standard ~$300 (I don’t quite remember) fee applies. Little ol’ Doris and Max from Penrith, 93 years of age, get a letter in the mail. Free National Broadband Connection available! However, reading the document, it states that costs of damage to the garden and lawn will not be covered and are the responsibility of the householder. Oh no, they say! I think we’ll skip it, our Dodo $9/month dialup is enough for emailing the kids. There, another household lost.

    ** At several points, Abbott uttered statements which were pretty much in direct conflict with his own party’s voter research and policies, his comments about NBN Co salaries are highly debatable, and on several points — buying services from the NBN and the price of doing so — he made clearly factually inaccurate statements.**

    – I don’t vote for either of the major parties, I don’t vote Green, I vote generally for independents. However, this statement really grated me. This is the section where you have crossed the road from clear independent Journalism into a local small town rag opinion piece. I hold Delimiter in high regard for their previous posts, and quick news but this article is amazingly inaccurate and bias.

    • You’re just wrong.

      You’re deliberately ignoring the complexities in the customer numbers. Your claimed take-up rate figure is invalid.

      You also ignore the logical reasons for any of these figures appearing to be low, instead implying that something is somehow going wrong. For example, many users are with Bigpond, who does not yet offer services over the early NBN installations. They would be waiting for Bigpond to release NBN plans before they make the switch. Also, the demand for higher speeds is expected to increase over time. The whole point of the network is to build something that will function adequately for the demand of the next two decades. Most users have not yet experienced the benefits of higher speeds.

      Take a look at the statistics for the Telephone or electricity networks in their early days. Demand started out slow then eventually grew until the market was saturated. Expecting every home to have connected to those networks in the first few weeks or months of the service being available would be ridiculous.

      You also appear to not understand the limits of VDSL. If you replaced every ADSL2+ connection today with VDSL2, the average speed would go *down*. In order to improve performance you need to actually reduce the line length (ie. build a “FTTN” network). Telstra does not have the capital to do this, unless the Government starts handing out cheques (a possible option for the Coalition).

      Can’t be bothered reading the rest.

      • http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/communications-minister-happy-with-tiny-take-up-of-nbn-service/story-e6frg8zx-1226108592925

        The Weekend Australian can reveal that internal NBN Co figures from mid-October show the take-up rate has been as low as one in 50 homes at Armidale in Mr Windsor’s NSW seat of New England, where Julia Gillard, Communications Minister Stephen Conroy and NBN Co chief executive Mike Quigley launched the first mainland NBN service in a ceremony that cost taxpayers $138,000.

        Sorry, not 5%. I meant 2%!

        If you also chose to read the rest of my comment, you’ll note that I mentioned OPEL, the FTTN plan with VDSL2 tails from the node. Which the Government was going 50/50 with Elders, Optus and Telstra.

        You cannot compare having 0 telecommunications then phones coming in with a low take up rate to having an existing broadband network then installing a new one. Logic decrees that the 2nd scenario would be even slower than going from scratch.

        Selective reading makes you look foolish!

        • “Selective reading makes you look foolish” and you link to the Australian?

          Although perhaps you also read the Tele!

        • The link you have provided is for Brunswick (dated 5-Aug-2011). Armidale is supposed to be a poster child for NBN take-up because of the high student population, so it would be very damaging if there is low take-up in Armidale.

        • You do realise that “mid October” was just 2 weeks after the network went commercial? (ie people could actually begin requesting connections). And before the two biggest ISPs (Telstra and Optus) began offering connections at all? (Telstra still aren’t).

          So I’m curious…..What sort of takeup would you expect after two weeks, with ~60-70% of potential customers unable to connect due to existing Telstra/Optus/TPG/DoDo etc phone/ADSL contracts?

          That’s not rhetorical. I’m serious. Given the above facts, what would be a good takeup after 2 weeks, in your opinion?

    • That was far too much rubbish to read in one go, and since much of it is based on the bizarre miscalculation of a 5% takeup rate, it hardly seems worth it.

      Perhaps before posting again you could work on your maths skills. Let me fix that for you: The NBN fibre passes 18,200 premises. They have 2315 connections. That equates to about 13%.

      Quite spectacular when you consider that it’s only been available for 3 months. Telstra (with 50% market share) plus others still aren’t offering connections at all, meaning well over 50% of potential customers can’t migrate to the NBN without paying out penalty fees.

      FYI, the takeup of ADSL1 in 2002 was just 3% after 18 months. I wonder whether, back then, you would have predicted that there was no future for it?

      Oh, and there is no $300 fee for an after-rollout NBN connection. No fee or structure has been decided, although Conroy has stated (and it makes sense) that there will be several opportunities to get a free connection. Personally my guess would be that you’d get a free offer during rollout, then a final free offer with a warning that the copper will soon be disconnected. Given that the cost is lower and the speed better, why wouldn’t you migrate? Grandma’s RSP will migrate her.

      As with Jean, I can’t be bothered dealing with the rest of the rubbish.

        • They have missed their target by 31,000. The billion dollars that they have spent so far on the rollout works out at $250,000 per connection. They state that they are happy about 4,000! How delusional. Their PR and marketing is going down the toilet.

          Have you considered that some of the construction involved in that $10B has included backhaul? So the fibre that doesn’t go past premises but is required to be laid to areas so when the GPON is rolled out it’s got something to connect to, and is the exact same thing that would need to be laid under the FTTN Coalition plan?

          http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/government-it/nbn-delayed-target-missed-by-31000-20120103-1pj8b.html
          Stop apologising on behalf of the NBN by criticising those against it. It is a flawed network.

          No doubt it’s expensive, but flawed, hardly, excluding GPON (direct fibre would be better in the longer term but would add to the initial cost) it’s actually quite a good network design.

        • You really no nothing about the subject on which you speak, do you?

          Of the 35,000 connections that were supposed to be active at 30 June, every single one was a Greenfield Build-Operate-Transfer. The BOT programme never went ahead, but the private sector still did the connections in those new estates (but kept them), and they may well be transferred to the NBN in the future. That’s up to Opticomm et al.

          Either way though, those 35,000 weren’t supposed to be part of the NBN at that stage, because the NBN transit network wasn’t built at that stage. The NBN were not supposed to have connected a single customer of their own (green or brownfield) at 30 June 2011. There are only supposed to be 5,000 by June 2012. Since they’ve only been on offer for 3 months and they already have 2315 connections, I’d say they’re ecstatic.

          As for your and Abbott’s ridiculous $250,000 per connection rubbish… I’ve haven’t read anything that stupid since I saw Alan Jones’s quote about the laserbeam speed record.

          Surely you don’t have to be a rocket scientist to work out that the startup phase of any project is the most expensive part? Let’s say there’s a new estate with a electricity grid which cost $2.5M to roll out. Once the first 10 houses are connected, you take the cost of the entire grid for that estate and divide it by the first 10 connections. Would you really then try to claim that the cost per connection was $250000, or do you restrict your imbecilic calculations to the NBN?

          • In all fairness to Tony Abbot with the $250,000/connection I’m pretty sure that is the basis Telstra use when quoting fibre connection to businesses even when the fibre is already in the building.

          • ….and the retards in Labor are using what? Pairgain on fence wire???….your a clown!!

          • Pretty sure you’re the fool.
            The above was a very tongue in cheek remark but reading comprehension is sometimes lacking in these comments. In future I will be sure to use [sarc][/sarc] tags for the worshippers at the house of abbot here.

            Whoops forgot the [sarc][/sarc] tags again.

      • “FYI, the takeup of ADSL1 in 2002 was just 3% after 18 months. I wonder whether, back then, you would have predicted that there was no future for it?”

        I signed up the first day it was available. I spent the next few years trying to convince everyone I knew that ADSL was the way – out of the hundreds I spoke to only my tech friends even knew what it was.

        Your average consumer didn’t know that ADSL was better than 56k because they had never experienced something better to compare it with. Plus the price difference was huge (ADSL was expensive for the first few years).

        Note to anyone interested: market demand has no correlation with consumers actually knowing the inner workings of what they are demanding. Hence FTTP vs FTTN means nothing to most people. They just want faster, cheaper internet and they don’t really care how it’s achieved because they don’t know the difference between one technology and another. To them it’s Labor vs Liberal, Private vs Public. You’ll need to step outside insular places like technology websites to see this – I assume most people here are by definition enthusiasts and have a heightened level of knowledge. Just go ask you mum if she knows what FTTP is (or even stands for…).

    • “Have a indepth non-comment discussion with anyone who claims they need higher speeds and you’ll quickly work out that they are pirates, gamers etc. Eg, they do not add to the economy.”

      I disagree. According the the ABS’s Household Expenditure Survey, 2009-10 (which you can access here: http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/mediareleasesbytitle/97E70263E0B479CFCA257059007E19B6?OpenDocument) , the average spending per household, per week, is 1.28 dollars on gaming consoles, and 1.21 dollars on COMPUTER games (excluding console games which i couldn’t locate in the report). While this may not seem like much, it is comparable when combined (it becomes 2.49 dollars) to the expenditure on car registration (3.33 dollars per week) and close to half of the weekly budget of fresh milk (6.16 dollars).

      My questions to you are: How dare you claim that people who enjoy gaming do not contribute to Australia’s economy? Should we cancel road repairs on highways damaged by flooding in Queensland and the Northern Territory because driving cars “does not add to the economy”?

      The point of providing services to a population is to increase their standard of living. Our government is spending money on this broadband infrastructure much in the same way that it spends money on tram lines, or buses, or public health care.

      Another point i would like to make is that as it stands, broadband access in the NT is widely regarded to be a joke. The NBN has prioritised it’s roll-out extremely well in including Darwin early. Not all of Australia lives on the Sunshine coast where 3G is faster than our line connections, or in Sydney where internet is cheap and accessible. You are selfish in your views.

      Chris

  12. The all-out opposition to the NBN stops the Liberal Party from highlighting the deficiencies of the project, Top of that list is the high number of Points of Interconnect which were forced on the NBN by the ACCC (after lobbying by the major telcos). This leads to about $20m pa being needed to provide a nationwide NBN service. This high fixed cost is already reducing competition in the ISP sector.

    The high number of POIs ensures that only traditional telcos can use the NBN, pretty much ruling out innovative uses. It also retains the “telco tax” imposed on large companies which might otherwise run their national telecommunications in house as a small part of their internal IT support.

    • Agreed — the Opposition should be focusing on issues that matter when criticising the NBN. There are definitely areas where the NBN policy is actively harming competition in the telecommunications industry — the PoI issue being a clear example.

      • I agree , it is too early to start looking at comparisons with the NBN Corporate plan to try and start looking at trends to see if they are falling behind or not, especially as it is clouded with Greenfield and Brownfield figures, and for most residences it is still no obligation tyre kicker exercise.

        I would also like the Coalition to push for a Independent audit of take-up figures around FY 2012, but that does not mean that no criticism should take place of the low take-up figures in a specific area, especially glib unproven excuses like most residences are still on contract or we couldn’t contact the landlords, or the best one I have seen the ‘NBN Explained’ booklet was not available in non-English.

        • “I agree , it is too early to start looking at comparisons with the NBN Corporate plan”.

          Yet that’s exactly what you have done and continue to do?

          • “Yet that’s exactly what you have done and continue to do?”

            stand by as alain does one of two things.

            1) replies with a convoluted argument about precisely why (or rather imprecisely why) he does not do what you have accused him of.

            2) fails to reply at all.

          • Or 3 accuses one of back pedalling, tap dancing, putting up the detour this way sign or of course goes straight for the jugular and accuse one of being “the banned guy”.

            Anything but answer or speak logically.

          • @WC

            Selective truncating of statements as usual RS as a deliberate set up for the response you want to give, nothing new there in your style.

            ‘I agree , it is too early to start looking at comparisons with the NBN Corporate plan ……’

            You chopped it off at the word ‘plan’ then copied it as if that was all I said and made up your conclusion and ignored the explanatory statements that followed.

            Copy, cut out the awkward bits and paste it, at least this time you didn’t do it across different discussions, even from different months and websites, ahh the good old days eh RS?

            Love your work, at least it’s consistent across bans.

          • that was pretty good.
            i don’t suppose you have the lotto numbers for tomorrow night?

          • Persistent prophecy is a familiar way of assuring the event – George Gissing

            ;)

    • There’s a lot of comment here about link speeds. Let’s put that into perspective.

      Firstly, actual ADSL speeds (as opposed to “sticker” speeds) don’t cut it for applications like Pay TV or hi-res, hi frame rate videoconferencing. Hardly any customers of an ISP connect at the full rate, and even then the levels of packet loss are often not nice. The NBN is about nice connectivity for most of its customers, which doesn’t describe ADSL in practice. For a vivid illustration of the difference between sticker and actual speeds grab a ABC iView file using rtmpdump and play the file back locally rather than streamed across a home Internet connection. The ABC is using Akamai at the moment, so you are only measuring the ISP-subscriber link.

      The NBN fixes the access rate issue, and in a way which has a future. The biggest criticism of the Liberal plan is that they spend a fair chunk of money on improving access and then have nothing to show for it when applications bring another bump in required bandwidth.

      Surprisingly, the NBN doesn’t provide a high end-to-end performance rate as its distribution layer is massively oversubscribed. This limits the use of the NBN for non-residential uses such as home office, small businesses and local schools. If you are going to be critical of the NBN’s data rates then it is the link from the street to the POI where the focus should be, not the sticker rate of access rates into the premises,

      The NBN has a very low uplink rate. So low that HDTV videoconferencing may not be viable once the network has a reasonable number of users. That’s a serious concern since HD videoconferencing is a major application in existing high speed networks. The low uplink rate also limits the ability of customers to provide their own web servers and the like. This makes life much harder for a small business wanting to provide a “webshop” to complement their retail outlet.

      On the plus side, the NBN doesn’t really stretch the wireless networking within most home premises. That is a significant cost saving to home owners considering the high costs of distributing Cat5 throughout a house. You’d seriously have to question the 1Gbps rate being promoted by The Economist magazine as most houses would not be able to take advantage of that. But I feel that The Economist’s objections to the NBN are much more to do with the whole concept of paying tax to improve the nation.

      One issue which hasn’t been raised is the robustness of the NBN. The multidrop fiber is attached at one end only, rather having redundancy by attaching both ends to active equipment. These bus-like networks are much more prone to end-point outages than the star-like networks of the existing phone system. You can view the move of Ethernet from coax to UTP as a move from bus to star, and uptime was raised considerably when that move happened.

      • Surprisingly, the NBN doesn’t provide a high end-to-end performance rate as its distribution layer is massively oversubscribed. This limits the use of the NBN for non-residential uses such as home office, small businesses and local schools. If you are going to be critical of the NBN’s data rates then it is the link from the street to the POI where the focus should be, not the sticker rate of access rates into the premises,

        I wouldn’t say “massively”. It’s a consumer network, not a dedicated link. The distribution layer is the only aspect of the network which is a affordable to be modified on the fly to comply with the users’ requirements. With that in mind, without the replacement of the GPON units, the highest contention level that is enforced by the network design is 13:1 on 1Gbps plans, that is the premises to transient fibre. Those who require dedicated bandwidth will of course still have the option of a PtP fibre connection at their own expense.

        The NBN has a very low uplink rate. So low that HDTV videoconferencing may not be viable once the network has a reasonable number of users. That’s a serious concern since HD videoconferencing is a major application in existing high speed networks. The low uplink rate also limits the ability of customers to provide their own web servers and the like. This makes life much harder for a small business wanting to provide a “webshop” to complement their retail outlet.

        Ignoring the fact that an “uplink” tends to refer to a satellite link, I’ll assume you mean backhaul, or transient fibre, as the other definition, upstream, is actually not low. The NBN has been specifically designed to have a high uplink for consumer applications, with a ratio of 5:2 on most plans, which, although still async is far improved over current consumer grade networks, which can have a ratio in excess of 20:1.

        Now, if you are referring to the transient fibre, that remains to be seen, but as I stated early, the transient fibre is one of the areas where it is actually going to be cost effective to upgrade if required by network usage. As for backhaul, that is not the responsibility of NBNCo to maintain. So it comes down to the willingless of ISPs to purchase adequate CVC, and NBNCo ensuring that they provide enough transient bandwidth to account for the CVC demands.

        On the plus side, the NBN doesn’t really stretch the wireless networking within most home premises. That is a significant cost saving to home owners considering the high costs of distributing Cat5 throughout a house. You’d seriously have to question the 1Gbps rate being promoted by The Economist magazine as most houses would not be able to take advantage of that. But I feel that The Economist’s objections to the NBN are much more to do with the whole concept of paying tax to improve the nation.

        I’m a little confused. How could the NBN “stretch” the wireless networking within most home premises. Networking throughput always comes down to the bottleneck. If the bottleneck is the consumers wireless router, they are not going to be able to utilise the full bandwidth of their connection, and they should downgrade to a cheaper plan in order to save themselves some coin. End of.

        And it always makes me laugh whenever people talk about the “high costs of distributing [Ethernet cabling] throughout a house”. It costs a lot of money if you do it to every room, with the cabling out of sight in the walls, with a high performance 24 point switch, yes. But that isn’t what I would recommend to the average consumer. Running a Cat5e cable along the skirting, although not as pleasing to look at, to only where it is required, can cost significantly less. Wiring up my current home, including a 25 metre run, runners for doorways, cable hooks, etc, cost us less than $100 not including the (provided with our contract) wireless router. All using certified cables as well.

        One issue which hasn’t been raised is the robustness of the NBN. The multidrop fiber is attached at one end only, rather having redundancy by attaching both ends to active equipment. These bus-like networks are much more prone to end-point outages than the star-like networks of the existing phone system. You can view the move of Ethernet from coax to UTP as a move from bus to star, and uptime was raised considerably when that move happened.

        I agree with you here, however this decision has unfortunately been made in order to save costs. Unfortunately, these types of decisions would exist in any network. Another reason for the move to UTP would also be the improvement in throughput, as the shared nature of multi-drop networks mean that the bandwidth available to you becomes limited. I cannot see the NBN being able to reasonably justify an upgrade to single-drop per premises considering the trouble the policy has had in convincing people that there is a need for the increased bandwidth the NBN offers at all.

  13. Personally I never believe anything Renai writes as he’s far too biased towards Terrans. A little support for the hard-working Protoss would not go astray and yet it’s all Terran all the time over here on Delimiter.

    Pathetic.

  14. The coalition strategy is so transparent, but I’m glad you’ve called them on the factual elements Renai.

    Attacking the technology was clearly not working for Malcolm, so their media spinners are going back to basics, which is to create the impression that the project is being mismanaged by Labor blah blah blah. Clearly they workshopped the strategy over the break and then got Malcolm and Tony to come out swinging.

    As Tony well knows, facts are not important in a public argument, believability is, and they know that Joe Public is more likely to accept the proposition that it’s another Labor stuff up than an argument about the merits of FTTN vs FTTH.

    I wouldn’t be surprised if Conroy was on holiday, so that probably played into the timing since Julia isn’t as effective as Conroy in response.

    Either way, nobody cares, the real games don’t begin in earnest for another few weeks.

  15. It is but time someone actually stared disecting what Tony says and hen correct his mistakes. In all honesty like everything else Tony Abbott is a Blind Buck on most things He has No Idea at all that is why he is reluctant and aleays has been to table his policies. If my memory serves me correctly he never even tabled his policies at the last election because he doesn’t have any. Then when he did they were so incredibly wrong . . . . . . . . . . .

  16. I enjoyed this article, and the facts presented in it are very relevant, it’s disappointing that politicians will play on peoples technological ignorance for cheap points, I have no problem with people opposing the project, and can sympathize with some of the viewpoints, but it’s incredibly frustrating when it’s politically motivated.

    I see the NBN as a project worth supporting irrespective of which politician supports it or not, it’s a shame more people don’t feel that way.

    • The total Labor NBN project is politically motivated Liam, for a start you think shutting down competitor infrastructure with taxpayer $$ is normal?

      • i certainly dont see a vertically integrated monopoly owner of the market as normal, which is why we are pursuing this policy. and as demonstrated by Telstra behaviour over the last 10-12 years that vertical integration gave it great power.

        in any case i see it as normal that governments step in to redress power balances – the Bell breakup was probably one of the best example of that, and the access regimes here and in the UK are to a much lesser extent intrusive actions by government on the market. so yes political motivations and affecting markets with taxpayer $$ is indeed normal. (hell, OPEL is yet another example of the behaviour).

        i know you wont agree with me but i think there are much better grounds on which to be outraged on than those.

  17. Renai, excellent deconstruction of Abbott’s inaccuracies and playing politics with the NBN, which when fully implemented will be a fantastic outcome for this country in the areas of research, medicine and large scale computational analysis.

    I find it humorous the number of post’s here who are calling you “biased” without being able to offer anything substantial or relevant in the way of evidence of this.

    Again. well done for a great article Renai.

    • Cheers George! I too find it amusing when people critique my articles without offering their own arguments. And I think we definitely need a more factual argument around the NBN.

    • “I find it humorous the number of post’s here who are calling you “biased” without being able to offer anything substantial or relevant in the way of evidence of this.”

      Actually I offer evidence of this in another comment. Of course, you can’t be expected to have read every comment in such a big thread.

  18. I see a lot of attacks and claims of bias, but very little effort being made to actually question or counter the arguments that have been made in this article. Renai has put up the quotes from Abbott that he has a problem with, and clearly explained why he has a problem with them. I suppose that it would be nice for those who are criticising him to make a similar detailed attempt to explain why they disagree.

    When one person can articulate their side of an argument, whilst another person can’t, then only one of them will appear credible.

    • Just because one doesn’t point out all the facts doesn’t mean they don’t know them, it gets tiring repeating the same things over and over again. someone with a poorly constructed argument/sentence might just know a thing or two but why waste energy on something which will likely be scrapped as soon as the liberal party walk into office.

      • The Liberals won’t scrap it – even if they currently say they will.

        They will say it’s too expensive to stop it and instead continue with the project. If the project succeeds then they’ll say “of course it did with all the money sunk into it”. If it fails they’ll say “we always said it would”. If people question whether their alternate plan would have ever worked they’ll say “we’ll never know because we didn’t implement it”.

        • this bullsh!t from an UTTER wanker who says he cant see bias anywhere as no one has shown him, then has a verbal manure outbreak with spastic comments like this???? NO evidence, NO facts, NFI !!!!…..put ya Kevin07 on properly, its inside out out again!…go sit in the corner your hopeless clown!!

  19. I just want faster broadband, as soon as possible.

    3.5mbps ADSL at my place bites. FTTP or FTTN will fix this but I prefer FTTP.

    Let’s face it, neither the Opposition or current Government are going to fix this for the majority of people in less than another few years, minimum.

  20. Totally crap article. 4,000 active services from a projection of 35,000. Must be a roaring success. And why does Senator Conroy kept on referring to the Internet as the “portal”?

  21. Coalition FTTN = $17b
    Government FTTP = $37b

    Coalition say go to FTTN first, and then FTTP later.
    Government say go to FTTP straight away.

    Coalition = $17b + $37b = $54b
    Government = $37b

    Who’s planning to “waste” money here?

    • What a fool you are! They wouldn’t build a FTTP network alongside a FTTN network. It would be an extension to the existing FTTN network!

        • And the DSLAMs and switches in the FTTN cabinets all need electricity. GPON splitters do not.

          • I suspect his point was that you would need to supply electricity (and backup power systems) to every FttN cabinet. Not a cheap exercise, and more wasted componentry in any future upgrade to FttP.

            Also makes the whole network more susceptible to damage by accident, storms, disasters etc.

          • Have you any evidence that FTTN networks overseas are more prone to storm and accident damage than FTTH networks, or does it just sound good so that’s near enough?

          • I notice you nicely sidestepped the main point, about FttN needing electrical infrastructure that’s thrown away in an “upgrade” to FttP. Care to comment on that point, or is it conceded?

            As for reliability/susceptibility…. It’s not rocket science. If you build powered cabinets on the footpath, they are undeniably more susceptible to damage than an unpowered GPON node safely housed in a pit. I’ve never been to a car accident where the car buries itself into a Telstra pit, or a tree falls through the ground…… But electrical kiosks and those little round Telstra poles? I go to them on a regular basis, either hit by vehicles or with a tree on top of them. You build it, and someone will hit it.

          • So I take that as a firm no then that you don’t have any evidence from well established infrastructure installations of both types overseas that FTTN infrastructure is more susceptible to storm or accident damage than FTTH.

            Here are some photos of the Brunswick NBN rollout:

            http://delimiter.com.au/2011/04/21/brunswick-nbn-rollout-photos/

            yeah those distribution cabinets built up against the road curb look real ‘accident proofed’, more so than a FTTN cabinet of similar size eh? BTW the graffiti looks great as well.

            As far as your comment about FTTN cabinets internal electronics becoming redundant because you need to upgrade them to FTTH ,and that is based on the tired pro NBN apologist argument that you will have to upgrade them very soon after installation -once again with feeling, why is that?

          • Can’t you see his point at all? FTTN cabinets are powered and connected to the electric grid therefore suseptable to lightling strikes to the power lines. FTTH cabinets aren’t powered, they are NOT connected to the power system.
            Some times a point is so obvious it just has to be conceeded and not dodged lest the dedger wants to look really dumb.

          • More armchair musings BS about lightening strikes and FTTN cabinets, I repeat the question to you that AustImages put on bypass, what evidence is there from ANYWHERE!! that FTTN infrastructure is more susceptible to storm or accident damage than FTTH?

            BTW do HFC boxes that are powered and sitting high up on electricity poles have more lightening strikes than those special lightening repellant FTTH distribution cabinets, what about electric cars vs petrol cars, the possibilities here are endless. lol

          • Significant less power is used by an ont compared to a modem or router which you need for fttn which means you double dip on power power at the node power in the house not jus at the house

          • So all FTTH connected residences will not use a router? – last I heard the ONT box does not come with in-built Wi-Fi nor does it provide a hardware based firewall.

          • So no houses now currently use a Router

            The power use for a device contaning a Modem + Router = Energy use of Modem + Router they do not magically use less power because they are in the same box.

            If that was the case I would build a big box around my entertainment centre = Profit according to alain!!!

            so ONT + Router == Modem + Router

            Therfore any power to the node is in excess of any other power

          • The same electricity DSL modems do.

            CPE requires electricity for either FTTN or FTTH. FTTN also requires electricity at the provider’s end of the loop.

        • Oh come on. Any comms person worth their weight in salt knows that the major cost of any fibre implementation is trenches and fibre. Not the DSLAMS etc.

          • Posting USB hard-drives is how they plan to increase bandwidth beyond what is capable with fibre.

          • Sadly, I think that would actually be a winner with Malcolm as he has shown in the past that the concept of latency is beyond his understanding. If you don’t care about latency, a truck full of hard drives is your best bet, as the throughput can’t be beat!

    • @Michael

      Dear oh dear. Maths and technology aren’t your strong suit, are they.

      The key point behind the coalition policy is that much of the FTTN infrastructure, namely the optical fibre itself can be reused for a FTTP network, so the additional cost would not be $37B but much less. In fact basic the cost difference between building FTTP first up versus getting there via FTTN is the cost of the electronics in the node. So unless you are suggesting that the entire FTTN network cost would be consumed by the electronics and there is no actual fibre in the proposed fibre to the node network, your numbers simply don’t add up.

      Other considerations that would need to be considered in any objective assessment are

      1) what is the economic life of the electronic gear anyway? If it is due for replacement at the same time the FTTN network is turned into FTTP, then the equipment is a write-off anyway. If FTTP isn’t necessary, then maybe more speed could be squeezed out of a new generation of FTTN electronics, as a minimum delaying the expenditure of the FTTP conversion.

      2) While a FTTP network may not require that particular piece of equipment in that particular place in the network to depreciate to the point of being worthless, it does buy time. Talk to an accountant about the merits of delaying expenditure.

      3) One thing that is consistent across technology is the fact that over time, it gets better and cheaper. The longer you can wait, the bigger the bang for your buck. One point that is commonly overlooked is that even the humble optical fibre cable itself is improving and getting cheaper over time. It seems like only yesterday that the people in white coats managed to send a single frequency laser down a 1km piece of optical fibre cable without a regenerator, and look at where we are now.

      There are advantages and disadvantages of going direct to FTTP vs getting there via FTTN. Regardless of which you believe is the better option, at least get your sums right.

      • and the coalition belief you can reuse FTTN assets in the manner you describe is quite simply, wrong. in the Australian situation, any putative FTTN will be built around and the assets binned – reuse of the pads etc is actually NOT cost effective and the most likely network will be the exchange model from the Copper era with much larger runs, fibre doing 20Km.

        it will be cheaper and easier to find one large parcel of land (for the exchange) that can service a large area than it will be to salt the same area with a bunch of nodes, in terms of power, in terms of land purchases by the network operator and any legal issues associated, in terms of upgradeability (im thinking full exchanges/full nodes) and so on. maintaining the FTTN pads and cabinets after a FTTP rollout is just added costs for no good reason.

        1) the economic life of FTTN is likely to be too long. that is to say by the time FTTP may be rolled out it will still be attempting to pay itself off and will need to be operated for some period extra before the operator will allow FTTP build (the old Telstra “we havent screwed enough money out of the fixed line market’ thing again). the upshot is the FTTN will actually be a delay rather than a stepping stone to FTTP.

        2) talk to an accountant about spending for the same thing twice in a ‘short’ period of time. short in this case is 10Y for a FTTN build vs 40+ y for a FTTP build. it actually makes more economic sense to go for the slightly more expensive long life item than the short ‘cheaper’ item and then have to spend on the long life item again anyway. the “saving” by deferring the spend is really a smoke and mirrors item.

        especially considering the Coalition plan costings (such as they are) do not include a Telstra payout, which they will demand as ‘just compensation’ for having copper cut to install FTTN. given the value of the NBNco-Telstra lease deal, a copper cut compensation will be in at least the same ballpark, which effectively makes a coalition FTTN policy nearly as much as the existing NBN costs. economically speaking, bypassing the FTTN stage is a saving in terms of costs to build, operate, and then the whole mess of going from FTTN to FTTP. in my view it is the best policy to avoid the complexities (and threrefore costs) of FTTN completely and use the much simpler FTTP policy instead.

        3) this is exactly where FTTP sits – we know the headend boxes from NBNco can do 100Mbit now, business boxes (i dont know if they are the same unit as the residential ONTs) will do 1GbPS and the fibre itself will likely be good for 10 GbPS in time – possibly more yet again. that kind of upgrade headroom in the line itself (not the boxes either end) is simply not available in copper. if there is a standard mooted beyond VDSL2 i expect it will be a very niche product – coppers last gasp is not long coming. it will be much cheaper to get speed upgrades with a FTTP started now, rather than trying to upgrade any FTTN if the initial tech is found wanting.

        from my point of view the sums behind FTTN simply do not stack up, even if initially looking cheaper. (it certainly wont be faster). Michaels’ math certainly is rough but i dont see it affects his conclusion much.

        • …and here I was thinking Michael has just added the Coalition’s FTTN cost to Labour’s FTTP cost without considering reuse of the optical fibre cable. I hadn’t realised there was such convoluted thinkinbg behind such a simplistic addition.

        • Excellent points, particularly point 1, most astutely recognised nonny-moose.

          Indeed, if the opposition are elected and build FTTN, by the time we need FTTP, unless FTTN has paid for itself or is most profitable if subsidised and privately owned, then we will in all probability, not receive FTTP nationwide until so, or if ever.

          Another aspect of the FTTN now/FTTP later nonsense being suggested is, the opposition’s breakdown of technologies/areas covered for Brownfields. 40% FTTN public/private (leasing from Network Co – a new name for one spilt part of Telstra). 25% existing HFC privately owned (by Network Co ). 28% existing ADSL privately (Network Co) owned and 7% publicly owned fixed wireless. It’s basically, the Telstra (woops Network Co – we must avoid the T word) show.

          But regardless of the argument of whether FTTN is upgradable to FTTP (or needs to be replaced entirely) there’s only 40% FTTN network that can be upgraded anyway. So they will still need to fully replace or subsidise replacement of the 53% HFC/ADSL and at absolute minimum, also replace the last mile of the 40% copper portion of the FTTN network, as well.

          Because do you really think once FTTN is built and further upgrades/replacements are needed that Telstra will say, it’s ok guys, our shout, we’ll replace ADSL, HFC and last mile copper ourselves and foot the bill, because we’re really nice guys?

          Don’t forget, those upgrades/replacements are all additional costs on top of the base $17bn analysis from Citi and not including any possible compensation to Telstra, either.

          And let’s not also forget the ROI too. The majority, if not the entire network under the opposition will be privately owned – 53% HFC/ADSL and the last mile of 40% FTTN – as well as subsidies paid to private companies. So ROI to the taxpayer would be minimal, if not zero (or in other words $17bn+++ outlay gone, no or little return to the country’s coffers and little or no asset ownership to show for it). Whereas the fees from the current NBN services sold to RSP’s, will be channeled back into repaying the NBN build (in other words, over time a zero outlay, continual ROI and asset ownership).

          So perhaps the FTTP antagonists guess of “$60bn or more” was close after all for FTTP, but only when done stupidly, via FTTN first.

  22. The only thing I didn’t like was how much cred. you give Malcolm Turnbull. He was a far better opposition leader than Abbott, but he is utterly unqualified to have anything to do with communications. The man was sick the day physics was taught at school.

  23. way too many labor apologists in this article and comments section, can not wait until next election so i and most of australia can bring down THE WORST GOVERNMENT INTHE HISTORY OF AUSTRlALIA AND WASTING MIONEY ON THE NBN!!!

    • Dont worry mate, they can make back all the wasted NBN money by robbing you blind with the carbon tax.

      *rolls eyes*

    • Maybe Abbott and Co can sell off the remains of the great white elephant on ebay. Get in quick because in the future when the techy parts cost double to implement… you’ll be on a winner for sure :S

    • Well, I’m sure you will be quite happy living in AUSTRlALIA where you can keep all the MIONEY you like.

  24. I love Tony, but he should stay clear of the NBN. its already cost billions and since they are installing a monopoly it will turn a profit, Labor got us in $200 billion in debt in a 4 year cycle and out of that the NBN is a small piece might as well finish the damn thing. Its the only productive thing Labor will probably build this decade.

  25. Its only governmet money paid by the taxpayer ….50 billon here or there is nothing in the scheme of things ..
    Most are ditching there landlines and using wireless.
    The ones who scream and jump up and down are the ones who want to download more ilegal movies or porn .
    The NBN is such a waste still it will remind us for years to come how great this government really was

    • A movie comes to mind with comments like yours ‘Dumb & Dumber’ it’s a funny flick you should check it out

  26. There is no point writing anything about the NBN because very few people are able to make unbiased, measured comments. There is only one way to tell if the NBN is going to work, and that is in 10 years when the NBN is meant to be finished. If its not finished, then the government has failed to deliver on its promise, if it has, then they have. If the whole country is on it, then they are justified, if they arent then it was a waste of money. Theres no point making predictions now, because every company has peaks and troughs, at the moment there is no doubt NBN is in a trough… but maybe over the next 12 months they will pick up. All these personal attacks people are leaving, on both sides, are just mind boggling

    • U hit on something I find few people actually mentioning (or I’m not looking hard enough). It’s the future. A lot of people, Abbott included, are saying the NBN is something no one needs. That’s true for today, but what about in 5 years time? Ten? Twenty? I see the NBN as giving Australia the infrastructure for tomorrow. It just seems to me that Abbott is hitting out against the NBN because he didn’t come up with it first.

  27. The article has taken Tony Abott’s comments out of context and then tries to “correct” them. Give me a break – are people so blinded by the prospect of an NBN that they completely ignore the commercial realities of delivering such a project?

    The NBN is built on a foundation of FUD and lies and we will all be paying for it dearly eventually.

    NBNCo has failed spectacularly in its over optimistic uptake rates and this is what Tony Abbott is talking about – you wouldn’t think so reading this “unbiased” article however.

    • I am actually surprised by the number of Abbott apologists who with obvious bias, come here to accuse Renai of bias.

      • As you are No 1 ticket holder for the NBN apologists club I am not surprised you made that statement at all.

        • “I am patient with stupidity but not with those who are proud of it” – Edith Sitwell

    • Speaking of FUD. You seem to know about as much as TA.

      The “shortfall” has absolutely zero to do with “low” takeup rates. Every single one of the 35,000 connections was to be Build-Operate-Transfer in greenfield estates. Since NBN Co never went ahead with the BOT programme, there are no NBN connections associated with it. Those 35,000 connections still went ahead, but they don’t count as part of the NBN and won’t do so unless Opticomm etc decide to sell them across.

      There was not supposed to be a single NBN fibre customer at 30/6/11, and only 5000 by 30/6/12. Since they already have 2315, they’re certainly on target to achieve that.

  28. I am biased. I want faster Internet. And everyone posting here would like to have faster Internet too. And if anyone says they don’t, they are lying.

    • Well back in my day we didn’t like to do things properly, and quiet frankly everything was done slow. Abbott.

  29. The biggest risk to Australia’s prosperity is this fools remarks. Not only god fearing (no one should admit that) and deeply self obsessed (too much make up, 730 report last night) and only concerned with queer view of seeing himself prime minister some day at the expense of the nation who buys his on the run remarks and made facts. Come on Tony stick to the Noalition No No No at least you cannot get that wrong… maybe not.

  30. I’m on the NBN, have been for a few months, and it rocks. Telstra is my ISP…I’m a trial customer, they haven’t released their pricing yet, and aren’t taking retail customers yet. But, I’ve had a few other ISP’s do letterbox drops with their pricing….and it’s all good, and way better value than my previous ADSL connection.

    My point, and there is one….is that not all ISP’s are up and running fully, and, while there have been a few ISP’s do letterbox drops, there has been no aggressive selling…..they are starting off slow. The numbers will increase once the trial period is over, and they get into full swing. The connection i have is superb. I see no downside.

    • Free connections and free broadband usually are, hey what the heck, what have you got to lose?

      • Julie B said, “But, I’ve had a few other ISP’s do letterbox drops with their pricing….and it’s all good, and way better value than my previous ADSL connection.”

        Alain: Are you purposely not reading her comments and just posting trash??? The NBN speed is good and WAY better value than ADSL. What is your problem? I smell Troll!

      • I’m not paying any extra for the NBN, but I have to still pay for the ADSL contract…so I don’t have free internet, actually.
        As soon as Telstra announces their pricing, I will need to switch from ADSL to NBN, or wait until my contract expires and go elsewhere.

        Anyway, was just adding input as someone in a first trial site about take up……they are not aggressively pushing new connections yet, so only those who are super keen and up to date are on it so far. Early days. With such good speeds and more importantly….such stability (not a single drop out!), and good pricing, it’s hard to imagine people not signing up. The NBN people here are quite happy with current sign ups, they know it’s early days.

      • Incorrect yet again, alain.

        There’s no “free” broadband for Julie at all, she still has to pay. Imagine NBNCo trialling and also charging Julie, she would have to pay twice. But then, I guess that would simply open up the opposite corridor for you to criticise.

        And look, she is “still on contract”. What did Julie actually say? “As soon as Telstra announces their pricing, I will need to switch from ADSL to NBN, or wait until my contract expires and go elsewhere”.

        Ah the proof that existing contracts can, do and will affect the NBN. Which was of course obvious to everyone but the most copepod like pessimist, who refused to accept this scenario, because even whilst logically obvious, the catch cry was “show us the evidence”. Well, say hello to Julie’s smoking gun.

        And look, it doesn’t sound like Julie was “forced” either!

  31. “In summary, I have to say that I am pretty disappointed with Tony Abbott’s knowledge of the National Broadband Network debate, as demonstrated during the radio interview with Tim Webster on 2UE yesterday. At several points, Abbott uttered statements which were pretty much in direct conflict with his own party’s voter research and policies, his comments about NBN Co salaries are highly debatable, and on several points — buying services from the NBN and the price of doing so — he made clearly factually inaccurate statements.”

    Why the apparent surprise at Abbott making factually inaccurate statements?

    As usual, he just makes stuff up. Those less charitable refer to it as ‘lying’.

  32. Given poor old Tims ratings I would suggest that the total audience for Abbotts inane bleatings has already appeared in the comments here… way to hit hard Tony, back to the hard hats and ride on mowers for you old son and leave the NBn to the grown ups…

  33. Why can’t the NBN be transformed into the Regional and Outer Metropolitan Broadband Network (ROMB)? People in the city already have access to relatively high speed broadband and are content with it which is why the take up is relatively sluggish in some areas whereas people like me who live only 15mins out of Proserpine, Queensland have access to basically nothing. We still have copper wire and our exchange is not ADSL enabled and when I enquire to Telstra about getting it enabled they reply with the stock standard sorry no can do it just not economically viable which is codename for if we can’t make a significant profit we don’t care and would rather not help regional Australians out. Telstras mobile coverage is also extremely patchy out here. The billions being spent on this project should go to upgrading ancient infrastructure in rural and regional areas that the telcos don’t bother with. Once you upgrade them to fibre optic it should be a once of investment because surely fibre optic is going to be around for a very long time. Why should us regional/rural taxpayers pay for the city to get the fancy NBN when we are going to get little if anything from it.

    • Justin, good question which I shall try to answer.

      93% of premises will get a fibre connection so maybe you will if you are close enough to town.

      4% will get point to point wireless which, while not as good as fibre, will be much better than anything currently available to you. This will be in situations where premises are too far from a fibre route to be economical to connect so wireless will be the link from the premises to the fibre.

      The remaining 3% will get satellite. These will be the really remote locations where no physical connection could possibly be economically justified.

      Who knows what the future holds after the NBN as currently planned is completed?

      Maybe there will be a further effort to upgrade some of the 4% to fibre where it is borderline possible? Maybe groups of people out of town will partially privately fund part of the last part of the infrastructure beyond the established limit?

      Certainly, when people see what the NBN will do, there will be pressure on behalf of the 7%.

    • Justin. the reason why is if you did want to do just a ROMB as you suggest you are doing the most expensive areas. generally speaking longer fibre runs more cost and expense with fewer customers per run KM you also make it harder or longer to pay back – im taking the assumption that your ROMB idea also pays back the govt as the NBN does at 7%. (what are super returns at atm btw?)

      so the economic case for the ROMB is a little shaky. if Tony is screaming for an NBN CBA when the NBN includes the easy dense metro areas in its remit id suggest a ROMB would find it even tougher going. the NBN includes metro areas for issues of economies of scale, pricing cross subsidy and the fact that many metro areas are also broadband blackspots that can do with a much needed upgrade.

      im also not sure if im reading you right but you say put money into areas with decrepit service – which is exactly the remit NBN have and what they are doing. for some that may mean wireless or satellite but for most that does mean fibre, as you suggest. it absolutely is a long term investment item and it should be looked at on that basis – another thing Tony has a problem with.

      i understand the feeling that you shouldt pay for something if you arent going to get anything for it – but rural folk arent the only ones antsy about the effect if the NBN (cant count the number of times people say ‘if you want better service move to the city’). personally i think going for the broadest section possible of the population with a long life network so there are the fewest ‘i dint get mine’ complaints while getting the best bang for build buck is the best way to go. that 93% will wind up with equivalent service, in the sense that as long as they have fibre what you get in one place will be what you can get elsewhere – no more ADSL DSLAM lottery. or line length lottery, unless you need a 20KM run of fibre…

      NBN will need to make its money back but it will not have the kind of profit imperative problem Telstra fobbed you off with. so the way they are doing it is actually in the main, the best model to go about doing it. a ROMB isnt a bad idea (its OPEL by another name and with better tech) but to me ultimately has more issues than doing it NBNCos way.

    • The “taxpayers” aren’t funding the NBN, so you aren’t subsidising anything. The NBN is funded from the issuing of infrastructure bonds. Those bonds are repaid by users of the network. Big users (ie people on 100Mbps fibre plans) will contribute much more to the cost of building the NBN than people on wireless or satellite NBN connections. If you don’t connect to the NBN, then you won’t contribute anything to its cost (so long as the return is as projected).

      In fact, it is the “city fibre subscribers” who will be subsidising the provision of broadband to rural areas like yours via the unprofitable wireless and satellite portions of the NBN.

      My guess would be that areas bordering Proserpine would get wireless NBN, which should give you ADSL2+ comparable speeds, for the same price as a 12Mbps NBN connection in the city.

      • Actually, taxpayers are funding it. The bonds will be offered at a later date to investors. The taxpayers’ money will be returned if the investment community snaps up the bonds. Investors will assess the profitability and risk of the NBN investment in the same way they would assess any other investment and make a decision accordingly. If the NBN goes gang-busters and becomes highly profitable on the ROI figures that even Mike Quigley admits is below what the private sector would normally accept, the bonds will be bought and the taxpayers get their money back. If it doesn’t do so well, the taxpayer will be left with at least some of the bill.

        Sadly, this is fairly typical of the risk/reward sharing schemes of public/private enterprises. The taxpayer takes the risk and the investors take the reward.

        The other factor investors are likely to look at is the track record of governments of both political persuasions to allow the owners of assets they have been sold to manage them as they see fit. They may be fearful that having bought into the NBN, the government will still dictate either directly or via the ACCC how it is to be used and at what price. This is where commercial investment and government policy collide. In many cases, it is appropriate for a government to dictate the terms of use of infrastructure for the common good, but in that case, they shouldn’t sell it in the first place. If they do decide to sell it, they must recognise that they don’t own it any more. They can lay down preconditions before sale, but they have a habit of changing post-sale too. With a track record of wanting their cake and eating it too, I suspect that the investment community could be a little spooked and consider this a risk for which they would be looking for a greater return in order to buy into the NBN.

        The government can offer all of the bonds they like. They just can’t force people to buy them.

      • @AustImages

        ‘The “taxpayers” aren’t funding the NBN, so you aren’t subsidising anything. The NBN is funded from the issuing of infrastructure bonds.’

        Interesting, tell me where is the application form is to buy these bonds as they don’t exist yet, who is paying for the current rollout if it is not from treasury funding or are all the NBN Co staff and contractors all issued with IOU’s with a note on them ‘all queries to be directed to AustImages at Delimiter’?

        ‘Those bonds are repaid by users of the network.’

        No they are not, these bonds are infrastructure Bonds underwritten by the Australian Government, the bond holders will get a fixed set rate of return irrespective of losses on the NBN, you expect bond holders to wait until at least beyond 2022 to get their interest payments?

        Other than 99% of your post being incorrect I give you the 1% because you got your own name tag right.

          • Yes pessimistic rainy, sky about to fall day at alain’s, again.

            But we knew that.

            Now, tell us how Telstra came about originally?

          • Two years after the invention of the telephone, a couple of rival private companies built a small telephone network in Melbourne. I can’t remember the exact year, but they were nationalised and brought under the control of the Post Master General’s office some years later. The network was expanded gradually, paid for through the retained earnings from the sale of communications services and not from taxpayers’ funds as per the common urban myth. In 1975, the then Whitlam Governement separated the phone and postal operations into the Australian Telecommunications Commission (operating as Telecom Australia) and the Australian Postal Commission (operating as Australia Post). When each was corporatised, they changed their name to the Australian Telecommunications Corporation and Australian Postal Corporation respectively, with the former later renaming itself Telstra Corporation.

            As a GBE, what we now know as Telstra was pumping about $1B per annum into the Treasurer’s coffers (and this was back when $1B was considered to be a lot of money) before shares were sold to the public and it became just an ordinary company. The annual payment was about half its profit, so the equivalent of a 50% company tax. This more than covered the small amount of government funding that was provided to support some of the uneconomic, politically motivated projects the governments of the day wanted to pursue.

            Even as a government department, the PMG was self-funded, not taxpayer funded.

          • “As a GBE, what we now know as Telstra was pumping about $1B per annum into the Treasurer’s coffers (and this was back when $1B was considered to be a lot of money) before shares were sold to the public and it became just an ordinary company. The annual payment was about half its profit, so the equivalent of a 50% company tax”.

            So just like the NBN. It also will be making money and returning money to the taxpayer

            Thanks for clearing that up as alain was too afraid to spit it out..

          • Tell us all about the heyday of fixed line revenue, you know when the PMG —> Telecom —>Telstra had to compete with all of that wireless data and mobile voice capped plans from other suppliers as well for revenue.

            Yep it was exactly like what the NBN Co faces in 2012 and beyond, which of course is ‘demand uncertainty’ oops they are the NBN Co’s words, but hey what would they know eh?

          • Again, you hate the NBN because it is a government build, yet you love Telstra???

            Please explain the difference!

          • Telstra was a regulated vertically integrated monopoly that didn’t have to worry about shareholders and it was that fact that allowed it to return the funds to the taxpayer. It could cross-subsidise less economic services such as those in rural and remote areas by raising prices in the more economically viable areas such as metro areas and business. After all, no organisation would be able to do this if it faced competition from another company that didn’t have to hand over that additional cash and could cherry-pick the more lucrative markets. Whether you agree or disagree with the concept of a regulated vertically integrated monopoly, that was simply the way it was and the flow of cash to the taxpayer was a byproduct of it.

            So, if NBN Co was to be another regulated vertically integrated monopoly that didn’t have to worry about shareholders, it too would probably be able to do the same thing. As a pure wholesaler facing competition from other technologies such as wireless and no doubt facing the same pressures to cut wholesale prices Telstra currently faces, it is a whole new game. NBN Co is going to find itself sandwiched between the political and retailer pressures and the commercial imperitives to make a buck. To be honest, I don’t envy them. They are in for a rough ride.

          • My point, lost in all of this is of course BC, was that Telstra’s humble beginnings and the embryonic NBN, have a lot of things in common.

            For example compare the NBN with any other Aussie Telco/ISP and which one is the closest match?

            Being so, I as one find it pretty humorous that a lot of the more outspoken NBN critics (not you per se) who oppose the NBN due to the taxpayer aspect, monopoly, forced or whatever else they can conjure up, support Telstra.

            Don’t you find that at all odd?

          • You are forgetting the main point, that is, until NBNCo (if it ever) pays any of its revenue back, the tax payer is funding the NBN, as it has been for the past two years

            So the risk is on the task payer, and hence why NBN is a gamble

          • Exactly, the bonds are not a gamble as they have a guaranteed rate of return from Day 1 of issue (whenever that is) with a guaranteed redemption date.

          • These bonds you speak about today are the very ones you were hinting or didn’t know, existed yesterday, aren’t they?

            http://delimiter.com.au/2012/01/04/the-five-nbn-misconceptions-of-tony-abbott/#comment-296051

            Seems you can teach an old dog new tricks, but no matter how much some dogs learn, they still revert back to the old FUD bone in the end.

            Oh well, heads up, at least it’s a better day than yesterday where “absolutely everything you muttered was categorically and humiliatingly, shot down in flames”.

          • @alain

            Who guarantees the return? The government issues bons promising investors that they will get an x% return. They hope that the NBN will cover that return, but if it doesn’t, how does the government fund that shortfall? Governments themselves don’t have money – they spend the taxpayer’s money. This means that the taxpayer is not only funding the initial build, we will also subsidise the investor return if the NBN doesn’t make as much as the government hopes.

          • Interesting that alot of the initial criticisms and current criticisms from those here, have revolved around “NBN is a monopoly/everyone will be forced to use NBN fibre” (totally ignoring that everyone was forced to use copper, using that same logic).

            Now the focus seems to have shifted to – without foundation and contrary to the very Corporate Plan, everyone against the NBN demanded when there wasn’t one, mind you – “the NBN will not be able to repay it’s costs”.

            Or as one said, NBNCo will run at a loss from Day 1 and will never ever run at a profit.

            What, even though “everyone is forced to use it”?

    • That’s exactly what it will be in a lot of cases. Many areas that don’t have DSL now will have NBN fibre.

  34. Bit unfair on the ABC, using a shot of Tony in one of their studios when it’s someone else who did the dodgy interview, isn’t it?

  35. The heading is misleading; there is A LOT more misconceptions that Abbott has about everything, let alone the NBN.

    That’s all he can do; The old Howard trend. Cut everything including the kitchen sink regardless of its value or potential, get the budget back to surplus then beat your own drum about what a good Government you are.

    Sadly, Howards long tenure as PM is proof that the Australian voting public is dumb enough to settle for much less.

  36. This is best laugh I have had in a long time.
    The liberal parties “village idiot” talking infrastructure and engineering.

    The fact that Abbott even attempts to discuss something he does not have a clue about amuses me immensely. Do people really believe this guy is a serious contender to run the country ? OK Labor may not be doing a good job, however the liberal party village idiot as an alternative shows just how stupid and ignorant the australian public really are. Its the liberal parties longest running april fools joke.

    Please stop putting Tony abbott and common sense engineering infrastructure into the same articles. If the village idiot really wants the best for this country he would see long term vision, long term future proofing of infrastructure, and long term planning to reduce the impact of moore’s law. But the village idiot only has one answer for everything NO.

    You are alternative government Abbott, produce some alternative proposals from that village idiot brain… oh wait, that right you cant…..and wireless, oh please, go get an education in communications engineering.

  37. Wasting all our money on the blasted NBN. Another labor stuff-up like the harbour bridge that fool Jack Lang built. Cost a nations ransom. All those lanes for the handful of cars that were around. There went even enough cars around to test it, they had to use trains. The maintenance bill is horrendous. Thing should be dynamited. Take decades to pay it off.

    …and the leftwing PMG rolling out phone lines everywhere so housewives and layabouts can gossip all day instead of doing a fair days work. Business got along fine with telegraph / telegram. The take up was crap, no real benefit to business, medicine or society. All those runners and message boys thrown on the heap.

    Free education for the great unwashed, degrees in basket weaving or trotsky. No wonder we have a skills shortage, all poncing around at uni.

    Don’t get me started on the lectric grid, wires to every house and budgy cage. Rolled out when every good cristian was asleep after dark and didn’t need or want it anyhows. Rolling home pissed after six o’clock last drinks, smack the missus in gob and flop into bed. What did they need lectric for?

    Left wing labour commie guvermint money wasters. And a bloody sheila running the joint!

    On ya Tony! You show ’em what foresight is mate!

  38. I haven’t read through all the comments here so forgive me if this is already covered but the way I see it Tony is just doing what Tony does best: Putting a negative spin on it. Sure what he said may not be 100% or maybe not even 1% true but it gets average Joe’s who don’t understand the bigger picture with the NBN believing it. The people criticizing his views such as the many on Delimiter etc sadly prob won’t drum up as much publicity as what his initial comments have and he knows it.

  39. Regarding the targets, and as was discussed ad nausea on whirlpool, this was NBNCo’s fault for being so vague

    If you read the corporate plan, NBNCo is not clear at all what the targets account to. In the worst case scenario they are well behind, and in the best case scenario they are barely on track

    In any case, for the good almost 5 years that Labor has been power, improving the service of just some 4000 people is really slow, whatever way you want to twist the facts. I am not counting the greenfield sites, because they would have gotten fibre regardless (it just wouldn’t have been from NBNCo)

    So the general gist of what Abbot was trying to say, where billions (and yes it has been billions, there have been press releases whenever Gillard inject taxpayers money into the NBN) has been spent and the actual impact to Australia telecommunications has been close to zilch

    • theres a difference between funds being RELEASED to NBNco and when NBNco actually SPENDING that money. something ~bn has been released; fair enough. i certainly disagree with the notion that all of that ~bn has been SPENT to date however.

      in any case as the point has been made multiple times in thread already – startup phases ALWAYS have that look about them where you are spending to get where you need to be (management, staff, some plant and equipment for the few thousand already served, and a hefty chunk for signing contracts with Leighton etc etc) but the actual impact looks to be zilch.

      whatever Chicken Little Abbott has to say about it – that is NORMAL for a business in its initial phase and for that reason you can safely ignore what he is saying – it is sound and fury, signifying nothing. there will come a point in time where those criticisms are valid but that point is still some ways off. There are much more valid things he can – and should – be interesting himself in, rather than buffing his ‘im no Bill Gates’ credentials.

      • I’m sorry, but the NBN is not a normal business, a normal business has to provide its own capital or come up with its own debt, that its forced to pay back (or it goes bankrupt)

        Which makes the rest of your point pointless

        • Also the nice thing about high-risk projects is that you can choose if you want to invest or not, just like the NBN , oh shit no we don’t , hey that’s way to get venture capital eh, just like every start-up out there?

          lol

          • Let’s just stop investing in infrastructure, what a smart idea.

            We’ll just pay our taxes directly to big business to divvy out amongst themselves and build what they want, where they want.

          • Oh right, so the democratic process is not used to determine what policies we do and do not support, and thus which ones get put into action by our government? That “election” thing we did a few years ago was just a big smokescreen? Because we, the people of Australia, have absolutely no say in what the government does… I get it now!

          • Sounds good NK, except the NBN as we know it was not something electors voted on in 2007, it came AFTER Labor got in.

            That democratic process you mean?

          • No, you mean the one which the electors voted, Labor LOST their majority and it resulted in a hung Parliament?

          • You seem to have a very selective memory alain. Remind me again, what was one of the key policies that resulted in the independents deciding to side with Labor over the Coalition? I believe it was the NBN.

            Remind me again, what is the Green’s, who hold the balance of power in the senate? That’s right, they support the NBN.

            Australia voted, and the people that represent Australia acted accordingly. So, you did get a say in it. You’re just unhappy that the people that represent the majority disagreed with you. Don’t worry through, you know as well as anybody that you get another say in 2013.

  40. WOW what a great read of dribble by a little known Delimiter.
    ‘The five NBN misconceptions of Tony Abbott’ Written by an even lesser known MORON Renai LeMay (A French person defending Alcatel’s precious NBN deal)
    Fxcked if I can see any facts in the dribble they have climbed onto their toy high horse and proclamated to be holier than though in their judgment of Mr Abbott, funny neither this shitty website or the idiot writing this crap cant seem to see the obvious rouse and deception being played out on the Australian public by the worst govt we NEVER elected…if your going to write self proclaiming expert crap maybe smear a bit of balance in it to stop it being so easily seen as Pro-NBN propaganda!!! WITH SH1T LIKE THIS YOU’LL NEVER GET A JOB IN A REAL PUBLICATION!!

    • “WITH SH1T LIKE THIS YOU’LL NEVER GET A JOB IN A REAL PUBLICATION!!”

      HAHAHAHAHA.

      oh man! that is gold!.

      i wonder if ZDNet would count as a real publication?

      Renai, i like him. can we keep him?
      pleeeease?

    • Leaving this comment up for hilarity value.

      For the record, I have previously had jobs as the news editor at ZDNet.com.au and as a technology reporter at the Financial Review. My writing has also been published in iTWire, CIO, Computerworld, CNET.com.au, CNET News.com, ZDNet.com and ZDNet.co.uk, iTNews, Communications Day and quite a few other publications.

      I liked working for all of those “real” publications, but quit and founded Delimiter because I wanted more freedom for my writing and my life. So far, it’s working out great :D

      • “as a technology reporter at the Financial Review.”…(rolls eyes) as we ALL KNOW a mecca like haven for all Techy Nerds needing a fix of the latest & greatest???…congrats on actually being published once in a real publication, maybe you can write Pro-NBN Propaganda for the Labor….ooh sh!t, you already are…ooh well, keep up the good work, your Kevin07 T-Shirt is looking a bit faded too…there must be spares they can let you have?

      • Renai I just wanted to say that when the most popular articles on this site in the last few weeks (fact checking conroy and this article) are holding both sides to account and you still get comments like you’re getting from that person “Never Again”, that you’re doing a great job.

        In this age of hyper-partisanship, getting the truth out there has never been more important, you’re doing a good thing here.

      • @Renai

        For what it is worth, I thought your article was well balanced. I do have my doubts on the wisdom and viability of the NBN, but Tony Abbott’s comments don’t really add much value to the debate and demonstrate a level of ignorance that is unhelpful to say the least. For the record, Stephen Conroy does not come across as an intellectual giant either and has made many ‘clangers’ of his own. I think it would be interesting to hear Malcolm Turnbull’s genuine thoughts on the topic, rather than those where he is playing the ventriloquist’s dummy to Tony Abbott. As we have no idea what they actually are, I am not even going to speculate and would suggest others do the same.

  41. I have been a critic of NBN from when it was first announced.
    It did not have a business case nor plan.
    It makes decisions on future use of technology based on current technology and usage.
    It assumes that there will be no effective competing technology. (Read history of American railroad, IBM, and Nokia.) In the Australian context, a Davnet type business model could cream the real revenue from the NBN.
    Its rollout ignores the 80:20 rule and the law of diminishing returns.
    It also does not specify an expected life span. The Government’s approach is like buying a very expensive computer because it will last a long time.
    The connections to the home is already obsolete.
    Its quoted speed is the maximum that may be achieved. It is like saying that you can do 110 km on the Pacific Highway at the end of a long weekend. It fails to address the sources of network congestion, and the uses of CDN networks.
    I am a fan of fibre-optic cable as a medium, having designed and managed a 1.5 kilometre fibre LAN over a decade ago. It is excellent for long distance, high speed transfer of data. However with only 14 nodes in Australia, the design ignores the design lessons of the Internet. Further, it is becoming increasingly clearer that the consumer preference is for cheaper, lower speed mobile computing rather than more expensive, more reliable fixed line computing. This is in fact a niche market. Direct fibre connection is essential for schools, hospitals, universities, and commercial and professional premises/areas.
    Unfortunately too many comments on NBN are driven by gamers and the technologically naive.
    Of course, what would I know. I am one of those nerds who found Pure Mathematics interesting, and can find a network topology diagram more intersting than World of Warcraft..

    • However with only 14 nodes in Australia, the design ignores the design lessons of the Internet.

      Could you clarify these, what 14 nodes are you referring to? and what design lessons of the internet?

      This is in fact a niche market. Direct fibre connect is essential for schools, hospitals, universities, and commercial and professional premises/areas.

      Direct fibre is being laid for these types of customers, GPON is primarily for consumer use.

      • Tezz,
        I have been trying to find a reference to the fourteen nodes. I used nodes, rather than hubs, or points of presence trying to be non-technical. The point is that these will act as choke points, and require network traffic from Dubbo to Parkes to be routed through Sydney, rather than Orange. I have looked for the reference. It was in an article by Paul Fletcher or possibly Malcolm Turnbull. I haven’t been able to locate details to date.
        In network terms, this is basically a complex star network. At best it could be described as a very partial mesh network. The Internet was conceived as a mesh network from the start. While not a full mesh at each node, the logical structure acts as an almost full mesh network at a macro level in terms of redundancy.

        • As NK has already pointed out, there are 121 POIs, not 14. As for traffic routing, the NBN is layer2, traffic is routed at layer3, or in the case by the service provider. How does the service provider routes traffic? Well that’s up to them, nothing to do with the NBN.

          As for the network layout of the NBN, well it’s a star, or I should say, stars, 121 of them infact. Probably because the NBN is just the last mile infrastructure, the bits connecting those stars are up to the service provider.

    • Phil, couldn’t agree more with your clear logical comments, pity they will be lost on the blinded labor loving slobs in here, they view NBN as the Fiber we had to have, completely ignoring the driver-less Spastic Bus that is the Federal Govt racing us full speed off a cliff into a sea of even more red ink as Senator Stephen Conroy madly licks the windows & waving at the people yelling to them to look out!!!….as long as they have 1Gb speed to their Windows Media Centers that’s all that matters!!

      • Who’s selling 1Gbps retail to homes? I want it!

        You might also have objected to the rollout of the copper CAN on the basis that some day in the (then) future 24Mbps services would be provided on it, which of course would have been a huge extravagance.

        To answer my rhetorical question, nobody is selling 1Gbps to homes yet. That figure merely reflects what is currently understood to be the capability of the physical media in the network as designed. It’s not just about what some guy with a media centre PC wants (although given the number of homes with Foxtel, that can hardly be called a niche application – just a different implementation), it’s about the capacity required for years after the build is complete.

        • “You might also have objected to the rollout of the copper CAN on the basis that some day in the (then) future 24Mbps services would be provided on it, which of course would have been a huge extravagance.”

          What did it cost?
          What did it achieve?
          What already surpassed it at time of implementation?
          How many companies had immediate requirements for it?
          24Mbs? Today people rejoice at 16Mbs ADSL2+ services, I would say the ROI on CAN Tech has more than been recouped over many years, NBN will not see this.
          NBN in the hands of mindless retards like Labor is a financial disaster that they are already constantly deceiving the public about.
          Wake up and smell the debt!!!

          for the record Frenchy Jurno.

          I was trained in Fiber termination, splicing and installation since 1991. Long before it was commonly used to connect back bones in risers.
          I worked for Alcatel before it became Alcatel Lucent, Telstra is approx 97% of its revenue stream in Aust.
          The marriage of Telstra, Alcatel & NBN was a forgone conclusion long ago.
          I have been to many NBN Demo’s and seen how it all connects and works first hand, I watched streaming HD 3D video on a new TV that didn’t require stupid glasses 18months before it arrived here. 70Mbs was the peak load, add internet + VoIP + overhead then 100Mbs might not cut it??
          I turned down contract work involving NBN due to the incompetent people involved (I knew them from past lives) I would I would have to work with and did not want to be part of such a massive waste of my taxes.
          Sadly time will tell, as in ALL Labor grand schemes, they fail, in NSW we will be paying for their stupidity for a few more years yet, NBN will only compound this.

          Maybe write an article about the 100 Lies told by Labor, Telstra & Alcatel….?

          • What surpasses GPON for last-mile to homes, for the scale of NBN’s GPON rollout?

            It’s interesting that you ask about what surpassed the CAN at the time of rollout though, because optical fibre has been around for a very long time…

            How the hell do you have any idea what the RoI will be on the NBN given that applications will be conceived – even while the network is still being built – that are not seriously being thought of yet? A cursory reading of the history of telecommunications and the Internet will demonstrate that.

          • Good one, let’s build FTTH to 93% of Australia’s residences, we will work out the applications that are needed to justify the $43 billion rollout in the first place later.

            Hey if we find out those applications are not forthcoming or we cannot even convince punters that HD video conferencing streamed simultaneously to four points in the home is required for ‘nation building’ and the ‘digital future who gives a shit, we will long gone from Government anyway.

          • Sorry alain, you’re right, the evolution of Internet and telecommunications applications will come to a screeching halt where it is, when the entire history of the technology says otherwise. The NBN should be built in accordance with the limitation of the imagination of the average person today. It ought to be obsolete halfway through the build. Now /that/ would be a white elephant.

          • Well seeing as the ‘average person’; today does not make full use of the optimum speeds that are available to them today on ASDSL2+ and HFC your point although sarcastically made is spot on.

            While you are it perhaps you can outline to me what is happening in all those FTTH in Greenfield estates all over Australia that have been using the FTTH product for years, how are they ahead of the vast majority of suburbs ‘struggling’ into the digital age with HFC and ADSL2+?

            What marvelous ‘applications’ are those estates using that us poor punters not on FTTH can only but dream about?

          • Say the same thing over and over enough and people will start to believe you?

            You think people jumped on 1500 kb/s the day it came out in 2000? Why did we bother to improve the speed of ADSL at all? What’s the point of ADSL2+ when people weren’t even using 1500kb/s when it was available?

          • I understand his point, it just has nothing to do with what I said. Of course, it’s easier to try and deflect the conversation than actually address a point, right?

          • You are actually enforcing my argument and you don’t even know it, my point was that residences don’t use the fastest speeds available to them today, or as in your example in the past.

            You quoted the release of 1500/256 in 2000 which I assume you mean even though 1500/256 was available many stayed on and were happy with 512/128 or even 256/64, and even when ADSL2+ was available many stayed on the lower speeds (as long as it was cheaper), because that’s all they needed, that is ‘always on’ BB.

            So after all of that exactly what was your point that you state I am trying to avoid and deflect?

          • Alain, he’s saying the providers still upgraded to ADSL2+, DOCSIS 3.0, etc, despite the fact that there is very little consumer desire for these upgrades. Not needed, they did it anyway, follow?

          • The point which still seems to have whizzed past your head, is that people didn’t flock to 1500kb/s – the fastest available at the time – when it was first released, but that doesn’t mean 1500kb/s is even close to good enough today, just over a decade on.

            Maybe we should just rip up all that useless ADSL2+ equipment, since people never flocked onto the highest speeds that were available at the time they were put in. Or maybe drop ADSL altogether, since people stuck with dial up for years after ADSL came around.

          • Telstra throttled the maximum available ADSL speed of 8mbit down to 1.5mbit or lower for years. When other providers entered the ADSL market enmasse the DSLAMS available were at the ADSL2 stage. This roughly coincided with Telstra uncapping their ADSL speeds and starting to upgrade to ADSL2/2+. The consumer really had nothing to do with it – they simply purchase what is available to them.

            Interesting enough, copper lasted about a century as a delivery medium. Pretty good really.

            It is fairly common knowledge that optical fibre more easily scales to very high transmission speeds. One day of course it’ll mean a terabit link to your house which will be thoroughly under utilised (but that doesn’t mean it’s wasted).

            Along the same lines, one day soon PCs will have computing power several orders of magnitude greater than that available today. This CPU/GPU/APU power will be almost entirely wasted. But that is not the fault of the consumer – they won’t have the choice to turn back time and buy what we use today – improvements in the technology is forced upon them.

            Is the an optic fibre NBN a good idea? Of course it is (I’ll sign up thank you very much).
            Is it financially worth it? For some it is, for some it isn’t. End of story. Worth is defined by the individual.

          • Never Again! says “Today people rejoice at 16Mbs ADSL2+ services”
            And yet of about 20 people I know who are on ADSL2+ in various locations around Australia, NOT ONE has a sync anywhere near 16mbit.

            Never Again! says “I worked for Alcatel before it became Alcatel Lucent,”
            So that’s why Mike Quigley made it to the top in Alcatel Lucent and now is head of the NBN and you ended up in no man’s land. Envy much or jealousy or both I think (of Quigley’s success)

            Never Again! says “I was trained in Fiber termination, splicing and installation since 1991. Long before it was commonly used to connect back bones in risers.
            I worked for Alcatel before it became Alcatel Lucent, Telstra is approx 97% of its revenue stream in Aust.
            The marriage of Telstra, Alcatel & NBN was a forgone conclusion long ago.
            I have been to many NBN Demo’s and seen how it all connects and works first hand, I watched streaming HD 3D video on a new TV that didn’t require stupid glasses 18months before it arrived here. 70Mbs was the peak load, add internet + VoIP + overhead then 100Mbs might not cut it??”

            WOW!! you must be some kind of “SUPER GOD or BRAGGART” Who gives a rat’s arse

            Never Again! says “I turned down contract work involving NBN due to the incompetent people involved (I knew them from past lives)”

            Or maybe they (NBN) knew of you and decided to pass on you for reasons only known to you and them from past lives.

            Never Again! says “NBN in the hands of mindless retards like Labor is a financial disaster that they are already constantly deceiving the public about.”

            Just like Abbott & Co at the last election (deceive the public) with their BIG BLACK HOLE in the funding for their election promises. Plus the EVEN BIGGER BIG BLACK HOLE there will be if Abbott & Co “honor” all their rape/pillage/destroy/say no to everything promises/threats if the Noalition wins in 2013

          • Anal Ganger! says “Today people rejoice at 16Mbs ADSL2+ services”
            And yet of about 20 people I know who are on ADSL2+ in various locations around Australia, NOT ONE has a sync anywhere near 16mbit….MINES DOES FXCKTARD!!..MANY TIMES

            Anal Ganger! says Envy much or jealousy or both I think (of Quigley’s success) Sucess?..how?…youve never met the puppey you fxcking assclown…go back to POXBOX and leave this to the adults!!

            Anal Ganger! says “

            WOW!! you must be some kind of “SUPER GOD or BRAGGART” Who gives a rat’s arse? YOU DO!!!…THANKS FOR WRITTING ABOUT ME POXBOX PLAYING CHILD!!

            Anal Ganger! says “Or maybe they (NBN) knew of you and decided to pass on you for reasons only known to you and them from past lives….JEALOUS MUCH???…You take what your given…I DECIDE WHAT I WANT…suck it up kiddy plaything!

            Anal Ganger! says “Just like Abbott & Co at the last election (deceive the public) with their BIG BLACK HOLE in the funding for their election promises. Plus the EVEN BIGGER BIG BLACK HOLE there will be if Abbott & Co “honor” all their rape/pillage/destroy/say no to everything promises/threats if the Noalition wins in 2013…WAAAAAHAAAA…spoken like a true lobotomized moron…hows it paying paying to use POXBOX Live?…your such a FOOL!!…you have no idea about freedom of choice your mentally crippled…I laugh at your pointless scribble….pull your nappy up and fxck off!!!

          • Just like the wizard of Oz!!

            NightyKhaos = Scarecrow (Just sad & pathetic)

            whinge commander = Cowardly Lion (desperate for non-confrontation)

            James = Tinman (hollow & empty)

          • Tissue?…mop up all those tears stinging those widdle cheeks?….you can put shit on me, when I push back you run to the teacher?…no wonder you were bullied so much at school.

  42. Mr Abbott struggles to understand the purpose of an “internet”.

    He’s not a technical person, and is quite disinterested in the concept of high-speed broadband in general. That is unless it involves taking pot-shots at the NBN. In which case he still struggles to understand the basics, despite stating he somehow has Australia’s best interests at heart.

    In fact he holds them so near-and-dear, his solution to high-speed ubiquitous access is to task Mr Turnbull with “destroying” the NBN. Apparently, the best step forward is to “assassinate” progress.

    The Liberal policy — which can be best described as “a lack of investment” — re-iterates the decades long lack of “doing”. In fact it’s entirely consistent with a complete lack of giving a shit, followed by a complete lack of expenditure, apart from a few tax derived handouts (mostly to Telstra).

    Asking Abbott to comment on fast broadband, is like asking alain to explain his reasoning and or logic. It just doesn’t ever really seem to make any sense, and in fact drives most readers straight to the medicine cabinet.

    I’d have less of an issue if the Liberal party actually took the concept of high-speed broadband, delivered to a high percentage of the Australian public seriously. They do not.

    It’s thus quite impossible to take anything Turnbull or Abbott say seriously.

      • @Philip Dowling.

        Referring to Brendan as an abusive troll, for simply doing as did you, forwarding his opinion (but one you do not agree with, of course) was completely uncalled for.

        • Of course when anti-NBN posters are accused of trolling you remain silent or back the assertion up.

          Your blatant one eyed outrage is wasted.

          • Trolling is trolling as you just clearly demonstrated, thank you.

            Clinton did not troll and Phil was wrong.

            You know wrong, you practice it 24/7 and have it perfected.

  43. the thing that i feel most people forget, is yes, NBNCo is currently the only provider for FTTH, but there is nothing stopping a second party from coming to the table and doing their own FTTH, the only requirement this other party will have is that they have to provide the same open-access model that NBNCo has to provide.

    So with this in view, there is nothing stopping competition in the wholesale market except for the unwillingness for private companies to actually enter the wholesale market, so long as they follow the NBNCo model of open-access for everyone.

    • “.. there is nothing stopping a second party from coming to the table and doing their own FTTH, the only requirement this other party will have is that they have to provide the same open-access model that NBNCo has to provide.”

      You are, of course, referring to infrastructure-based competition. Whilst this does introduce a degree of competition, it also introduces multiplicity in service delivery.

      The downsides are that getting from one ‘supplier’ to another involves additional steps, including migrating from an entirely separate network to another, unlike the current situation is that Telstra is effective the single back-stop, there will be multiple.

      The “unwillingness” comes down to ROI. Which of course, we’re told, explains why the NBN is unpossible and simply must be stopped. The reality is there are very few companies whom would even contemplate it; the largest one that has (Telstra) decided it wasn’t viable.

      • The “unwillingness” comes down to ROI. Which of course, we’re told, explains why the NBN is unpossible and simply must be stopped. The reality is there are very few companies whom would even contemplate it; the largest one that has (Telstra) decided it wasn’t viable.

        That’s also the reason why no one has duplicated the current copper network.

    • Every time I drive on the Western Ring Road, I hope with all my heart that Transurban will build one right next to it.

        • I’m making an analogy of infrastructure duplication for the purposes of pointless competition to the ultimate detriment of the public.

          And no, before you deliberately or otherwise misinterpret me again, I didn’t say competition was essentially pointless, just this particular type.

        • Oh, and while I’m on the subject, the Western Ring Road is another great example of infrastructure that was built according to capacity required at the time ground was first broken and was already congested the day it was completed, requiring expensive and highly inconvenient upgrades for the past few years.

          • Well to be fair to make your analogy more NBN like you would have to add that Transurban when it builds a road next to the Western Ring Road has the taxpayer pay for the ripping up of the Western Ring Road so that everyone is forced onto their road with a compulsory toll on top.

            When drivers complain about this and that they were happy with the Western Ring Road just tell them they are not embracing nation building principles at all and to just shut up.

          • The compulsory toll on top being taxpayer money being used? Does this mean that everything tax payer money is used on is a compulsory toll?

            Following that through to its logical conclusion, your saying that funding the fire department, police department, education and health are all compulsory tolls?

            Interesting.

          • No you are deliberately going off track with the analogy, we pay for the NBN to be built as taxpayers, we pay the NBN infrastructure competitors Telstra and Optus to shut down their networks so the NBN can get enough customers by forcing residences onto it, we then pay ISP’s again to access it, which is the monthly variable toll with a baseline of $24 + taxes + retail margin.

          • Okay, the problem with your analogy in the first place alain is that for it to be accurate we would have been tolled to use the M80 (Western Ring Road) before it was ripped up and replaced. The M80 has no tolls.

          • Update: It’s not my analogy, I was only pointing out the blatant flaws in the logic comparing it to the NBN rollout.

          • So, you weren’t the one that suggested Transurban have a toll? Because that dear Alain was the specific problem with the analogy I was pointing out, and since you were the one who amended the analogy to include this specific posit, you hold responsibility for the analogy.

            See what you did here is took a flawed analogy (broadband infrastructure competition is similar to building another, higher capacity, road right next to the M80) and making it more flawed (the toll, i.e. implying you have to pay to use the road when you didn’t before, which in the case of Broadband is incorrect as you always had to pay) and using that specific flaw cast light on the negative, potentially wasteful, consequences of following this analogy to its conclusion (the forced migration onto the new road, analogous to the forced migration to the NBN) by attempting to show that consumers would not agree to such a ludicrous idea, when in fact the idea of replacing a road with a better one is often done is actuality.

  44. Here are some fairly specific reasons why this article does provide balanced coverage:

    1.

    You may have a perfectly good explanation for why the Greenfields BOT is way behind prediction, but it’s still a bad thing for the NBN revenue stream, which in turn pushes up the price and puts pressure on the ROI, and this compounds (just like compound interest on any loan). What’s more, they have approx 1500 satellite sites and need to get at least another 10,000 more installs in 6 months… that’s very hard yards when you consider how remote those satellite sites are. On top of this the NBN fiber rollout covers something like 18,000 homes but only 2500 subscribers. That’s about 15% uptake, and they simply cannot survive on 15% uptake… it really does show a lack of interest, and worse when you consider how carefully they picked the early rollout regions.

    Thus, you can quibble about a few fine points but Tony Abbot is perfectly right to say that the subscription numbers to date are disappointing. That’s a perfectly fair summary of the situation.

    2.

    The debate over the need for higher speeds has not gone away, it’s just that none of the NBN advocates are listening, so people are explaining it the only way you guys will listen to — by not subscribing. What happens when you NBN advocates ignore everyone except each other, is that you don’t actually convince anyone else, you just reinforce your own conviction.

    3.

    I’m not going to quibble over how much these guys are getting paid, what matters to me is how much the whole project costs, because as a taxpayer, it’s my project. Whether it’s $40 billion or $50 billion makes a difference, and the reason it makes a difference is that someone will pay for this (very likely me). Either it will be paid for by taxes, or paid for by subscribers, or a bit of both, but it is seriously wrong to put about the idea that you can have $40 billion or $50 billion in infrastructure that no one at all ever needs to pay for.

    When June 2012 comes around we can revisit this and I’m pretty confident they will be nowhere near 150k subscribers by that stage, I doubt they will even be at 100k, and more likely they will be around 50k. More importantly, when June 2012 comes around they SHOULD be publishing some sort of per-subscriber profitability statement, although I dare say they very cagey about the numbers but as a taxpayer and thus a shareholder I’d expect to see such a statement.

    4.

    So the last refuge for the project is forcing people to subscribe, even people who are not interested. To do this they will need to shut down the copper but with only 2500 fixed line subscribers that’s going to be a bit difficult. Be realistic, copper is not about to shut down in 2012. OK, let’s consider 2013, there’s going to be an election in the second half of 2013, do you think they will shut down the copper and start twisting arms right before a major election? Hmmm, the ALP must expect to lose, but would they actually deliberately kick the voters in the knees just to prove a point? Anything is possible.

    More likely the NBN will need to depend on voluntary subscribers at least as far as June 2013 and their target is a half million voluntary subscribers. They have 18 months, so that’s about 900 new subscribers every day (including weekends), at 15% uptake they would need to get a fiber link into 6000 homes a day.

    • Ok for the sake of not arguing, let’s just say NBNCo could be behind. So could that possibly have anything to do with Telstra negotiations, ACCC negotiations and a hostile opposition?

      Now it’s your turn (for the sake of not arguing) to say, yes – that could be part of it.

      So after that, do the NBN detractors have anything else apart from “we don’t need it (opinion)”, “$50bn is too much (assumption)” and “people are forced (refusal to accept progress)”?

      Seems not.

      • It doesn’t make any difference what “is part of it”, all that matters is whether the project is viable, in this world that we live in now.

        The ACCC has a job to do (maintaining competitive industry, and preventing monopoly takeover), the Telstra executive has a job to do (making money for shareholders) and Tony Abbott has a job to do (representing the people who voted for him, and trying to become Prime Minister). None of these should surprise anyone. None of these are about to change anytime soon.

        Besides that, the biggest pivot for the whole NBN project is whether they can achieve good voluntary uptake in the next 18 months. That will be make or break right there, and the decision comes down to ordinary Australian households. Blame the Tasmanians living in Midway Point, Scottsdale and Smithton who have only voluntarily decided to sign up at a rate of about 16% after thinking about it for a year or so.

    • @Tel

      Well I concur with all of that and your point 4 re the disconnection process from HFC and copper is especially pertinent.

      At the moment the NBN rollout is a rather pleasant tyre kicking exercise made especially pleasant by free trial broadband, the biggest ISP BigPond has just stated it’s free trial and we are already into 2012, to say the two biggest ISP’s BigPond and Optus are demonstrably lukewarm about the NBN would be the understatement of the year.

      It is also important to note that other than Greenfield rollouts, brownfield rollouts are FTTH with PSTN fallback, existing brownfield rollouts are quite comfortable with that as they can keep using their PSTN phone service or if they want or even ADSL whilst using the NBN for BB.

      As you rightly point out the shut down of a exchange area and HFC BB by Telstra and forcing up till now ambivalent residences to use it is the interesting period in the NBN gestation when it becomes the sole fixed line player, but that as you stated is not going to happen until 2013 because of the time limits imposed under the terms of the Telstra /NBN agreement.

      A defined NBN Rollout Region is about 3000 premises, Telstra has 18 months within the NBN Co declaring a Rollout Region Ready for Service to migrate those premises from copper and or HFC BB,
      which cannot be declared by the NBN Co until 90% of premises in a Rollout Region are passed by NBN fibre.

      The agreement also specifies a Disconnection Date, which if you care to read Point 4.2.2.1 ‘Disconnection of Services’ has lengthy conditions attached to it.
      So on that basis even if a Rollout Region just for example was declared Ready for Service by the NBN Co this month Telstra has until around June 2013 to migrate everyone over and shutdown the exchange/s and HFC BB supporting that Rollout Region.

      Looking at it optimistically we could say the first Rollout Region declared Ready for Service under the 90% rule won’t happen until at least the second half of this year, which gives Telstra until the end of 2013 but more realistically more likely into 2014 to migrate customers wholesale and retail and start shutting down their infrastructure.

      Of course Telstra may decide to fast track migrations because it doesn’t receive disconnection payments until premises are disconnected, but it may not be operationally wise to speed up the process and run the risk of stuffing up, as I have stated before if the forced migrations do not go smoothly the NBN is toast, especially as they lead into the next election anytime Gillard wants to call it, between 3rd August and 30th November 2013.

      • Yes you concur.

        Now again I ask.

        So after that, do the NBN detractors have anything else apart from “we don’t need it (opinion)”, “$50bn is too much (assumption)” and “people are forced (refusal to accept progress)”?

        Still seems not.

        • I think you are right.
          I haven’t been impressed by any detractors propositions. Very few have any technical merit. Most seem to be driven by political leanings only.

          If the libs proposed the NBN as is I believe the opinions would be reversed.

          None of the more vociferous comments seem credible, they do not provide any substantive credentials or logical arguments.

          There are notions that Fibre-Otpic cable is obsolete and wireless networks have overtaken them.
          I can find no evidence for wireless being able to scale to the point of fibre.
          People have not made the connection between speed and volume.
          No one has mentioned security issues with radio. And there are some nasty issues.

          There are two vital topics around ADSL that not one person has mentioned (in that up to100Mb may be feasible) see Dr John Papandriopoulos, Professor John Cioffi’s work. Thus extending the life of copper.

          Wireless has not yet come close to making fibre redundant although it may do so in the future with a 100 GHz spectrum and even then it may be financial advantage. It may also turn out that fibre technology may advance past expectations as ADSL has.

          Some many here are absolute that there will be no new use for fibre to the home. In the same way that Bill Gates et al did not see the public internet coming. Not Vint Cerf or Sir Timothy Berners-Lee saw WEB 2.0 or cloud coming but so many political dogmatists here are prescient and are neither conversant with history, the topic at hand and lack imagination.

          I can only make my decision based on my training in network design and operations. Not politics or personality issues.

          My credentials are
          1) I’m a computer scientist / engineer.
          2) I own an IT tech company.
          3) I have designed built local and global networks using DSL, Ethernet and ATM. I am still building them. Our customers love us.
          4) I also have been to the NEC / Nexstep labs in sunshine (Mr neveragain)

          Lastly, I’m not convinced that all government infrastructure should be undertaken as long as it ensures a healthy profit. Laissez-faire; free market; supply side economics does not have impeccable credentials.
          Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard are about the only two businessmen I might have trusted to have people and profits both on the agenda.

          E&OE

          • @papwalker

            Just as it would be foolish to dismiss every fan of the NBN as a card carrying Labor Party member, it is just as foolish to dismiss its opponents as being politically motivated as well.

            I suspect we are supposed to be impressed by your technical credentials, but I haven’t seen even the most ardent critic of the NBN question its technical ability to deliver. The concerns tend to be more economic and concern the question as to whether the future round of service innovations are actually going to need the speed of the NBN. Why do we need it, why do we need it right now, and why is this the most economically responsible way of doing it?

            If the critics’ questions are so weak, why can’t anyone actually answer them? All they seem to get is abuse and accusations of being politically biased. In the rare case where someone has attempted to answer them in an objective fashion, all they seem to do is restate the question. Q. “Why do we need the NBN?” A. “Because we need to improve our broadband infrastructure.” Sorry, but that is just the question slightly reworded and without the questionmark at the end.

            To answer your questions, it is true wireless speeds have always lagged fixed network speeds and will probably continue to do so into the forseeable future. The importance you place on this is based on the flawed assumption that speed is everything. What if mobility becomes the most important thing? What if these new wonderful applications that no one seems to able to name yet are useless if tethered to the wall or confined to the house?

            Optical fibre is not obsolete by any means. It provides the vital backhaul required by all of the modern wireless networks :-)

            Just as many have not seen the importance of future technological trends as you correctly pointed out, others have bet the farm on technologies that went nowhere. All this proves is the foolishness of betting on the direction of technological advances. Broadband ISDN was going to open up a whole new world of services. The microwave oven was going to be a commercial flop. DIVX (the player, not the codec that hijacked its name) was going to revolutionise the way movies were to be delivered to the home. The microprocessor was too slow to be of any value. The Elcaset was to be the recording medium of choice for music. The mobile phone was just a rich person’s toy that would never go mainstream.

          • +1 BC.

            Even though we are obviously on different sides of the NBN fence, I agree, that not “everyone on the anti NBN/dark side, LOL” is politically motivated.

            However, it is apparent that while NBN fans are spread across various political ideologies, the absolute majority of those opposed are indeed, from the right.

            Your comments appear to be of a technical nature. However when most poster says things such as, Labor wastage, white elephant, communist plot and echo the Coalition word for word, well!

          • My point exactly.
            Many comments are vicious, profane, ignorant and emotive political responses from people that did not pursue positions of social leadership, duties or service. (thank goodness)

          • ‘However, it is apparent that while NBN fans are spread across various political ideologies, the absolute majority of those opposed are indeed, from the right.’

            Complete and utter BS, you would have no idea whatever what the motivation is of pro and anti-NBN posters, you don’t have a clue about most things but this piece of fictional rubbish takes the cake.

          • Now provide evidence that what I said is BS and remember, “anyone can spin a roulette wheel, I am after something substantive”.

            :->

          • “Although it is not true that all conservatives are stupid people, it is true that most stupid people are conservative” – John Stuart Mill

          • i always preferred Will Buckleys’ definition: “a conservative is someone who stands athwart history, yelling ‘Stop!’”

            on personal observation, the definition cartainly fits TA.

          • So, a Canute-like exercise in futility then? I think Buckley was onto something…

          • I also like a similar one from Thomas Fuller – “A conservative believes nothing should be done for the first time”

          • Let’s be clear about the speed issue. What we are really talking about is volume. We sometimes use the technical term ‘big pipe’. We want to increase the volume of data per second by decreasing end to end delivery time of the bit stream as well as increasing the bandwidth to allow more parallel cells.
            The actual latency of the web is not too bad, I get 180ms to latimes.com and 350 ms to petaluma.com.
            But in trying to shift large volumes I may run into a serialization issue. Telegraph was very very fast but really bad for data volume.
            So to summarize, we want more volume.

            Why do we want more volume?
            Computer applications tend towards shifting ever greater volumes of data.
            CPU advances were typically made by increasing speed. (multicore is related to limitations of speed an so introduces parallelism)
            Storage advances were in speed and capacity.
            Display advances are size and density.
            Computer busing and IO have been alternating between serial and parallel but the goal were to increase volume.
            Digital Camera sensors are have increased in density and colour depth.
            Televisions have increased in size, density and colour depth.
            Audio system have increased in bit-rates.
            The word length of computers had ‘widened’ to 64 bits. (now we can move even more zeros around)
            All this speaks to increasing the volume of data.

            Why do we want the greater volume of data?
            Because we do. We want clearer, sharper, bigger images and moving images.
            Higher fidelity sound.
            Smarter documents (video, audio, user interaction etc)
            At the developer level we want better modular frameworks to decrease development time, reduce ‘spagetti’ complexity and importantly reduce the effects of ’emergence’ or emergent behavior. Thus a bigger Javascript library or code base needs to be delivered along with content.
            Applications and operational systems need to be updated seamlessly and quietly.
            We want more of these applications. We want them to operate asynchronously and in parallel. (Witness the outcry for multitasking on Apple IOS products)
            We want our computers and devices to do complex and amazing things reliably, instantly and simply.
            Is this first world greed? Should be be more like the Amish? Can’t help with that. See a philosopher.

            Now if wireless throughput can be increased by say a thousand fold in the next ten years I would say go that way. Absolutely. But we want the benefits of all the above as well as mobility. We cant yet have both.

            This need is not all hedonistic.
            If you feel unwell and stick your finger in the medex300 it can deliver your FBC, BSL, O2sats, enzymes, foreign DNA / RNA sequences and assorted other markers to your doctor. The system may recommend urgent action.
            Your kids are watching movies, playing games, attending a virtual University lecture. The smart kitchen is ordering groceries. Your wife is gasbaging to her mother on the video link. The plumber is sending a live video feed to the inside of your dishwasher to the aftermarket parts people to identify the exact widget and this dishwasher has already transmitted the fault code data to the manufacturer. (as well as receiving software upgrades). The electricity, water and gas companies are reading your smart meters, and bucket loads of email are pouring in for the whole family etc etc ad nauseum.
            We want all this magic and more, and we want it now. (personally I’m not fussed, but I’m not young)
            There is an element of ‘build it and they will come.’ Although I admit, I’m still waiting for my flying car and robot I was promised by 2000 in the fifties. There is also an element of ’emergence’ making it impossible to predict the future.
            We took a chance on the Collins class subs, let’s take a chance on this. After all we are a nation of punters and usually get it right – when we press on. There are many other issue where unholy amounts of money are wasted that are below the radar.

          • @papwalker

            What you are describing is speed, not data volume. You can transfer 100MB over an old 300 baud modem – you just have to be patient.

            We can already have HD video using current technologies. Unless the human eye evolves to something with far greater resolution or we develop another sense that consumes information at a greater rate, we have probably maxed out our ability to consume real-time bandwidth. That said, you have touched on another of the criticims of the NBN, that for most it will be nothing more than an entertainment service. If Foxtel want a new distribution network (and I don’t believe they do) or any other player wants one, let them pay for it. Access to Pay TV is not one of those basic human rights that justifies public funding. If video is needed for something else, then what? This is why I have been banging on about the applications. Video is a means for delivering applications, it is not an end in itself.

            Compared to video, the rest is miniscule. How big do your Javascript modules get? I assume you compress them removing comments, shortening variable names, and doing the things most do. If larger modules are to be transferred, real-time compression and decompression or even just tokenising the modules would fix the problem if there is a problem in the first place. Similarly, SOAP transactions are relatively lightweight and subject to significant compression through some fairly simple techniques. The use of frameworks will actually reduce the volume of transactions. Once downloaded, the client’s PC will cache it and reuse its local copy rather than download another. Where the cache wouldn’t do that, if it is an issue, browsers could be modified to manage standardised frameworks better. After all, only Australia would be fixing the problem via the NBN and the browser makers would still need to address other markets. The reality is that it is not the major problem you are portraying it to be, hence little of what I have described has been done.

            Regarding iOS and multitasking, that is an issue for the internal design of the OS and has nothing to do with the external transfer of data. Bear in ming that iOS is used on mobile devices, so if there is a capacity or speed issue, it is in the wireless networks, not the fixed one. This is a classic example of how we could end up betting on the wrong horse.

            “Now if wireless throughput can be increased by say a thousand fold in the next ten years I would say go that way.”

            I love that one. A decade ago, wireless data speeds were only 1/1000th of what they are today, and I am comparing apples with apples in that the speed comparison in both cases is based on the ideal maximum. I am not comparing the old real-world speed with the new ideal speed.

            We took a chance on the Collins class subs and lost. Just because we made a stupid mistake in the past does not mean we have to risk making a stupid mistake this time. If the NBN is so important we can justify taking the risk, I just want to know why and have yet to see a compelling list of applications that are desperately needed, cannot be done today, and justify such a large amount of public spending.

            You have made a valiant effort and I want to acknowldge you for not resorting to the usual personal abuse that often accompanies questions such as mine, but you have still missed the mark. Sorry.

          • Perhaps I wasn’t clear enough.
            With regard to IOS multi-tasking I meant several applications moving data at the same time. Not stopping when it loses focus. Program A is still downloading even though program B has the focus and is also downloading.

            Regarding 3g or 4g throughput (as opposed to speed to the handset) I meant 1000 fold increase in volume. ala 1000 times the connections at say 10 megabit. A 1000 fold reduction in contention.

            Speed versus volume I am talking about latency versus volume. Similar to the concept of bonding or say a 5 tonne truck at 50kph versus a fifty tonne truck also at 50kph.

            I labour the point only for the benefit of others here. Many of my customers don’t realise the contention issue. I normally use the ‘turn on the hot water tap at the sink while your missus is in the shower’. You don’t need more pressure just bigger pipes.

            With regards to javascript and frameworks I was referring to my horror at what Apple xcode and Microsoft dot net send down the wire for a simple Web application. I have also looked at script that comes down the wire from newspaper sites. Script libraries that load other script libraries that load other script libraries. No-Script browser add-on really shows this up. I have seen some like the SMH go four deep from 25 sources.
            A lot of ‘web programmers’ want one or two functions from say JScript or JQuery but load the whole thing, and, probably correctly, do not source it from the web server but from Google or wherever the latest version resides. I’m not a browser engineer but it seems to me that the bloody things download the same libraries again and again. Possibly to ensure that the latest build is always present. Perhaps there are meta tags on every page to stop caching.

            With regard to a compelling list of applications, for the average household, there are probably none bar email. But that would hold true of the PSTN. My guess is that a high percentage of calls are social and on that basis the PSTN is a luxury that cost the tax payer billions.
            For better or worse young people today expect HD youtube, iTunes, Bigpond movies, Bittorrent, iMessage and facetime type of stuff. The do tend to see it as a right. More more more more! They will also vote (and hopefully pay taxes).

            With regard to the Collins class, it started out as a dog but is now considered a reasonable boat. It performed well at rimpac and surprised everyone, although that could be Ozzie seamanship.

            “The repeated successes of the class in wargames and multinational exercises earned the Collins class praise from foreign military officers for being “a very capable and quiet submarine””

            There are so many issues to this that you could write a thesis. Like how many jobs are created and how much money from the initial investment circulates in the economy.

            I always wondered what kids would do with the money they spend on mobile comms etc if it wasn’t there.
            It has struck me on occasion that innovation is sometimes finding new ways to suck money out of peoples pockets.

            BTW
            Our main project at the moment is shifting several customers to thin client and total web \ cloud solutions. Now finally seems the right time having resisted web apps for 12 years.
            Although we are starting to hit barriers with broadband contention.

          • We could go on like this forever.

            My PC has been multi-tasking for decades. It is nothing new. So what? An email client wakes up every 10 minutes and downloadeds a few messages. The updater program wakes up once a week and downloads an upgrade in the background. You are not going to have muiltiple tasks streaming video-like data quanties all in parallel with real-timebandwidth requirements.

            Software bloat is a problem, but it would need to be massive to equate to a single HD video stream.

            It could be argued that the social interaction offered by the PSTN is a necessity. I’m not sure that the need to watch a dog play a piano on YouTube is really up there. Anyway, as I pointed out in another post, the PSTN was paid for through retained earnings and not through taxpayer funds. The NBN is very different in this regard. It is being paid for by the taxpayer in the hope that is will make a profit and pay the taxpayer back. If it bombs, the taxpayer will be left with a huge white elephant. Had the telephone failed as a concept, the taxpayer would not have been out of pocket and it would have just faded away.

          • The PSTN was paid for via retained earnings not taxpayer funds? I think you are talking semantics and being quite selective now BC, by seemingly looking at Telstra and the PSTN as being separate.

            Because here you told us – “Telstra was a regulated vertically integrated monopoly that didn’t have to worry about shareholders and it was that fact that allowed it to return the funds to the taxpayer”.

            http://delimiter.com.au/2012/01/04/the-five-nbn-misconceptions-of-tony-abbott/#comment-297855

            How can you “return funds to the taxpayer”, if they didn’t come from taxpayer?

            Look I have no need to argue with you, as from the nature of your comments you appear to be genuine (not a political troll – although I did see those magic words “white elephant”…LOL) also appear to have/or had, hands-on experience with the PSTN/Telstra and an obvious wealth of knowledge to boot.

            All I am saying and I reiterate, I believe the way Telstra came about and the plan for the NBN are “very similar” and again find it hypocritical that the most outspoken critics (not you per se) seem to be Telstra supporters (and obviously, Coalition supporters) who love Telstra but hate the NBN.

          • ‘and again find it hypocritical that the most outspoken critics (not you per se) seem to be Telstra supporters (and obviously, Coalition supporters) who love Telstra but hate the NBN.’

            … or like most of my post content I have made all of that up, because in reality I would not have a clue if that’s true or not but I take the attitude that if I repeat false BS over and over enough times perhaps one person out there might actually believe it one day!

          • Now provide evidence that what I say is BS and remember, “anyone can spin a roulette wheel, I am after something substantive”.

          • The biggest furphy in the NBN debate is the use of e-medicine as a justification.
            As a parent with four children with 2 major public and one major private hospital within 15 kms, it still takes hours to see a junior doctor and weeks to see a specialist.
            E-medicine will not solve the problem of insufficient doctors and specialists.
            My fear is that just as call centers moved overseas, so will e-medical treatment. If a person in the country can video conference to a city, they can also videoconference to India.
            As soon as the governments wake up to this, they will do it as it saves money, it ostensibly provides a service, and they will have more money for the swinging city electorates.
            Incidentally test results could be sent via dial-up, while x-rays, etc could be sent by snail mail and still get to the specialist weeks before the appointment.

          • Google telemedicine saves lives.

            Then factor the added advantages the NBN will provide, with it’s overall improvements and if you have an open mind you will at least have learnt something and can then consider the possibilities, rather than just scoff and dismiss.

          • Poor bitter child.

            I’ll reiterate what I wrote.

            “Then factor the added advantages the NBN will provide, with it’s overall improvements and if you have an open mind you will at least have learnt something”.

            Never mind.

          • Good thing we are having this out now then, instead of 10 years ago.

            Otherwise, people like you who are unable to learn, would have said, we don’t need Skype, what we have now is good enough.

            How ironic eh?

            But nothing else will crop up over the next 10 years either, Tony said and that’s all that matters.

          • I did indeed google “telemedicine saves lives” and the story of Carolyn Thornton came up. What exactly was she doing with telemedicine? Oh she was sending her incredibly high bandwidth blood pressure readings (maybe 10 bytes an hour). Here’s a quote from the article:

            “The console’s liquid crystal display prompts patients through data gathering, then the patient presses a button that initiates a dial-up session to upload the data through the patient’s home telephone line.”

            Well lookey here, a dial up session is more than sufficient for the job. How about that? So, um what was the justification for megabits of bandwidth again? I would have thought that for monitoring purposes, wireless was exactly the right technology — low bandwidth, portable, cheap and readily available. Oh yeah, did I say mobility? Able to leave the home? That’s kind of important to people.

          • Googled until you found one to suit eh, good for you.

            Regardless if it works on dial up just think how much better everything will be with upgrades.

            I’m sure you could have Googled all day to find the one you wanted and then submitted it via dial up too. But I have a sneaking suspicion you have upgraded, haven’t you?

            Why?

          • Thank you for your advice to Google the terms as indicated. I am not obsessive, albeit I find Sheldon in “The Big Bang Theory” rather vague and not detailed in his comments. However I would like to clarify as to the exact Boolean logic I should use. Further you did not indicate which browser I should use and what level of safety I should set IE to if I chose to use that.
            I found a video indicating the prompt arrival of paramedics. If one lives in Booligal, I suspect that it may take longer than indicated unless the paramedics can be teleported through the NBN. Please advise.
            If in Sydney, the paramedics would take much longer than indicated because even after their previous patients have been admitted into hospital, they may have to traverse the M2 or M3. If in peak hour, this would mean that they would travel at about 20 kph.

          • Herein lies the problem.

            The so called “open minded” sceptics scoff or ask for examples, receive info contrary to their claims but then are simply not willing or equipped to comprehend the possibilities.

            Nice approach, simply dismiss anything which doesn’t fit within the square. I bet those e-mails still have you marvelling.

            I think like a few others here, “Happy Days” may be more your thing than the “Big Bang Theory”, Phil. Thanks for adding your name to the list of, really not imterested just here on a mission.

  45. Why do we need that much speed anyway wireless is the way of the future, fiber is already obsolete. Infact why do we build things at all? the future is here and now, i’m looking forward to slaying this Great White Elephant come follow me to the next election we’ll get the job done.

  46. It’s pointless interviewing Tony Abbott as nothing that comes out of his mouth means anything unless it was first written down, he called himself a liar on that famous 730 report with Kerry.

  47. This just a infomercial for the Liberal Party. Just keep saying the same old BS Tony and some will believe you. Sadly this is the level of debate in this country.

  48. Hey elephant, ‘wireless’ needs fibre!

    The only argument Libs have is if it needs to be fibre to the home in chich case tehy all agree new resisdences should get fibre and not copper!

    Lol, the hypocrisy is simply unsustainable: IT’S ALL ABOUT MOMENTUM!!

    IN OTHER WORDS: YOU CAN’T STOP PROGRESS EVEN IF YOU ARE A BITTER CONSERVATIVE WHO ACTUALLY LOVES FTTH BUT HAVE TO PRETEND IN FRONT OF DAD THAT YOU HATE IT AND… OH, IT MUST BE SO CONFUSING TO BE A LIBERAL VOTER THESE DAYS AND ACTUALLY WANT TO EMBRACE THE LUCKINESS OF THE LUCKY COUNTRY THAT IS BUILDING CHINA WITHOUT ,UM, EMBRACING THE LUCKINESS!!

    LOL, JUST SO LOL!! ~8^&’///,<

  49. I dont understand how Abbott can continually make such stupid claims… surely there is someone working for the shaddow communications minister who can tell him what and idiot he is being.

    Its one thing to have a competition of ideas, it another to mislead people over and over again.(and lets be fair, its not the first time they’ve made these claims.)

    • To be fair on Abbott, he normally does leave commenting on the NBN in any detail to Turnbull. However, as with Conroy, if you ask him the right question at the right time, you can depend on Abbott to give an amusingly incorrect response ;)

  50. I can’t believe the political theme through the comments.
    I’d call my self a Liberal voter. That’s beside the point.
    Even if the Libs were proposing the NBN I’d be against it.
    Too much talk above about the technology and politics.

    We need to keep up with technology no doubt, but not for the sake of it at this cost.

    Pensioners living on the poverty line.
    No public dental care (Medicare ok for any body part except teeth? WTF)
    Hospital waiting lists getting longer.

    How happy would you be as a taxpayer if given a $2500 bill for the NBN this year and then had to pay for access after your copper service is taken away. Or to pay $200 a year to cover the interest bill in the infrastructure cost.

    Meanwhile ‘we’ as taxpayers are in debt again to the tune of thousands each.
    Sure the Libs might have cut too much spending. But I’d rather be in a better position as a taxpayer than about $16,000 in debt and the NBN pushing it to nearly $20k!

    http://www.debtclock.com.au/

    Very scary.
    Good time to slow down the spending a bit?

    • I find it ironic that you say there is to much talk about politics and then your comment is purely political in nature.

      So let get this straight, you find the fact that taxpayers are in debt to the tune of $20K per capita scary. Well, the idea of getting a $300K mortgage between a couple ($150K each) must keep you up at night shaking!

      If you’re going to talk about debt, why don’t you talk about the ability to service the debt not the fact the government has any. For the record, the NBN is designed to make a return, i.e. it is deigned to service its debt. The issue of if it will is one up for contention, however, but that is beside the point.

      Don’t insult our intelligence with misnomers like the old $2500K per taxpayer line. It’s a ten year project. You don’t instantly have debt to the tune of the project cost from day one, so you won’t have to pay the interest on the entire project cost from day one, only what debt you have procured so far.

      So, do you want to rephrase your criticisms of the NBN to actually reflect the situation? Don’t worry, if you don’t, someone will most definitely reply to this post with an attempt at it, because they think I am trying to completely discredit your position.

      • I’m sorry NightKaos but I fail to see how my comment is politcal. Certainly not intended to be. I thought my comment was purely about priorities as taxpayers. We have to pay for everything and like my choice to the size of my mortagage I control the level of personal debt I have. Yes, I do find it scary, but I’m not paying rent and I have little problem meeting the serviceabilty of paying that debt. I find the debt for every taxpayer in this country a worry including the ability to repay it which seems to be getting more dificult.
        I won’t get started on debating the NBN making a return as enough has been said there and it won’t acheive anything. My point is that ‘we’ as taxpayers have bigger problems than the NBN to fund.
        I don’t see how posing the question that $2500 is insulting anyones intelligence?
        Would you be happy to write a $250 cheque yourself for the next ten years then? Then pay the monthlyservice fee on top of that. This is a massive financial burden.

        I don’t know how to rephrase it any simpler. Seems to me alot of people here are very pro NBN without the concern of ‘our’ position as taxpayers.
        As for your last sentence. Are you trolling? Now I think your insulting my intelligence.

        • I’m sorry NightKaos but I fail to see how my comment is politcal. Certainly not intended to be. I thought my comment was purely about priorities as taxpayers.

          You can’t see how discussing priorities as taxpayers is political? You are asserting your position as to what priorities you think government funding should have. That is the very definition of a political statement.

          Also why is it no one can seem to spell my name correctly?

          We have to pay for everything and like my choice to the size of my mortagage I control the level of personal debt I have. Yes, I do find it scary, but I’m not paying rent and I have little problem meeting the serviceabilty of paying that debt. I find the debt for every taxpayer in this country a worry including the ability to repay it which seems to be getting more dificult.

          My point was when you look at debt you need to look at the ability of the entity taking on the debt being able to actually service the debt, not how much they have. Our debt is one of the lowest in the OECD as a percentage of GDP, which should tell you something about our ability to pay it off.

          My point is that ‘we’ as taxpayers have bigger problems than the NBN to fund.

          Which is the very definition of a political position. I’m sorry, but as deteego has pointed out, separating the NBN from politics is not possible.

          I don’t see how posing the question that $2500 is insulting anyones intelligence?
          Would you be happy to write a $250 cheque yourself for the next ten years then? Then pay the monthlyservice fee on top of that. This is a massive financial burden.

          Okay, the problem is that the debt accumulated by the NBN is going to paid off the by revenues of the NBN, which is why the project is off-budget. So, actually, you are insulting our intelligence here, because we don’t need to pay $250 for the next ten years. We’ll only have to pay an amount on top of the service fees if the government decides to bail the NBN out of it’s debt, and even if that does happen, that will not come to the full amount now will it?

          So more accurately, what you are doing is taking out a loan for about $250 a year, and then increasing that loan by $250 a year, but paying off that debt, in the form of your monthly service fee. Follow? Good.

          I don’t know how to rephrase it any simpler. Seems to me alot of people here are very pro NBN without the concern of ‘our’ position as taxpayers.

          I’m not concerned with you rephrasing it simpler, I’m concerned with you rephrasing it correctly, which you have failed to do twice.

          As for your last sentence. Are you trolling? Now I think your insulting my intelligence.

          That last sentence was just to indicate that if you didn’t reply someone else probably will if the object to my statements strongly enough. I meant exactly what I said by it.

          • You can’t see how discussing priorities as taxpayers is political? You are asserting your position as to what priorities you think government funding should have. That is the very definition of a political statement.

            OK. As I said. Certainly not meant to be politcal. Leave politics out of it. Purely on ‘practicalities’ of NBN.

            Also why is it no one can seem to spell my name correctly?

            Too many days watching Get Smart?!

            My point was when you look at debt you need to look at the ability of the entity taking on the debt being able to actually service the debt, not how much they have. Our debt is one of the lowest in the OECD as a percentage of GDP, which should tell you something about our ability to pay it off.

            I agree. However just because our ratio is one of the best doesn’t mean it’s ok. Some debt can be good. If used for the right reasons. NBN? I’m not so sure and yet to be convinced.
            The total government debt and non funded liabilities like govt super is getting massive.
            How do we pay off all the liabilities without making some sacrifices in capital spending?
            The serviceability is a problem, which is one thing, paying it off for the next rainy day(GFC etc) is another.
            Say about $350bil of revenue which is all spent each year give or take a few bil$ no matter who runs the budget. Spare 1 – 2 %, say $5bil and it’s 30yrs of good times before the debts paid off at best?
            Certainly not going to happen? Just the interest bill is about 3% of govt revenue?
            To compare the NBN, p.a would be say about 1% of the govt revenue in Aust for just one project upgrade!

            Which is the very definition of a political position. I’m sorry, but as deteego has pointed out, separating the NBN from politics is not possible.

            I agree that politics can’t be removed totally if that is where you want to take the debate. Is it not possible to purely talk about the ‘value’ in going ahead or not with the full roll out?

            Okay, the problem is that the debt accumulated by the NBN is going to paid off the by revenues of the NBN, which is why the project is off-budget. So, actually, you are insulting our intelligence here, because we don’t need to pay $250 for the next ten years. We’ll only have to pay an amount on top of the service fees if the government decides to bail the NBN out of it’s debt, and even if that does happen, that will not come to the full amount now will it?

            My understanding is the private sector can’t/won’t fund a full roll out across the country as it is not economic. I don’t understand how it can be ignored that no matter if the funding is from bonds, fully funded in budget, public/private funded, Australians will be paying twice. Once directly for service and indirectly at some stage.

            So more accurately, what you are doing is taking out a loan for about $250 a year, and then increasing that loan by $250 a year, but paying off that debt, in the form of your monthly service fee. Follow? Good.

            I Follow. I’m trying to understand how the whole package can be justified rather than upgrades over time.
            The problem I see is the cost of full roll out is more like $250 in interest alone p.a.per taxpayer. Then the debt has to be repaid ( service fees and/or taxpayer) and/or the NBN sold off. While the existing infrastructure suits alot of service needs and is being removed from access.

            I’m not concerned with you rephrasing it simpler, I’m concerned with you rephrasing it correctly, which you have failed to do twice.

            Ok. So what is incorrect about posing the theory that the NBN is over capitilasing with taxpayer backing?
            What is incorrect about the fact that we have other problems/priotities such as hospital waiting lists etc?
            What is incorrect about taxpayers directly or indirectly funding the NBN wether economically viable or not?
            What is incorrect about public debt becoming a problem? PIGS, USA etc, Good times can’t go forever.
            Full roll out to me doesn’t add up.

            SMEMatt

            There is one sure fire way to ensure the tax payer does pay for the NBN. Cancel the project after all the money has been spent on trials and prep work but before the bulk of the project has been built. At the moment the bulk of money spent has been development work which is worth very little in the sale of the NBNco until it is realised into actual infrastructure.

            Correct. Too late now to pull the pin on work started. Do we need to continue with full roll out though. Why not renew as part of maintenance/repairs and new estates etc.
            Maybe not a good example, but…Isn’t it sort of like ripping up all the roads instead of just the old ones needing maintenance because a new technology low maintenace surface is available?

          • OK. As I said. Certainly not meant to be politcal. Leave politics out of it. Purely on ‘practicalities’ of NBN.

            The “practicalities” of the NBN is a political issue.

            I agree. However just because our ratio is one of the best doesn’t mean it’s ok. Some debt can be good. If used for the right reasons. NBN? I’m not so sure and yet to be convinced.

            Well so far your criticisms haven’t actually discussed the usefulness of and reasons for the NBN, only the ability to pay. In that you have had a lot of incorrect assumption. So, once we deal with those, what do you need to convince you that the NBN is a viable project? If like some people here the answer to that question is “nothing” then stop wasting my time.

            The total government debt and non funded liabilities like govt super is getting massive.
            How do we pay off all the liabilities without making some sacrifices in capital spending?
            The serviceability is a problem, which is one thing, paying it off for the next rainy day(GFC etc) is another.
            Say about $350bil of revenue which is all spent each year give or take a few bil$ no matter who runs the budget. Spare 1 – 2 %, say $5bil and it’s 30yrs of good times before the debts paid off at best?
            Certainly not going to happen? Just the interest bill is about 3% of govt revenue?
            To compare the NBN, p.a would be say about 1% of the govt revenue in Aust for just one project upgrade!

            So all of the customers who sign up for the service don’t help pay back the part of the debt? Your figures are all on the assumption that the project is going to be a complete and utter failure, with 0% take-up rates. This is far from accurate considering that all fixed-line customers are being migrated.

            I agree that politics can’t be removed totally if that is where you want to take the debate. Is it not possible to purely talk about the ‘value’ in going ahead or not with the full roll out?

            The problem is that discussing the value of going ahead with the project is a political discussion. You are weighing up the pros, cons, and risks of the project. How can you not see that?

            My understanding is the private sector can’t/won’t fund a full roll out across the country as it is not economic. I don’t understand how it can be ignored that no matter if the funding is from bonds, fully funded in budget, public/private funded, Australians will be paying twice. Once directly for service and indirectly at some stage.

            You do realize that the alternative, a government subsidy, is just the government throwing money at the problem with no requirement for the companies involved repaying? So if the NBN requires an injection as you are asserting, it’s no different to the subsidy the Coalition are considering providing for their project.

            I Follow. I’m trying to understand how the whole package can be justified rather than upgrades over time.

            The justification doesn’t come down to “can the government pay for it” it comes down to “is there enough demand to pay for it.” I am trying to point out the difference to you.

            The problem I see is the cost of full roll out is more like $250 in interest alone p.a.per taxpayer. Then the debt has to be repaid ( service fees and/or taxpayer) and/or the NBN sold off. While the existing infrastructure suits alot of service needs and is being removed from access.

            And what? Do you complain when a company stops manufacturing and old model of car and replaces it, despite the fact the older models were fine? Did you complain when your phone company turns off the old 2G mobile network, despite the fact that old network was still perfectly adequate in providing phone and texting services?

            These upgrades cost the companies in question billions of dollars to do, and, practically in the second case, caused them to dismantle a multi-billion dollar investment they are replacing. The NBN still meets all the same service requirements of the old network, by design, with some added (optional) extras.

            Ok. So what is incorrect about posing the theory that the NBN is over capitilasing with taxpayer backing?

            That is a strawman. That is not what you were saying before, nor what I was responding to. You were saying that the taxpayers have to pay for the project, which is incorrect because it is an off-budget project.

            What is incorrect about the fact that we have other problems/priotities such as hospital waiting lists etc?

            You’ll note I didn’t respond to that particular aspect of your original post. Since you went there however, the health-reform project the government has undertook isn’t an attempt to address these issues?

            What is incorrect about taxpayers directly or indirectly funding the NBN wether economically viable or not?

            Seriously! I have covered this. It is an off-budget project. The taxpayers don’t fund the project. The project funds itself. The taxpayers will only have to fund the project if it turns out it is not sustainable, and even then it will likely be an injection much less than the full amount of the project.

            What is incorrect about public debt becoming a problem? PIGS, USA etc, Good times can’t go forever.

            I refer you to your own statement: Some debt can be good. If used for the right reasons.

            Full roll out to me doesn’t add up.

            Well, lets get the facts straight about how the NBN is being paid for first, then we can discuss the merits of the project. Misinfromation, like the taxpayers having to foot the bill and then pay for the service on top doesn’t help you make properly informed decisions, which is my point.

            Correct. Too late now to pull the pin on work started. Do we need to continue with full roll out though. Why not renew as part of maintenance/repairs and new estates etc.
            Maybe not a good example, but…Isn’t it sort of like ripping up all the roads instead of just the old ones needing maintenance because a new technology low maintenace surface is available?

            And if it comes down to that at the 2013 election, then fine. But before you make your decision in regards to that election, why don’t you actually get your facts straight?

          • I don’t doubt the NBN would be useful or some people & business would use its capabilities.
            I would like to see some reasoned debate that the cost of full roll out can be justified given the degree of need for the technology against other problems facing us or reducing our current debt levels.
            Ifyou feel I’m wasting your time then you can chose not to reply. Plenty of people on the net already doing that.
            Why not some very broad figures as I have tried to justify myself. I would be interested.

            Making some very broad assumptions. I’ll assume even with 100% take up with forced transfer off copper, it is still a big burden. Say 10mil users accounts on the completed network to cover the finance bill on a $40 bil network at say 7.5% to cover interest is $3bil = $300p.a or $25 a month.
            Then factor maintenance, rent to telstra (for existing pits, conduit, terminals, infrastructure, etc), repaying capital cost, management of wholesale services etc etc
            Can’t see it adding up without taxpayers coverning it.

            It makes no difference which politcal party is at the helm. I can’t see the justification. Private sector don’t want to do it alone for a reason.

            A government subsidy (whichever party, can we leave that out) is a rediculous alternative. I never thought I asserted that. Merely pointed out that the taxpayers eventually will be going to have to foot the bill as NBN Co can’t meet cost of capital for full roll out.

            I can’t see the demand to pay for it let alone government needing to pay for it given other demands on taxpayer revenue.

            I’m sorry but to relate to old cars is rediculous. Business and consumers dictate the product market. Full scale roll out is forcing the market with govt/taxpayer backing.
            My problem is for the expense, the ‘some added (optional) extras’ is too big a bill to justify for full scale roll out. Ask some country residents what they thought of the closure of the old anolog mobile network.

            You keep saying off budget. It makes no difference to the ultimate liability of us, the taxpayer.

            I used health and those examples of bigger problems facing us needing funding, not wanting to debate every issue.

            Seriously!…… “The project funds itself. The taxpayers will only have to fund the project if it turns out it is not sustainable”

            So you answered that yourself. Taxpayers foot the bill. We shouldn’t even be put in a position of having to inject anything.

            I understand where you’re coming from, but the financial business case to me doesn’t add up without the forced closure of an existing network that suits a significant proportion of the population. As you even mention, previous mobile spectrums for example. It is the combined govt backing and/or potential burden along with service fees on a new network for people who didn’t need or want it.
            What part of taxpers footing the bill and paying for service is incorrect. We are footing the bill now, and will be paying for service are we not?

            As I stated from the start, I don’t want to debate politics. Both parties in my opinion are out of touch. So lets not go there.
            I am trying to get my facts straight, so thanks for the insight. I still don’t see how you can ‘shoot me down’ when the taxpayer still has to cover the build in capital funding and subsciption. I see your side but if Telstra struggles to make a decent return now on a larger lot of assets of full network copper, wireless, mobile assets etc etc worth say at least the same $40 bil, how will NBN cover itself purely as a wholesaler without help on $40 bil invested?

        • Would you be happy to write a $250 cheque yourself for the next ten years then? Then pay the monthlyservice fee on top of that. This is a massive financial burden.

          I’m sorry but this and you’re previous comment (that NK replied to) seem to indicate that the taxpayer will be directly paying for the installation of the NBN on top of whatever access fees they pay, you do realise the NBN is part of the Federal budget right?

          • Tezz, get your terms right. Also, I already said this. ;)

            FYI if it was on budget the taxpayer would be paying for it via their taxation. It is an off-budget project. Meaning that the government, i.e. the taxpayer does not pay for the project, instead they provide security for the debt.

          • Yeah yeah, the money is coming from government bonds I know so it ‘s not direct from taxes. Either way the implication that the end user will be directly footing the bill is incorrect.

          • ‘Meaning that the government, i.e. the taxpayer does not pay for the project, instead they provide security for the debt.’

            The bonds are not available yet, we are into our second year of the rollout , so how is the NBN staff and all the rollout contractors being paid, with Monopoly money?(deliberate pun!)

          • Seriously? How can you not know this?

            Equity payments from the Commonwealth Government. You must have missed it considering the only comment you made was about how the NBN is going to be the discovery of a new anti-biotic.

            And where does the Commonwealth Government get this equity? They sell bonds.

            For the lazy:

            However, investors who buy Australian government bonds will not know that their money is going towards NBN Co’s fibre-to-the-home project because the government’s financing arm is rolling the infrastructure bonds into its general issuance program.

          • Yes we all know what they intend to do at some point in the future, in the meantime the rollout continues and the sub-contractors and all the staff are paid including the cost of the NBN spin truck err sorry the information truck that will travel to areas ‘explaining’ all about interactive dance mats and how telemedicine that is really Skype over fibre actually works.

          • “The May budget papers state $2.7 billion will be raised this financial year to fund NBN Co’s project”.

            Again, do not pass go, etc.

            But one’s got to love the selective manipulation and secrecy (or if that’s not it, it can only be gullibility or foolishness) of some who oppose the NBN.

            Firstly we had this bloke trying to pass off Doctor’s video conferencing via Skype as Telemedicine (because, well, it was Doctors).

            Then we had another new contender straight out of the same mould, telling us about Carolyn Thornton and her “dial up” telemedicine, to prove we don’t need “megabits of bandwidth”.

            But again, like the first shyster, there’s a catch he was desperately trying to hide too. The Carolyn Thornton telemedicine story was written six years ago and was relating her story, from two years previous, “2004”.

            Which leads me to this phrase from Dan Abrams – I’m not going to let people get away with either a dishonest or inaccurate premise to what we’re talking about because I think that does the viewer a disturbance.

          • Did you even read the articles in question? Where is your evidence that there were no government bonds for sale over the last 9 months or that the ones that were weren’t used to inject funding in the NBN? The bonds in question aren’t going to be labeled “NBN bonds”.

          • While some of the bonds may be rolled into the general issuance program, my understanding was that the Government was going to allow people to directly buy NBN bonds as well — I’ll be disappointed if that’s not the case.

          • There is one sure fire way to ensure the tax payer does pay for the NBN. Cancel the project after all the money has been spent on trials and prep work but before the bulk of the project has been built. At the moment the bulk of money spent has been development work which is worth very little in the sale of the NBNco until it is realised into actual infrastructure.

          • this is actually my biggest concern. it would be the single fastest way to ensure a massive waste of funds – that after having done all the prep work the project then gets cut off at the knees by a putative lib government hell bent on their wrecker credentials. so far its costed a significant amount to do the Telstra deal, theres been significant amounts sunk in producing the stuff ACCC has required and theres been some spent on tendering processes. at the very least none of that is recoverable and theres probably a lot more that i havent considered. the biggest downside i see to any major change in NBN policy at this point – regardless of which party is responsible – is the waste it will incur.

          • Agree.
            Does it have to be full roll out with all the expense?
            That’s where I can’t see value. There’s a reason why teh mobile phone network doesn’t have 100% coverage. NBN is no different. Where do we draw the line at $. $40bil is too much fro me.

          • Of course it doesn’t, but I’ve noticed a lot of people seem to think it has to be “all or nothing”, or more precisely “97% or nothing” when it comes to the NBN.

          • That’s what the Implementation study looked at. It was a look at what we can build for $40billion or whatever but how much FTP we should build before cost per premises begins to climb more rapidly, 93% was the total reached there was also lower break point I can’t remember what that percentage is off the top of my head. This study is reason why the FTP coverage goal was increased after the initial announcement. 97% was the breakpoint for fixed wireless.

            So it wasn’t what can we get for $xbillion, it was what percentage of premises can we cover without a sharp climb in the price per new premise connected.

          • the break point for going from being serviced by fibre to fixed wireless was initially going to be 90% – as you say the study saw it possible to extend that to 93% for the same funding.

            and personally i see the full rollout in the first instance as preferable to spending for a shortlived FTTN and then spending again to get essentially the same finished product. one of the two paths spends only once, the other spends twice. beyond that i have serious reservations about the estimate for cost of a FTTN build with regard for cut copper ‘just compensation’. 40 bil ‘looks’ too much until you realise just how complicated and how much cost is woven into the competing proposal. for the size of the nation, size of the network and the abilities it gives, the expected life and bandwidth headroom available in the network that will be suitable for consumer use without upgrade for a lot longer than FTTN – 40 bn is actually a fair price to pay.

            even if i thought (at worst case) it was going to have absolutely zero social benefits or other economic spillover benefits from a new network, on a cost for return basis i think straight to FTTP is the way to go. thing is i think there WILL be other benefits that will feed back though – and on that basis as well as cost for return i am comfortable with the level of maximum governmental spend. assuming 0% gets paid back and the entirety requires support is worst case thinking and i dont expect that to happen either.

            so what we are talking about, if you dont believe those two worst case scenes, is that there isnt even the possibility of the govt losing ’40 bn’ with its policy, even if it did pay up all the cash upfront – which it has and will not. realistically the best you can put that argument is ‘what portion’ of that 40bn is not going to get paid back. i dont know how much of TAs FTTN plan would be paid back to the govt, as an aside, but i know alain believes the FTTP plan wont turn a red cent and cost the govt for the lot. i simply dont see that as credible, and while they wont be open market return figures i do believe the govt will be paid back to the point that this whole nonsense of ‘we cant afford 40 bn’ will be seen for the scare talk that it really is. in a worst case scenario the govt will take on some of that cost but it certainly wont be to the tune of ’40bn’.

          • I can tell you alain, it is difficult to say oh dear out loud whilst guffawing.

            Do not pass go, do not collect $200 (deliberate pun).

            Gold.

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