blog So today is the day we’ve all been waiting for. The day when the Coalition finally releases its rival telecommunications policy to go up against Labor’s flagship National Broadband Network project. Sadly, so far we still don’t have the actual policy documents which detail the Coalition’s plans; they’ll (presumably) be released later today. What we do have is a series of limited leaks and briefings to conservative newspapers on the part of the Coalition, detailing that, as expected, the policy will require a little less capital to enact than Labor’s NBN and will focus (what else?) on fibre to the node technologies to replace much of Telstra’s copper. The Financial Review probably has the most detailed rundown (we recommend you click here for the full article). It reports:
“Under the Coalition’s plan, all Australians would have access to speeds of at least 25 megabits per second by 2016 … Under the plan, about 70 per cent, or roughly 9 million homes, would get “fibre-to-node” broadband by 2019.”
There’s also similar articles at the Daily Telegraph and The Australian, and Shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull was also on ABC AM radio this morning. For those who’ll be following the nes throughout the day, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott and Turnbull will be holding a joint press conference at 11 (we’ll be there); plus there’s a second technology journalist-specific teleconference with Turnbull later this afternoon. Let me know any questions you have and I’ll endeavour to put them to the Member for Wentworth at least. Delimiter’s approach today will simply be to report the news and let readers debate the issues. We’ll follow up with opinion/analysis later in the week and next week as the whole picture of the Coalition’s policy becomes clear.
Sooooooo. One in three Australian households won’t have fixed line fttn broadband under the coalition plan. What a vote winner!
And the coalition wants to spend $29.4 billion to give us last decade’s DSL technology — 78% of the money that the government’s investing to build the real (fibre) NBN. Again, what a vote winner!
Actually the Govt kicked in $27b, the remaining $16b is private.
I wonder if the Coalition plan is also co-funded?
More importantly, does the Coalition plan have cost recovery like Labors?
If not, it’s a lot more expensive…
Sent to you on twitter but a Question
could you find out the minimum upload speed under the coalition plan?
Thanks
iirc it’s 5mbps UL if you live next to the Node.
They gave a minimum for download we need the same for uploads 5 is really not good enough for much unless hugly compressed
exactly, MT please explain how a Graphic Artist working from home will be able to get better performance from FTTN that say FTTP on a 100/40 plan?
Oh he wont get better performance? Ok we’ll pass on your lame plan then!
Turnbull was on ABC702 this morning and was asked this exact question (down to the graphic artist example), he said that some premises would be FTTP in greenfields because the cost of running last mile fibre wasn’t that different to last mile copper. For brownfields folks who need it the cost of upgrading the last mile to FTTP would be a few thousand dollars and a business expense (meaning it’d be tax deductible etc)
The question is what is the minimum upload for FttN?
The reason for this is the big change in the next 10 years is cloud computing which will require much higher uploads these speeds will be needed by everyone.
I will buy my Government subsidised FttH and will get everyone I know to do the same and look to offer my family services over the network not possible over FttN and allowing them to save a lot of money long term.
So, what you’re saying is…. He ignored the question asked? Okay, glad we got that sorted.
” … we need the same for uploads 5 is really not good enough for much unless hugely compressed … ”
I agree totally. That’s why I’m still amazed that the fatest speed option of the crap Telstra FTTP implementation at South Brisbane tops out at about 5MBps upload.
Hey Renai, please ask Turnbull if he thinks we’ll ever get another chance to build an NBN? If not and we only get one shot at this, then why not implement the best solution?
Also how did he arrive at his passion on FTTP vs FTTN, it seems that those who are across the NBN debate overwhelmingly support FTTN, so what evidence did he use to suggest that FTTP was a better route?
Did the coalition ever consider implementing FTTN and finding efficiencies in the build to save $$ rather than implement a slower solution?
Does Turnbull really believe that voters will be influenced by a difference of 2 years in the end date?
I think Turnbull is pitching this at those who want it fast and want it now without looking at the quality of what will be delivered.
That demographic is not those who read Delimiter, but we know of that demographic and how the tech industry responds to them.
Err, I think you have FTTN & FTTP/FTTH around the wrong way… ;-)
> Hey Renai, please ask Turnbull if he thinks we’ll ever get another chance to build an NBN? If not and we only get one shot at this, then why not implement the best solution?
First you have to define what metrics you are using to define the “best solution”. If it is purely technical excellence, then PON is not the “best solution”, direct fibre is.
I’m still bemused that Google can implement direct fibre model so much cheaper that we can do PON.
So far the information we do have presents more questions than answers. I have pushed a few to the aether on Twitter.
I’m going to reserve commenting further until I actually have read the policy document. Maybe that’ll answer them.
I will say this: On the face of it the Coalition appear to have a better policy, but the moment we dig a little to many question pop up, first and foremost the $90b claim.
How is this regressive nonsense a policy, let alone a better one.
This appears to be a shovel money to Telstra from the public purse policy.
Seriously?
That was actually a criticism of the Coalition. A policy document should answer more questions than it presents. Now, if, and I stress that I too think this is unlikely, the current ALP will cost $90b, and Turnbull can deliver the promised minimum of 25Mbps, which policy would you back?
I would back the Coalition. But unfortunately everyone here is skeptical enough to look beyond the cliff notes, so as the saying goes if it looks to good to be true it probably is.
Sadly I think we’re the exception rather than the rule, so you need to aware, and that’s why I highlighted it, that until we have some hard evidence to disprove the Coalition, we’re facing a policy that looks a lot more favourable to the general public.
You can invent any large number to make a smaller number look better.
If the $90 billion wasn’t in print yesterday, we’d be looking at two competing solutions, with vastly different outcomes for what will effectively be a similar spend. How that’s a better policy beats me.
We need more detail to draw factually accurate conclusions, but using $90 billion to justify $23 billion as being cheap is simply ridiculous.
So if the coalition completes a cost-benifit analysis and it proves that FTTP is the better option, does that mean they will change their policy and move toward that?
How long will that process take?
Their cost-benifit analysis will have its scope set to ensure FTTN s cheaper, I don’t believe the ‘Coal’ition* is looking past about 2020 from the news reports I read nothing longer term was mentioned.
It is quite possible in this short term FTTN would be cheaper as it doesn’t include the long term maintenance of the copper.
*: Coal as in coal powered i.e. old fashioned
Question: A connection to BT’s FttN network, on which the coalition’s policy is modelled, costs 40% more than ADSL. Will this hold true in Australia?
So from what I heard on ABC’s AM this morning, the further you get away from the node the slower you will be, BUT no one will be under 25mbps in speed.
Turnbull then stated it will be all most people need.
The way I see it, this plan will spend $29B and we will be back at this point in say, 10 years time. The lack of vision in the alternative is disappointing to say the least.
I think the 25Mb minimum will be Satellite – sneaky but actually correct that thanks to the current NBN, the LNP will be able to offer 25Mb to all Australians by 2016.
All Australians? While the satellite does cover all of Australia I was under the impression there is nowhere near enough capacity for 100% (or even 10-20%) of Australians?
As soon as you go over 500m it drop off a lot
http://nbnmyths.wordpress.com/why-not-fttn/
Which leads to the question: How many cabinets will be required to cover all those little 1Km areas covering even the most populated bits of Australia?
What a complete joke! Building a network that will be obsolete by the time it’s finished. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such lack of thought for future progress in a technology policy. Spend the extra two years building FTTP and you avoid having to re-build an entire network not long after you complete your FTTN network.
Would you rather have a second-rate network limited to 25Mbps with no hope of usable upload speeds, or a future-proof network capable of 1Gbps+ in the near future? All that for a measly $17bn.
Renai, if you could ask how he will guarantee 25/5 (I assume it is 5 up)?
* Will the FTTN be capable of on demand FTTP upgrades?
* Will he commit to remediate the copper to ensure 25/5?
* What happens if a service that qualified at 25/5 deteriorates over time, will they remediate to bring back up to 25/5?
* Does it make economic sense to remediate copper tail or upgrade to FTTP if works need to be carried out?
* How long does he think that 25/5 will serve the country? When will they need to start a FTTP upgrade program and who will pay for it?
* What technology will be deployed in FTTN? VDSL2? Bonding? Vectoring? Which profiles?
I live on the side of a hill and still get dodgy connections when it’s raining. Is he going to upgrade everyone’s copper line? If not, I don’t see how he could get anywhere near what he’s claiming.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BHXU6swCQAEcn7s.jpg:large
25-50Mbps speeds before 2016 and up to 100Mbps by 2019!
At this rate he’ll be putting node cabinets outside each house…. *facepalm*
This +10000
*Groans* More BS from the LNP!!!
Considering NBN Co are having trouble training up enuf Fibre Splicers, how in hell do the LNP think they’ll be able to get enuf fibre splicers and train up even more folk in the dead art of copper pillar migrations???
Those Telstra techs with the copper pillar management skills are mostly retired now and there arent that many required to maintain the PSTN in its current shoddy state!
That’s simple – even more 457 visas.
This policy is not actually ever going to be put in place, it’s simply a stalking horse against the NBN.
It’s job is to blunt an area that is popular for Labor – nothing more.
It’s realpolitik, dirty and simple, any other view of it will prove naive on future reflection.
I’m sure the labour could also finish their NBN by 2019 at 75% of the cost if they only covered 70% of houses. I don’t see the value here.
That’s an amazingly good point. They are covering less premises, with an inferior service, and not saving any money or time at all.
This point you raised needs more media attention. It’s spot on.
nice summation, I’ve pinched it and posted it on my FB page :)
don’t forget they’re doing those smaller number of premises 1 whole year quicker too.
Renai, i think if you only get one question to put to the turnbull, it should be on this topic.
So what is there plans for this 20% of premises? Expanding the LTE Wireless from 4% to 24%?
Does anyone know what this 20% would actually be – I suspect they are just going to do major cities, and screw over the small to large regional areas. Grow some balls National Party and stand up for your regional constituents!
I imagine they would be premises currently connected to HFC and existing NBN fibre
Looks like @mwyres was right about the $90bn!
“Our approach is likely to save about $60 billion to taxpayers,”
I have two questions for Turnbull:
What will the rate of return to the taxpayer be for the Coalition NBN be vs the Labor NBN?
Under the Coalition NBN plan what will the timeframe be for NBN Co to pay off it’s debt vs the Labor NBN?
Ask Turnbull to confirm that, under the Coalition’s “plan”, all those apartment dwellers in HFC areas (including many in his Wentworth constituency) will be marooned indefinitely on ADSL.
motioned seconded
To add
Please tell if any of you can see Telstra delivering an message to the Coalition Government that will now be require an additional of purchase of decaying copper network for e.g. $20 Billion Dollars? on top of the $11 Billion it is ready getting!
I think it is a very good time buy shares in Telstra? – a very large pay day about arrive in September!
Question:
1. If the copper does not meet the speed requirements of FTTN or degrades over time, who will be responsible for replacing it? NBN Co? Telstra? Who will determine if the quality of the connection is good enough? And would it be replaced with more copper or a FTTP connection at user cost?
Could you please ask how they can justify keeping their NBN plan off-budget after so many statements against the current NBN being off-budget?
[em]”The policy document confirms that government funding for the Coalition’s NBN will remain off-budget, despite fierce objections to the financial structure of the project by its own MPs.”[/em]
Off budget is where it should be, if it remains an investment.
The problem has never been an accounting one, it’s the typical egotistical blather from politicians whom reverse there decision when they actually realise they have to pay for shit.
That it makes a mockery of the LNP statements, and FTTN champions, is beside the point, clearly. :)
I completely agree Brendan, I just wanted to point out the hypocrisy of the coalition. After years of saying that cancelling the NBN can build more schools and roads they want to fund their alternative in the same manner. It boggles the mind that they will get away with it.
Are there any details on how it is an investment? As far as I know, an investment means there is a plan on recouping the costs. While I havent looked at any of the details (yet), that goes completely against how I understood their plan to be rolled out.
TBA I presume.
Turnbull cannot seriously take tax-based non-investment expenditure off budget and expect that to fly.
The policy appears to effectively co-opt the Labor derived NBNco project, switch technology to FttN and reduced the footprint.
It will be easier for him to cop a bit of flak for having off budget, than to face the consequences of a budget deficit due to the NBN.
How does providing a 50% subsidy for persons wanting to upgrade from Copper to the home to Fibre to the home represent value for taxpayers?
How is Turnbull funding his policy? What is the upgrade path to FTTH – currently suggests user pays?
Nearly the same price, for roughly a third of the network over NBNco’s footprint; the $90 billion garbage in print yesterday was more of the thought-bubble “could cost” shenanigans and is clearly aimed to make $23 billion seem cheap.
1/3 of the network (in many different senses) for about the same spend. Sounds like a bargain to me, right?
I’d like to see more detail, all the same.
I’ll correct myself here, and say that I meant two-thirds. Still an absolute bargain.
Originally Malcolm said their plan would cost less than 20 didn’t he? Or was that back when they claimed having wireless for all even metro was the answer
So 29 for FttN and then how much more in 10 years to connect thosee homes to the house? Sending workers back out and redigging sites is going to cost more than doing it once
I think he said a while back he had a “fully costed” plan that was ~$15B
Renai, I am sure you are planning to ask him anyway, but can you ask
a) About the cost of upgrading FTTN to FTTP
b) Whether people who pay to get fibre early at 50% of the cost will be reimbursed when the upgrade to FTTP is done
c) What will happen to the powered cabinets once FTTP has been implemented
By my calculation, $29.4B / 70% = $0.42B per %
The NBN aims to cover 93% of homes with FTTP, so 93 * $0.42B = $39.06, which is about the amount of money NBNCO claims they will spend on FTTP, fixed wireless and satellite combined.
So the coalition plan delivers an inferior product for more money
Paul
So…
Turnbull is proposing that he cover 70% of the population instead of 93%. (75.25% as much coverage)
He is proposing that it will cost 29.4B instead of 37.4B. (78.61% as much cost)
Reducing the coverage by 24.75% to reduce cost by 21.39%? Even if he wasn’t proposing using a hideously inferior technology, even if it was still using FTTP, the maths doesn’t add up to making this a good deal.
It only makes sense if you believe the $90b figure that has been touted. Turnbull’s policy doesn’t stand a chance against a well-informed electorate, but with Newscorp on his side he can create whatever truth he likes.
How will they ‘guarantee’ 25mb/s? Will they legislate it as a minimum service level, requiring all suppliers to repair or upgrade services until the 25mb/s target is maintained?
What about the other 30% of Australians?
I thought the LNP were committed to an independent review of the NBN if they gained office? What happened to doing the most fiscally responsible thing? Mr Turnbull has heavily criticised the Govt for deciding on FTTH without adequate review – how is what the LNP doing any different, particularly when it flies in the face of recommendations from almost the whole of the ICT industry?
What is the business case supporting their ‘off budget’ funding model, what are the ROI targets and what assumptions are these based on?
That’s a good one actually, the noalition promised that the first thing they’d do once gaining office is to do a full review on the current NBN and the best way to roll it out (even if it would be as rigged as hell…)
Yet now apparently they have forgotten about that and are just going to go straight ahead with their version which is going to cost a heck of a lot more than they say it will…
Satellite is what they will rely on for 25/5. Thanks current NBN!
They can’t – it doesn’t have the capacity to guarantee services for more synchronous connections than it was designed for, so you can’t just keep adding people to it or you will have the same contention as on mobile broadband (which of course means you don’t have ‘guaranteed’ service levels, you have ‘peak’ or maximum best case).
So there is the questions then:
1. How will you guarantee 25/5 to all Australians by 2016 without FTTN?
2. If Satellite, how do you plan to address the contention with all the additional Australian’s using it – will you deploy more Satellites – is that costed?
Just do me a favour Renai, when you are asking him questions and he inevitably dodges them with polly-want-a-cracker speak (and he will) make sure to push him on those questions repeatedly until he answers them… Easy way to publicly make him look like the hypocritical fool he is…
Lol, have you seen Renai questioning Shantanu Narayen? (adobe CEO)
http://delimiter.com.au/2013/02/14/farce-adobe-ceo-flatly-refuses-australian-price-questions-video/
I do when I get the chance, but Turnbull rarely lets himself get into situations like that — he’ll move to the next question if someone heckles him enough. He’s more skilled in this area than most ;)
Here’s a question I would like you to ask –
Under the coalition plan, will the existing HFC & ADSL services be decommissioned as under the current NBN plan? If not, what impact will this have on the take-up and rate of return for their NBN?
That info is already out there, they won’t be decommissioning the HFC, in fact, people in HFC areas are the ones they are calling “low priority” and may not get the Liberal NBN at all.
Turnbull needs to be asked what the point of his CBA is if he has already specified the outcome. He also needs to be pressed on how much future upgrade to FTTH will cost, and when that will happen.
We also need to know what his guaranteed minimum speeds are going to be over copper, and how he is going to guarantee them.
Thanks Renai
Is he aware that many Cable customers don’t see anywhere near the advertised speeds especially at peak usage times?
It would be a waste of a question, but the tempting one to ask would be…
“Last week you were agreeing with Alan Jones and Ray Hadley that building a wired NBN using fibre optic cable was dumb and that wireless was the future. What caused you to flip-flop and propose building a wired network using fibre optic cable this week?”
Who will pay to maintain the ageing copper network under the coalition plan?
And how have they arrived at a price for the NBN without a contract to gain access to the existing copper network? Have they assumed that the deal already negotiated by NBNCo will grant this access?
Yeah this too.
The current $11B to Telstra only allows access to pits and ducts. The copper still belings to Telstra.
Actually, is Turnbull still calling for a review? A CBA for his plan? Beuller?
i’m expecting their policy release will come with a CBA attached to it.
after all they’ve made it quite clear that any NBN plan should have a CBA done.
wishful thinking, MT dropped the “we need a CBA” line many months ago because he knows his own plan wouldn’t stand up to scrutiny!
Ask him if he is willing to take a lie detector test to state that he truly believes his plan is better….
Who cares how much it costs or what is delivered how does he do what government is supposed to do. How does his policy address the fundamental problem of how we got in the this position in the firsts place. Not once have I heard the Coalition’s talk about this and it just shows they don’t understand the issue or don’t want to admit we are hear because of the past policy failure on the part of the Howard government. All governments make mistakes a bad government covers them up and good government admits to the mistake and tries to fix it and move on.
Mr Turnbull, how can you do a radio interview last week criticising the Govt for the FTTH NBN when ‘wireless broadband is clearly the future’ and then today announce that the LNP policy broadly follows the Govt’s model favouring fixed line services instead of mobile broadband?
Same way that claiming off-budget for the NBN is cooking the books. And then doing so yourself when it’s actually time to pony up a policy.
The issue is, whether Turnbull is seeking a return. If he’s not. Then how can it be off budget?
Also, has anyone asked Telstra if they’re okay with the same $agreement struck with NBNco to provide services over FTTN under the Coalition plan? I know they said they would consider a different mix of technologies, but there’s still the last mile question.
A good question would be, how is he going to protect our connections from;
Water ingress
Power outages
Radio Frequency Interference
Crosstalk
Dodgy joints
Corrosion
As well as incompetent Telstra sub-contractors that wouldn’t know a copper network from their backside, let alone a half fibre one?
Also, considering that the majority of our copper network barely works as it is, how is he going to afford (using our money) to replace the several million copper bundles all across the country that have failed and even Telstra can’t afford to repair today?
This! RFI is a huge problem for me, when I first moved into my house and had an old unshielded phone, I could hear ABC Radio louder on my line than the person I was calling :-/
How much of his $29 billions is to buy the copper assets from Telstra?
Undisclosed.
Either the assumption is the current deal struck with Telstra will cover it, or the comment Telstra has made — “we’d consider a different mix of technologies” means they would offer last mile access under the same deal.
I’m not sure that’s entirely accurate. Pretty sure that statement meant “we’ll talk options, but the $11 billion is still ours, regardless”.
That’s the assumption, T$ won’t want more than what they are being paid now – yeah, good luck with that.
Hey Renai, if you see this before questiontime, can you ask what their justification is for the $90b claim, and what guarantees they have for the same thing to be avoided by them?
One of the key things here is the cost. On the surface, it looks like there is roughly 2/3rds the cost ($29b vs $44b in funding) for roughly 75% coverage (70% vs 93%) of a product that only delivers 80% of the speed (80 Mbps vs 100 Mbps).
Basic maths says that they come out with about the same value, only FttN will need to be upgraded. For those wondering, there are gains in the cost v coverage (basically, cheaper per head), but then lose with the peak speed.
End result is they are about the same in net value BEFORE you look at future costs of upgrading, etc. Just one of many ways to compare the two of course, but it should be enough to question where the benefits are of changing the process.
Considering that the main problem with the current NBN rollout is a “people problem”, ie. they just can’t find enough qualified/trained people to do the rollout as fast as they would like, how does Mr Turnbull propose to solve this problem?
I find it hard to belive that a FTTN rollout won’t run into exactly these same sort of problems as the current FTTP rollout.
Some questions (sorry, no references supplied and probably spelling errors: combination of phone and annoynace :)
Could he clarify the 25mb/s minimum. What is in the fine print, and isn’t this difficult to actually deliver using VDSL2 because inherant unpredactability of copper.
The prediction of $90bn is mainly from a capex blowout to $70bn, What are the assumptions/reasons outlined in the reports for this blowout? Why do these assumptions not match the actual capex expenditure of the NBN rollout so far?
The NBN isn’t just about “fast enough” internet for people, it is also about business growth. NBN Co have estimated that the NBN could deliver real Industry growth and GDP growth. The ICT sector is a huge part of our economy and has been neglected by most previous governments. How does his plan effect industry growth?
Who in the industry has he consulted with?
How is it decided which 30+% miss out on fibre? Is this mostly regional centres who miss out?
Who owns the network at the end?
Is the coalition still claiming he can deliver the network in 1/4 the time? (his announcement seems to contradict this)
Is Turnbull still committed to more honesty in politics?
Well, if the AFR details of the Coalition plan are accurate, it’s a complete dud. 2/3rd the cost for 2/3 the coverage. FTTN which will still need an upgrade to FTTH eventually and only a couple of years shaved off the rollout. I think even the most bias commentators and MSM coverage will have trouble spinning this as a good thing. Though I look foward to the claims of Ergas, etc, that it will certainly blow out to $90B, supported some inappropriate use to cost to date data. He was so accurate on his $200 NBN plans after all ;)
How does Mr Turnbull plan to achieve structural separation of Telstra? Is this even part of his plan?
So there will be 9,000,000 homes with FTTN. They can pay individually to get their home connected to fiber. The estimated costs I have seen are between $2,000 and $5,000 (average of $3,500).
9,000,000 x $3,500 is $31.5 Billion dollars.
Add in his estimated $29.4B and you get a cost of $60.9 Billion dollars to get 70% of the population onto fiber.
How can that make sense to anyone?
So if you believe his $90b claim of yesterday, then its only 66% of the cost, to cover 75% of the population with fibre! Savings!
If you’re scratching your head, the LNP plan aims to hit 70% with FttN, a number which is 75% of the Labor rollouts 93% FttH target. So its costing 66% to connect 75% of the FttH option. If it cost 66% to hit 66%, then it would be cost neutral, but it isnt, its MORE than that, so obviously a good thing.
Right?
Oh crap. {emotion.sarcasm=off}
The only people it makes sense to, are those who do not see the point of high-speed ubiquitous broadband and thus wouldn’t ever dream of spending $2k to upgrade to a network that’s already being built as we speak..
.. this apparently now includes the Wizard of Wentworth.
I don’t really see where Turnbull is coming from at this point; the costs are extremely similar for a vastly different network, to less people, that creates a broadband class-based society all over again; in this case, if you have $2-4k spare you can buy into the fibre club. If not? too bad. No fibre for you.
And no immediate roadmap to if/ when a future LNP lead government would seek to change that.
> I don’t really see where Turnbull is coming from at this point; the costs are extremely similar for a vastly different network, to less people, that creates a broadband class-based society all over again; in this case, if you have $2-4k spare you can buy into the fibre club. If not? too bad. No fibre for you.
It is Labor through their decision to re-introduce speed tiers on the network that will create a broadband class-based society. Which segment of society do you think the 50% on 12/1Mbps will come from?
You need to take a step back and consider that the bits don’t really care if they travel by carrier pigeon, fibre or wireless. It is the throughput, latency and reliability that matter. For the 50% connecting at 12/1Mbps, the Liberal plan is more double the speed for them at less money and sooner.
Considering that wholesale AVC charge is $150/month (e.g. $1,800 year) if the speed is not capped, then the Liberal plan could be a bargain for me, especially when the after tax cost will be half :-).
You need to take a step back and consider that the bits don’t really care if they travel by carrier pigeon, fibre or wireless. It is the throughput, latency and reliability that matter. For the 50% connecting at 12/1Mbps, the Liberal plan is more double the speed for them at less money and sooner.
And quota. You forget the key differentiating point between fixed connections in general and mobile connections, the sole reason why more people used fixed line connections now despite current wireless options being almost equivalent to what they would achieve under ADSL.
Considering that wholesale AVC charge is $150/month (e.g. $1,800 year) if the speed is not capped, then the Liberal plan could be a bargain for me, especially when the after tax cost will be half :-).
That’s only the initial AVC cost for 1Gbps when it is finally released. You do realise they plan to drop the AVC prices over time under the current NBN right? You do realise that they’ll probably completely remove the 12Mbps plan at some point as well? And the 25Mbps one? And then even the 50Mbps one?
Once again, would you please stop focusing on headline speeds for once. That’s not the only metric behind consumer choices or engineering decisions. You even admitted that above, but I don’t think you fully realised the gravity of your own statement.
I don’t get you Mathew, you fall hock, line and sinker for the NBN’s “speed” rhetoric, and then instead of realising that speed isn’t the most important metric and the reason we need an NBN FTTH network, and it never was, you start to criticise the NBN for not giving you your cheap 1Gbps connection.
So what, you think a broken promise that Conroy should have never made is justification for supporting the Liberal policy? Look, just because your house’s taps are leaky does not mean you up and rebuild the entire plumbing system, you replace the faulty taps.
Once I get hold of the policy I will probably end up doing an objective analysis of our options, I strongly suggest you do the same, and when you please remember it’s easier to replace a tap than it is to replace a rusty pipe.
> And quota. You forget the key differentiating point between fixed connections in general and mobile connections, the sole reason why more people used fixed line connections now despite current wireless options being almost equivalent to what they would achieve under ADSL.
Huge quota is not that important to most internet users. Remember the average is under 20GB and there are plenty of people who have 1TB and higher plans.
> That’s only the initial AVC cost for 1Gbps when it is finally released. You do realise they plan to drop the AVC prices over time under the current NBN right? You do realise that they’ll probably completely remove the 12Mbps plan at some point as well? And the 25Mbps one? And then even the 50Mbps one?
If there was any intention of this then there would be at least some indication in the NBNCo Corporate Plan but there is zero evidence.
> Once again, would you please stop focusing on headline speeds for once. That’s not the only metric behind consumer choices or engineering decisions. You even admitted that above, but I don’t think you fully realised the gravity of your own statement.
Except for gamers, latency shouldn’t be a significant issue on any of the solutions being proposed.
> I don’t get you Mathew, you fall hock, line and sinker for the NBN’s “speed” rhetoric, and then instead of realising that speed isn’t the most important metric and the reason we need an NBN FTTH network, and it never was, you start to criticise the NBN for not giving you your cheap 1Gbps connection.
Why do we need a FTTH network if not for the speed that fibre offers? You could argue it is reliability, but the majority of problems I’ve had with my internet connection are builders putting a backhoe through it. Fibre will be broken just as badly :(.
> So what, you think a broken promise that Conroy should have never made is justification for supporting the Liberal policy?
It isn’t just one broken promise, it is continual incompetence. The only reason Conroy even mentioned 1Gbps was because of Google Fibre. At the same time NBNCo released Stage 2 maps. Large parts of those areas that were supposed to have been connected in 2011 aren’t even in the current roll-out.
> Look, just because your house’s taps are leaky does not mean you up and rebuild the entire plumbing system, you replace the faulty taps. Once I get hold of the policy I will probably end up doing an objective analysis of our options, I strongly suggest you do the same, and when you please remember it’s easier to replace a tap than it is to replace a rusty pipe.
True, but if the pipe hasn’t rusted through and by moving the pumps you can increase the pressure then this is often an adequate option. The copper down my street was direct buried in the 1950s. Despite the best efforts of a couple of builders it still delivers close to the expected performance.
Huge quota is not that important to most internet users. Remember the average is under 20GB and there are plenty of people who have 1TB and higher plans.
I didn’t say huge quota. I said quota. It costs a couple of hundred dollars to get around 20GB on mobile broadband and less than $50 to get it on fixed line right now.
So you expect low income families to be able to afford a couple of hundred bucks because hey “the speed performance is equivalent to what they can afford on the NBN”?
Bullshit. Low income families will still buy fixed line for quota, even if they can’t get the speed increase they would desire.
If there was any intention of this then there would be at least some indication in the NBNCo Corporate Plan but there is zero evidence.
That’s because the plan stops at FY2028 when looking at distribution of services available. Note that under section 8.2.6.1 all the AVC prices 100Mbps and below are clusted together with nominal difference between them? It is reasonable to expect that they might consider dropping it in the 2030s. Through reality probably will push them towards doing it sooner.
NBNCo are assuming retailers will continue to offer 12Mbps services when this happens. I don’t believe they will, in fact some already don’t. You seem to think NBNCo are the arbiter of what’s available, they specifically designed so that they’re not.
Even if NBNCo don’t drop the tier, retailers will, because there is no demand for it, and keeping product options simple is better for business.
Except for gamers, latency shouldn’t be a significant issue on any of the solutions being proposed.
I wasn’t talking about latency here. You picked the one metric that doesn’t suit your argument. Clever, but I’m not going to play these games.
Why do we need a FTTH network if not for the speed that fibre offers? You could argue it is reliability, but the majority of problems I’ve had with my internet connection are builders putting a backhoe through it. Fibre will be broken just as badly :(.
Also clever, you undermine the very argument that goes against your position with an anecdote. But again, I not going to play these games. Water ingress, corrosion, interference. These factors affect the reliability of copper based connections and will continue to under a VDSL2 based scheme, however they won’t affect fibre connections.
It isn’t just one broken promise, it is continual incompetence.
The only problem you have ever vocalised is speed tiers. That stems from a misunderstanding. If you want to discuss other possible issues with the NBN, may I suggest actually vocalising them? Especially if they’re more important than speed, which as I have implied on my occasions, they probably are.
Conroy even mentioned 1Gbps was because of Google Fibre. At the same time NBNCo released Stage 2 maps. Large parts of those areas that were supposed to have been connected in 2011 aren’t even in the current roll-out.
Only about 120 thousand worth were in the direct ability for NBNCo to control. Or don’t you remember the Telstra deal? How it took way longer than expected? I thought you were reasonable, but obviously if you are willing to blame NBNCo for Telstra pulling the chain that must not be true.
And it doesn’t matter why he mentioned 1Gbps, he shouldn’t have made an inferred promise he can’t. As I said, this isn’t about headline speed. If you really want 1Gbps, move to Kansas. Most other fibre programs all started at a more reasonable amount. UFB in NZ offers 30Mbps and 100Mbps for example. You still get considerable benefits at 100Mbps.
While we’re at it: you know that the Coalition plan only wants to offer 12Mbps to the majority as well right? Or did you just read the cliff notes?
True, but if the pipe hasn’t rusted through and by moving the pumps you can increase the pressure then this is often an adequate option. The copper down my street was direct buried in the 1950s. Despite the best efforts of a couple of builders it still delivers close to the expected. performance.
Green blooded hobgoblin.
“News Ltd claims the coalition policy will deliver broadband at a comparable speed to the NBN, but charge households $66 per month by 2021 instead of $90 as anticipated by the government.”
*rolls eyes*
Am I the only one that noticed that the leaked figures thus far DON’T seem to include the cost of buying the copper from Telstra??
So $29.4 Billion (which doesn’t seem to include the AT LEAST 10-15billion price tag Telstra is likely to ask for its copper network) for a substandard network that will be completed just 1 year earlier than the current FTTH NBN????
And People are seriously calling this a ‘Policy’???
This is a monumental crime against humanity!!!! Yet I bet the Right wing newspapers will be littered with headlines today proclaiming the “Faster and cheaper” network their good mates in the liberal party will build…
God help us….this is a tragic day in Australian telecoms…
Abbott and Turnbull standing side by side, united on delivering an affordable NBN.
Can you imagine Julia and Rudd standing side by side announcing a policy? They don’t even like being in the same room as each other.
I think you mean Julia and Stephen. Wake me up when Rudd becomes the broadband minister.
Well he was foreign minister under Julia for a while, never saw him next to Gillard making an announcement.
My point was ex-Opposition leader and current Opposition leader standing side by side is something you’d never see with the nasty factional infighting and disorangisation of the ALP.
Well, they did say they’d do whatever it takes to gain power…
But of course. A united front.
Delivering a policy that costs almost exactly the same amount, that delivers to as much as a third-less people, with slower technology, reliant on an ageing network, owned by someone else, roughly a year earlier.
Yes, that’s definitely “winning” by comparison.
so if on demand upgrade to FTTH is an option, i wonder how long it will be before turnbull has his connection upgraded.
He’ll have fibre hooked up straight off… Bet you…
Wow, my comment yesterday was remarkably prophetic (I had a 50/50 shot):
“Turnbull will spin the narrative that his plan (that now costs almost as much as the original figures for NBN, seems to leverage NBNco, despite Telstra owning the CAN) is better than the <insert current many billions cost of NBN here> for delivery of an (inferior) network hat will be “heaps good, heaps sooner”.”
http://delimiter.com.au/2013/04/08/coalition-policy-claims-nbn-to-cost-90bn/#comment-603471
Look, I’m all for the “real” NBN as much as anyone, but do you need to resort to their tactics of twisting the truth to suit your goal? Apples to apples comparison would put the price of the Coalition’s proposal at $20b, not $29b. Every time the NBN is talked about on this blog the $37b number is always thrown around, not the $44b number that’s the actual “funding requirements”. If you’re going to be comparing proposals on numbers alone at least make sure they’re the same number.
Capex is $24.4 versus $37.4, Opex is listed as $29.4 versus $44.1.
The questions arise in that there’s no clear statement as to wether the existing Telstra $11 billion deal is included in Liberal policy numbers (if not, the Opex number jumps) or whether the numbers include an agreement for CAN access (which would push the Opex numbers for lease, Capex if the network is purchased).
This, backed on to a comment yesterday by the Coalition that the NBN could blow out to $90 billion. So, with respect, who is inventing numbers here, sorry?
I agree on reasonable analysis – people have been questioning the Labor NBN and Policy numbers for months (which is reasonable; it’s a huge investment).
To throw the same critical thinking against LNP policy, and questions as to how the numbers stack up, does not strike me as unsound.
Renai, can you please ask him how much extra power will be required to power all those Fibre Nodes once the rollout is complete, either as a percentage of the current amount and in GW.
Oh and how he thinks they will get all the new wireless tower past councils when no one wants wireless towers near them.
FFS Nodes won’t cost any more “power” than an ADSL exchange.
You turn the ADSL off at the exchange and turn the node on which is much closer to the actual residence so there may actually be a electricity saving.
If NBN’ers wanna attack FTTN… this aint it.
Actually no sorry but you’re wrong.
In order to get everyone up to a minimum 25mb there will need to be a lot of additional FTTN cabinets. They need to be powered.
Futhermore the power required to push that extra frequency ramps up the power usage.
Walk the video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akKjo0e8V3k
Have to agree with TTH on this one. If you want to pick something bad about FttN, power consumption is very very low on the list. So low it shouldnt be a consideration. Like hte $90b claim, the 3 power station claim is the extremist view, when the reality is it wont be all that much more than now, if it is any more.
Pick on the speed limit thanks to the copper, or the node lotto, or any of a number of things, but dont bother with the power argument. Its not strong enough.
Actually, swapping from exchanges to nodes would take a lot more power, due to the simple fact there is a hell of a lot more of them and every single one needs to provide the full calling current to cause a phone to ring.
Going from a bit over 1000 exchanges to well over 1,000,000 nodes, each of which requires a constant power supply, backup batteries, significant surge protection equipment to handle our garbage national power supply. If a power outage affects a small town for too long (as happens frequently around Australia) whoever is in charge of maintaining the network (Telstra) will have to transport and setup a significant amount more diesel generators to that town to support the drained batteries.
So where a single exchange would only need 1 or 2 generators to support it a city such as Newcastle would need hundreds if not thousands of generators to support each node, and a heck of a lot more diesel to keep them going for as long as needed, and if they ever needed to do this… There isn’t that many external generators within 100 miles of Newcastle, let alone solely owned by Telstra… The network would fail and an entire city would be cut off…
If you have an emergency with NBN fibre connected during a power outage you can still call out by providing your own power source to the NTU, using the FTTN method… You’re screwed…
1,000,000 Nodes now? Why not 1,000,000,000 nodes?
You really think there is going to be 1 node for every 7 houses getting FTTN? Really?
Realistic estimates put the required amount of nodes at the ~40,000 mark. These nodes do not have hidden aluminium smelters inside of them, they run similar gear that is run inside the exchange that powers your phone and ADSL… the services that will be switched off once your node is fully activated.
The power argument is simply FTTN FUD.
Even if 40,000 was correct (It’s not, add another 30,000), it’s a far cry from the “Few thousand” Abbott mentioned.
“You really think there is going to be 1 node for every 7 houses getting FTTN? Really?”
Actually by the noalitions estimates it would be 1 node every 9 houses. 9 mill divided by 1 mill… Not that hard…
“Realistic estimates put the required amount of nodes at the ~40,000 mark.”
lol bs, if the noalition does what they say they will do and provide a guaranteed minimum of 25Mbps to every premise then every single premise would need a node within 300m of their entry point otherwise the speed will drop and the noalition will again be proved to be complete lying scumbags. Providing that service to 9 million premises would take a lot more than 40,000 nodes, especially if they ever want to upgrade the network to 100Mbps which will require the nodes to be within 100m.
“These nodes do not have hidden aluminium smelters inside of them, they run similar gear that is run inside the exchange that powers your phone and ADSL… the services that will be switched off once your node is fully activated.”
Correct, they each need similar independent power supplies similar to the current exchanges, only there is going to be a hell of a lot more than them than there is exchanges which means they all need to provide wetting current on the copper line so the outdated analogue signal can get through and ring your phone, whereas the FTTH NBN is completely digital, has a fraction of the power requirements of the FTTN plan and is also a hell of a lot cheaper to both build, maintain and replace when the noalition finally decides to upgrade to FTTH.
Not to mention the complete waste of money of having to rip out and scrap all the paid for copper nodes and replace them with far fewer (and much cheaper) fibre FSAM’s.
“The power argument is simply FTTN FUD.”
Just like every single post you make.
Renai could you ask Mr Turnbull whether he thinks Australian voters are stupid bloody idiots or are just so dumb that they would believe anything he or Liberal cohorts espouse?
Yeah I know you can’t really; but am sick to bloody death with these morons treating me as an idiot and I am sure that there are a lot of other voters who are feeling the same way..
so the Coalition policy will deliver to 23% less premises (70%) at a cost of 29B. If you scale upwards (and i know its not a linear scale, so bear with me) ->
29 X 1.23 = 35.6 Billion.
So 1 billion dollars seperates Fibre to the premisis and fibre to the node if it were linear….
Fact is, the NBN Lite is a POOR alternative that costs nearly as much, delivers 23% less coverage and 1/4th of the bandwidth(currently), and 1/40th of the mid term speed (1gb),for a 24% savings in capital expenditure, and a larger ongoing cost in terms of copper maintenance and powering all those nodes….
Seriously?!
Wonder what the true “costed” price of 93% (or each incremental %) of the NBN Lite? Clearly it isnt as cost effective as made out to be, as it only covers 70%, rather than 93%.
Also what would FTTP cost if it only covered 70%? I think it was in one of the NBN Corp planes or something..
Sooooo…..saves $7B and 2 years sooner for something without the same coverage and at it’s best is 75% slower than the current plan…
/yawn
70 percent to get FTTN. I think it’s pretty easy who will constitute the 30 percent that won’t be getting it – people in the HFC footprint would account for almost all of it.
So here’s the initial assessment – the savings aren’t as big as initially claimed, there is an enormous potential for cost blowouts because of the dependence upon copper, and we’re spending almost as much money to service far fewer premises for a solution that will perpetuate the existing digital divide rather than ending it.
Oh, and I call BS on the promise of 25Mbit. At least, I’m calling BS until they tell us how many nodes they’re going to deploy.
Well it really isn’t 2 years sooner. The current NBN would have covered those 70% by or before 2019, so not sooner at all. Just less money and wasted money at that. With FTTH we reach the end goal, with FTTN we only extend the useful life of copper by a few years.
And I already see a cost blow-out, he hasn’t factored in the cost of buying/leasing the copper off Telstra or the maintenance cost of same…
From Technology Spectator:
“Mr Abbott said the coalition would deliver its NBN for under $30 billion, saying the coalition will deliver a national broadband network faster and more affordably than the Labor government possibly could.
The coalition’s NBN rollout is set to cost $20.4 billion in capital expenditure, and will require funding of $29.5 billion.”
So does that mean it’ll actually cost $49.9B? $20.4B from the public purse and $29.5 from (hopefully) “other sources”?
I’m pretty sure my favourite questions would be:
1) How long would it take, and how much would it cost, for the Coalition alternative to deliver 100/40-capable connections to 93% of Australians (i.e. to ‘complete the objective of the NBN’)? Specifically, if a business owner wants to provide a product online to Australians that requires 100/40 connections, how long will they be waiting for the Coalition’s network to catch up to their concept?
2) How much connection speed will Australians need in 2019? In 2024? In 2029? How are you going to improve the Coalition alternative technology to meet that need?
3) In what year do you project that the Coalition’s alternative will become obsolete? Specifically, how long will it take before the system you implement requires replacement?
> 1) How long would it take, and how much would it cost, for the Coalition alternative to deliver 100/40-capable connections to 93% of Australians (i.e. to ‘complete the objective of the NBN’)? Specifically, if a business owner wants to provide a product online to Australians that requires 100/40 connections, how long will they be waiting for the Coalition’s network to catch up to their concept?
You need to distinguish between what is available and what people are actually ordering. NBNCo are predicting 50% will connect at 12/1Mbps. The Coalition plan more than doubles this speed for less money. Looks like a win.
> 2) How much connection speed will Australians need in 2019? In 2024? In 2029? How are you going to improve the Coalition alternative technology to meet that need?
I suggest you read the NBNCo Corporate Plan. It provides some estimates and the answer is in 2029 less than 5% will have 1Gbps while slightly less than 50% will be on 12/1Mbps. Liberal plan is a big win for the poor.
> 3) In what year do you project that the Coalition’s alternative will become obsolete? Specifically, how long will it take before the system you implement requires replacement?
Zero. If people want faster speeds they buy a fibre connection. My hope is that fibre connections will actually be cheaper. When you consider the wholesale AVC cost for 1Gbps is $150/month = $1,800 year the pay back could be very quick.
You need to distinguish between what is available and what people are actually ordering. NBNCo are predicting 50% will connect at 12/1Mbps. The Coalition plan more than doubles this speed for less money. Looks like a win.
And you need to distinguish between a prediction and what people are actually ordering. Yes, I admit the figures are skewed by early adopter figures, but you have to admit that the fact more people are ordering 100Mbps than ISPs have predicted is significant.
Zero. If people want faster speeds they buy a fibre connection. My hope is that fibre connections will actually be cheaper. When you consider the wholesale AVC cost for 1Gbps is $150/month = $1,800 year the pay back could be very quick.
1) as I pointed out that is only the initial AVC cost.
2) You talk all about how the Coalition plan is better for low income family and yet you seem to forget that low income families cannot afford a sudden large expensive like the Coalition FTTHoD would involve. At some point the Coalition plan will require upgrading to get people on FTTH.
Why is everyone here whinging… you will get the NBN 8 years earlier and if you want FTTH you can have it.
Seems like a win win for everyone… except for maybe bludgers
Showing your tenuous grasp on reality as always TTH!
Well nobody has told us where the problem with the Coalitions plan is.
Want FTTH? You can have it.
Want FTTN for cheaper? You can have it.
Want NBN in less than 3 years? You can have it.
Want to just keep your ADSL connection? You can have it.
Want to keep just a landline phone/fax? You can have it.
Everybody wins except for maybe Labors bludgers who want taxpayers to subsidise their porn downloads.
“Well nobody has told us where the problem with the Coalitions plan is.”
Are you serious? 2/3 the cost for 2/3 the coverage on an obsolete technology?
You can have FTTH as a huge cost, a cost that over the 70% that is even covered will far exceed the savings.
“Want NBN in less than 3 years? You can have it.”
No the rollout is til 2019, current NBN would have covered more than their 70% by then.
“Everybody wins except for maybe Labors bludgers who want taxpayers to subsidise their porn downloads”
Bias Liberal stooge is obvious, btw I normally vote Liberal. You are blinded by your political allegences.
Well nobody has told us where the problem with the Coalitions plan is.
– It should be painfully obvious, but thanks for teeing them all up for me, here we go:
Want FTTH? You can have it.
– Hahaha you think I have $5000 sitting in my pocket? That’s a good one, you must be pretty well off if you think people have cash like that sitting around.
Want FTTN for cheaper? You can have it.
– No you can’t. Turnbull has already admitted that FttN plans will be around $66, much more expensive than both the NBN and ADSL. He separately also admitted that revenue on his NBN would be the same or higher than on the current NBN. Did you not watch the announcement?
Want NBN in less than 3 years? You can have it.
– 2019 is 6 years away, not 3.
Want to just keep your ADSL connection? You can have it.
– No you can’t. A basic understanding of the technology would allow you to realise that VDSL (FttN) replaces ADSL.
Want to keep just a landline phone/fax? You can have it.
– Just as you can on the current NBN.
I have $110K sitting in my bank account… if you can’t afford it, don’t buy a FTTH, stick with the ~50Mb/s FTTN connection. Nobody is forcing you to pay for the FTTH.
If you need it for work or like downloading lots of movies, you should pay for the service rather than expect the taxpayer to subsidise you.
Onto point 2, if the plans are $66 this will be for the max available VDSL2 speed which means up to 50Mb/s which is actually cheaper than NBN plans.
Point 3, the coalition plan is to have the FTTN complete by 2016 which is 3 years away.
Point 4… BZZT WRONG again. FTTN is simply that… Fibre to your Node from the exchange. People on ADSL conenctions will still be able to connect to the exchange until the ADSL infrastructure is turned off at the exchange end.
The Coalition plan is infinately more flexible and gives people a range of options for their internet connection… people can’t expect a gold plated network to be rolled to their house for free.
Onto point 2, if the plans are $66 this will be for the max available VDSL2 speed which means up to 50Mb/s which is actually cheaper than NBN plans.
Except Tony said the 50Mb/s speeds aren’t on the agenda unless/until they get a second term, so it’s “up to” a possible 25 Mb/s…
Point 3, the coalition plan is to have the FTTN complete by 2016 which is 3 years away.
Completed 2 years after it’s started? Considering they won’t be able to get it going until 2014, I’ll borrow from Malcolm and ask if you believe in unicorns and Santa too?
The Coalition plan is infinately more flexible and gives people a range of options for their internet connection… people can’t expect a gold plated network to be rolled to their house for free.
let me fix that for you:
The Coalition plan is infinately more feeble and gives people a limited range of options for their internet connection… people can’t expect a national network to be rolled to their house for their taxes paid (they need that money for maternity leave!).
“the coalition plan is to have the FTTN complete by 2016 which is 3 years away.”
LOL
“The Coalition plan is infinately more flexible and gives people a range of options for their internet connection”
False. It only gives them two options. Accept the speed you are given dictated by the length/condition of the copper or pay a lump sum for fibre that would have been otherwise paid for by the user in installments on the proper NBN plan. The proper NBN plan has a larger array of options, you as an individual get to decide what speed you need and is flexible enough to allow speeds higher than what is currently offered (100/40mbps). Speeds that are impossible on FttN.
“people can’t expect a gold plated network to be rolled to their house for free”
I wouldn’t call fibre gold plated, it is simply the new standard. FttN is substandard and the coalition plan reflects it. Hope that helps.
“if you can’t afford it, don’t buy a FTTH, stick with the ~50Mb/s FTTN connection. Nobody is forcing you to pay for the FTTH.”
Except the coalition if we ever want a connection that is actually reliable and works as advertised instead of having to suffer constant dropouts and speed loss due to water ingress, dodgy joints, RFI etc.
“If you need it for work or like downloading lots of movies, you should pay for the service rather than expect the taxpayer to subsidise you.”
But the taxpayer doesn’t pay a cent with the current NBN, so this plan costs us significantly more even if we stick with the outdated FTTN
“Onto point 2, if the plans are $66 this will be for the max available VDSL2 speed which means up to 50Mb/s which is actually cheaper than NBN plans.”
Yea… I seriously doubt this will be the case unless the total download quota is about 20GB, as the FTTN network will cost a lot more in the long run to roll out and maintain than FTTN the money has to come from somewhere, either it will come from a higher subscription price from the plans or it will be subsidised by us through taxes.
“Point 3, the coalition plan is to have the FTTN complete by 2016 which is 3 years away.”
Yea, good luck with that… It will take them that long just to retool for FTTN, renegotiate existing contracts and sign new ones and figure out where they are going to get the money from to pay for it without pissing off the public.
“Point 4… BZZT WRONG again. FTTN is simply that… Fibre to your Node from the exchange. People on ADSL conenctions will still be able to connect to the exchange until the ADSL infrastructure is turned off at the exchange end.”
So using this method the premise owner will have to pay hundreds of dollars to rewire the copper FTTN connection into their network, whereas with FTTH they can just plug a $10 CAT 5/6 cable into the NTU and it works.
“The Coalition plan is infinately more flexible and gives people a range of options for their internet connection… people can’t expect a gold plated network to be rolled to their house for free.”
Well that’s exactly what we are getting right now, a gold plated network rolled out with no cost to the taxpayer. But from what you said there, it sounds like you expect the outdated and already failed FTTN rollout to be funded from taxpayer dollars.
“I have $110K sitting in my bank account… if you can’t afford it, don’t buy a FTTH, stick with the ~50Mb/s FTTN connection. Nobody is forcing you to pay for the FTTH.
If you need it for work or like downloading lots of movies, you should pay for the service rather than expect the taxpayer to subsidise you.”
The point is, under the current plan the taxpayer doesn’t subsidise it. If you read any of the plans you’d know that. The coalition’s plan is still to substitute an inferior service, and save no money in the long run. They have presented no argument that this is not the case. Everybody agrees that due to the ongoing maintenance cost and eventual need to upgrade to FttP, FttN is more expensive.
“Onto point 2, if the plans are $66 this will be for the max available VDSL2 speed which means up to 50Mb/s which is actually cheaper than NBN plans.”
You get the max available speed because that’s the only speed. It’s not “up to 50”, it’s “at least 25”. You can slice it any way you like, $66 is a lot more than $29.95.
“Point 3, the coalition plan is to have the FTTN complete by 2016 which is 3 years away.”
Completely incorrect. The coalition plan is to have broadband available to all Australians of speed 25 Mb/s by 2016, and to have the FttN complete by 2019. Again, did you not see the announcement?
“Point 4… BZZT WRONG again. FTTN is simply that… Fibre to your Node from the exchange. People on ADSL conenctions will still be able to connect to the exchange until the ADSL infrastructure is turned off at the exchange end.”
You simply have no idea what you are talking about. Under FttN, the copper goes from your house to the node and ends there. It is not possible for a connection to go from your house to the exchange for 3 simple reasons: there will be no equipment left in the exchange to accept copper connections, the copper from node to exchange will no longer be there, and the copper from your house can only go to one place – the node.
“The Coalition plan is infinately more flexible and gives people a range of options for their internet connection… people can’t expect a gold plated network to be rolled to their house for free.”
Complete lie. It gives people exactly TWO options, option one: FttN more expensive than current plans at a speed to be determined by copper quality and node distance and probably the luck of the gods too, option two: pay $5000 for a decent connection.
The current NBN gives people endless options, you can pick between 5 speed tiers with more to come, and they already have the better connection at no extra cost.
Hi Karl,
You are partially right. The ADSL infrastructure would be turned off at the exchange, HOWEVER the VDSL2 cabinets would be backwards compatible with ADSL and ADSL2(+),
That means people on ADSL1/2/2+ may actually get a much faster connection because it only has to go a few hundred meters rather than kms back to the exchange.
So everyone who is on ADSL1/2/2+ will actually get a speed boost from FTTN.
Isn’t the point of FTTN to get people off ADSL and on to VDSL???
Why would they keep ADSL going?
All his other points have been utterly obliterated, he has to grasp on to something! Even if it is “ADSL is great!”
“I have $110K sitting in my bank account”
Well good for you, and if you were in the least way money savy it’d be invested.
“The Coalition plan is infinately more flexible and gives people a range of options for their internet connection… people can’t expect a gold plated network to be rolled to their house for free”
Well it isn’t really is it, because on a per premises basis the FTTN rollout costs more than the current FTTH rollout and is therefore a total waste of money.
“TheTruthHurts”
Try it some day, you might find it isn’t too painful to tell it.
“I have $110K sitting in my bank account… if you can’t afford it, don’t buy a FTTH”
Congratulations… you must be one of those Aussie battlers some politicians talk about, im so sorry to hear about the changes to your super plan;
You miss an important point about networks; The network effect, its where the value of a product or service is dependent on the number of others using it.
If the only people who can get FTTH are people with $110K in their bank it devalues the worth of the network as a whole, business, education and health industry cant assume that level of service will be available, so they cant justify implementing new products and services that require good upload speed.
Also the cost of converting from FTTN to FFTH will be more for the coalition plan because it will be done in such a fragmented way, not en-mass like with the NBN.
you will get the NBN 8 years earlier
and for $60B less as well right?
a) 3 years, based on the current policy statements. 8?
b) Of course. For a few grand. Or more.
But keep on inventing numbers, Malcolm would be proud.
“a) 3 years, based on the current policy statements. 8?”
they talk about up to 25Mb in 3 years then rolling out FTTN til 2019
I could be wrong but I believe the upto 25Mb is just getting ADSL2 to everyone over their first term. Hopefully the FTTN waste will never happen.
I like a lot of people are unhappy as this “policy” does nothing to fix the issues with the current state of Australian Telecommunications landscape.
The current, in progress government contribution does more than provide “fast internets for leechers and lazy people” like you suggest.
The actual benefits include and are not limited to;
Breaking the Telstra stranglehold on telephony infrastructure, allowing you total choice in who you use for telephone and internet.
Fixes endemic faults with the current telephony infrastructure a result from a lack of maintenance by the commercial telephony providers.
Removes the need for more than 500 Million dollars of government USO subsidies paid each year to private companies for city/ country equality of telephone pricing and availablity.
Mandates through the ACCC the charges and access privileges of Telephony and Internet providers to the National Communications Network
Allows for additional capacity to be added to the National Communications Network through installation of the current and foreseeable futures best technology (50+ years) easily and cheaper than any other known method (either in use or development).
Reduces the ongoing maintenance costs of the National Communications Network through installation of a resilient material that is not prone to decay through contact with nature.
Plus on a more personal note, it stops the “infrastructure lottery” where the quality of your phone calls/ internet is dependent on where you live. From personal experience when I last moved house even though I am physically closer to the Telstra exchange my phone always hums with static (it’s worse when it rains) and my internet is slower and drops out all the time.
The quality of internet is important to us, as both my wife & I study online as we need to fit study in around work commitments and we have both been disconnected during testing sessions, solely at fault of the local infrastructure.
+1
@ TTH
“Why is everyone here whinging… you will get the NBN 8 years earlier and if you want FTTH you can have it.”
I (one of the you, you refer to) am due to receive “the NBN (not this cheap impostor you call the NBN) between Sept ’14 and Sept ’15… even if it were to blow out, say Sept ’16… so how can you claim that I will receive FttN 8 years earlier?
Does Malcolm’s new plan come with a flux capacitor?
Some of my questions I’d like to see answered by the coalition.
Say I decide to come up with the 50% to get myself FttP, who pays the other 50%?
Will this be impacted in anyway if there is a large uptake on the 50% offer?
How does this affect performance on the node if there are a number of users paying to get FttP?
What will the average distance to a node be for the users? Noting that Tony Abbott has stated there will only be a few thousand nodes – this seems entirely unrealistic?
Using the NZ FttN rollout as an example, their cabinets could fit 2 dslams. Who will be responsible for the dslams here? Will RSP’s find themselves renting ports from their competitors?
If the coalition is serious about giving Australian’s the best solution, why is there no CBA being done on the current Labor plan? Are they afraid of the results?
and the other question no one has asked, If I stump up for FTTP, will I get rogered by my ISP’s billing dept every month the way they currently roger existing non-NBN fibre customers?
Heres a question for Turnbull.
He states that he will upgrade any copper that is degraded to fibre. Is that to the Premises, or will house holds need to chip in an extra $5000. Also, Nick Ross over at the ABC noted that Telstra said in 2004 that their copper would be defunct in 15 years. So as soon as the Coalition plan is finished in 2019, we will have to start all over again with FTTP upgrades. Surely we should do it once and do it properly.
> Nick Ross over at the ABC noted that Telstra said in 2004 that their copper would be defunct in 15 years.
Have you ever paused to think that Telstra might have had an agenda in making that statement? ACCC spend significant effort in attempting to determine how much it costs to run Telstra’s copper network, because those costs are the biggest factor in setting the costs that Telstra can charge. It is in Telstra’s best interest to talk down the copper network.
> So as soon as the Coalition plan is finished in 2019, we will have to start all over again with FTTP upgrades.
If you aren’t happy with the performance just buy fibre. It is likely to be significantly cheaper than the NBN plan for 1Gbps.
> Surely we should do it once and do it properly.
That would be direct fibre (see Google Fibre which somehow is significantly cheaper and doesn’t have speed tiers).
If you aren’t happy with the performance just buy fibre. It is likely to be significantly cheaper than the NBN plan for 1Gbps.
AVC costs will goes down over time.
That would be direct fibre (see Google Fibre which somehow is significantly cheaper and doesn’t have speed tiers).
Because they are doing a high population metro area and levering over existing dark fibre and back-haul assets in order to reduce the overall construction costs. If the NBN stuck to metro areas only, i.e. capitals cities, it would cost significantly less too. Not to mention fast time frames tend to add extra expenses.
What you really think that if Google waltz into Australia and decided to do the NBN for us they could do it significantly cheaper? How naive are you?
> Because they are doing a high population metro area and levering over existing dark fibre and back-haul assets in order to reduce the overall construction costs. If the NBN stuck to metro areas only, i.e. capitals cities, it would cost significantly less too. Not to mention fast time frames tend to add extra expenses.
There is plenty of dark fibre in Australia to exchanges and power assets, and I doubt the dark fibre is helping much with the last mile.
> What you really think that if Google waltz into Australia and decided to do the NBN for us they could do it significantly cheaper? How naive are you?
Google could benefit significantly from faster internet connections, because they can push more advertising so they have incentives to push the cost of internet access down. Google are a company of very smart and driven people. I’m not sure they could do it cheaper, but based on the evidence, I think it is worth exploring. I think everyone would agree that Google Fibre currently stands as the ideal solution.
Actually, Google would benefit a lot more doing a mobile network similar to the system Amazon has for the Kindle rather than deploying a “bulk” fixed line system.
How much would Labor’s FTTP NBN cost if coverage was reduced to 70% of premises as Turnbull’s is. I would wager about the same as what Turnbull is planning to blow on DSL.
Turnbull said that HD video can be acheived with 6 Mpbs bandwidth. How does he plan on delivering HD videoconferencing with maximum upload speeds of 5 Mbps???
Here we go folks…. what you can achieve with Fibre-To-The-Node(Cabinet).
No spin. No FUD. Numbers speak for themselves:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeVsyMTzF3M
that guy is 100m away from the node.
so how many nodes will be needed across australia to ensure that no home is more than 100m from their nearest node?
i’d love to know what connection the guy from sweden has to get 350/150.
i’m guessing it ain’t FTTN.
“No spin. No FUD. Numbers speak for themselves:”
You are perfectly correct, the numbers do indeed speak for themselves, particularly the part in the comments where the poster of the video is asked how far away from the exchange they ran their test and they replied “100 meters”.
Not to mention the part where he states “It is costing me a little bit more than your regular ADSL connection” meaning that it costs more than the US ADSL prices which are already significantly lower than ours, whereas the FTTH connections currently rolling out are CHEAPER than current ADSL prices.
And the final nail in the coffin… BT have publicly admitted that they made a mistake in choosing FTTN and are currently ripping it up and replacing it with FTTH as it is unreliable and costing them far too much to maintain.
Who cares? Why even bother with the FTTN step? If you want to save pennies drop the FTTH plan to only cover 70% and it’d be cheaper than the Coalition plan.
“Here we go folks…. what you can achieve with Fibre-To-The-Node(Cabinet).”
100 meters. Sorry, that would be inaccurate. Turnbull has given an indicative example in a published speech:
http://www.malcolmturnbull.com.au/homepage-speeches-articles/commsday-melbourne-congress-2012/
Circa 800 meters, based on the prior Telstra proposals. That’s 8 times the distance.
You’d be getting around 16-18Mbps at that distance, though it could be lower depending on your line quality/condition.
Great, so now the future of Australia’s Internet is resting on a rooted copper network that Telstra has given up on years ago. This is the height of stupidity from the Coalition.
Last time we went on holiday a Telstra technician assigned our line to a neighbour. Reason is because Telstra don’t bother keeping records anymore, they just listen on the lines for traffic and if its quiet assume its not being used.
Futher reading: http://www.abc.net.au/technology/articles/2012/11/23/3639761.htm => “Australia’s copper network is rooted”.
Oh wow it’s everything I hoped it would be, expect so much less! 2019 until only 70% of Australia are connected to a vastly inferior system! So their big claim to fame is they will finish one or two years earlier, which is exactly the same time everyone will be getting extremely fed up with their crappy FTTN connection, and require us to start building a FTTP network all over again (for completion in 2030 perhaps?). Excuse me while I go jump off a bridge with joy.
Oh wow it’s everything I hoped it would be, except so much less! 2019 until only 70% of Australia are connected to a vastly technologically inferior system! So their big claim to fame is they will finish one or two years earlier, which is exactly the same time everyone will be getting extremely fed up with their crappy FTTN connection, and require us to start building a FTTP network all over again! (for completion in 2030 perhaps?). Excuse me while I go jump off a bridge with joy!
I was so excited by the Coalition’s “policy” that I posted twice by mistake. Feel free to delete second post please Renai.
sorry if this was mentioned already, but by 2019 how much of the population will be connected to FTTH if the labor nbn continues as planned?
Does this truly mean that the coalition expect a full 30% of Australia to be satisfied with DSL, HFC, hideously overpriced wireless, or satellite? So in theory, in 2019 many people could still be stuck on whatever antiquated method of Internet access they have in 2012. How is that in any way a “national” broadband plan, when a full third of Australians aren’t even included?
Summation:
20% of the network
for 60% of the cost
delivering 2.5% of the performance
and taking 80% of the time.
2.8 million new estate FTTP connections = 20% of the current rollout
saving $17 billion which is less than 40% of the projected cost
delivering a MINIMUM PEAK speed of 25Mb/s which is 2.5% of the 1Gb/s of FTTP
and saves only 2 years on a decade long rollout.
And even these figures are rubbery. The $17 billion “savings” does NOT include compensation for Telstra’s copper or the much higher costs of maintaining a degraded copper network or electricity for thousands of powered nodes.
Minimum peak speeds will be lower in practice
And the 2 years time saving doesn’t include the 18 months at least for a CBA. negotiating new contracts, reskilling the workforce and gaining access to Telstra’s copper.
I already have 18/1 sync on ADSL2+ (but not the most stable – should only be 16/1 to have stability) so this plan offers me no real upgrade.
Once again the coalition has proved they cannot be trusted to offer what is best for Australian telecommunications – no chance of them getting my vote.
> I already have 18/1 sync on ADSL2+ (but not the most stable – should only be 16/1 to have stability) so this plan offers me no real upgrade.
Come back to reality.
1. FTTN will be faster that ADSL2+
2. You have the option of installing FTTP
If you cannot afford the FTTP install, then it is highly unlikely that you could afford the truly fast speeds under NBNCo’s plan.
> Once again the coalition has proved they cannot be trusted to offer what is best for Australian telecommunications – no chance of them getting my vote.
As compared to Labor who endorsed 50% of Australians on fibre connecting at 12/1Mbps. You need to read past the headlines and look at what is actually planned.
As do you Mathew.
You also need to stop focusing on 1Gbps and look at the other slower options from 100Mbps and up. Speeds which won’t be available on FTTN, and aren’t equivalent to the initial 1Gbps speeds in terms of price.
You also need to look at the corporate plan better for NBNCo, the part where AVC prices drop over time?
Come back to reality.
1. FTTN will be faster that ADSL2+
2. You have the option of installing FTTP
it wont be faster than whats currently available unless Tony gets a second term. The “option” cost $3-5k
If you cannot afford the FTTP install, then it is highly unlikely that you could afford the truly fast speeds under NBNCo’s plan.
Huh??!? $69.95/month for 100/40 20Gb/20Gb with iiNet (as an aside, thats $4 more than the Liberals 12-25Mbps one) isn’t affordable?? Compared to dropping thousands to get the same under the Liberals??! Seriously?? did someone change the definition of “affordable” while I wasn’t watching :/
“Cannot afford” is the wasteful white elephant of the Liberals plan…
Just watched 7:30 and after a fairly comprehensive story, and a few decent questions from Leigh Sales, there was no mention whatsoever of upload speeds. Turnbull masterfully spun his bullshit to the highest degree, and while Leigh did a decent job overall, I didn’t think she was technically proficient enough to fight back with the relevant ammo, once Turnbull started contorting the facts (which was as soon as his mouth opened).
Have to hand it to the coalition. This is a clever policy. Not in any way clever in terms of what it will deliver, but clever in terms of how easily it will fool the public, into thinking its a decent alternative to the NBN.
+1
This is precisely what I was thinking, following that interview.
> Have to hand it to the coalition. This is a clever policy. Not in any way clever in terms of what it will deliver, but clever in terms of how easily it will fool the public, into thinking its a decent alternative to the NBN.
I’m struggling to see where the real outcome is significantly worse than Labor’s plan.
1. Labor’s NBNCo are predicting that 50% will connect at 12/1Mbps. The coalition plan at 25/5Mbps will be faster and cheaper.
2. For those people who want really fast speeds, when you compare $3000 install cost up front for FTTP with the wholesale AVC cost for 1Gbps of $150/month ($1800/year), the coalition plan seems like a much better outcome.
3. People in rural towns who Labor were having DSLAMs replaced by wireless have a strong chance of FTTN or at worst redeployed ADSL2+ DSLAMs.
Remember the bits don’t care about the medium used to carry them. Yes FTTP is the better technical solution, but Labor set up a pricing model which meant that for the majority of Australians (especially the poor) would never see the benefits.
1) The coalition also predicts the majority will be connected at 12/1 which implies there will be speed tiers. Please don’t just read the cliff notes. (Funny through as this data was on the LITERAL cliff notes given to the press).
2) Fast is also 100Mbps, it isn’t just 1Gbps. If you think the FTTHoD will offer 1Gbps straight up you’re dreaming. It’ll probably start with about 200Mbps.
3) Did you forget the part about. the Coalition using the existing wireless and sat parts of the NBN? Did you forget that the CAN is staying on in regional towns for at least the next decade? You also said it yourself, bits don’t care what medium they’re transfered over.
1. Labor’s NBNCo are predicting that 50% will connect at 12/1Mbps. The coalition plan at 25/5Mbps will be faster and cheaper.
No, the Coalition also say 12Mbps (have a look at the picture in the article of the handout here: http://delimiter.com.au/2013/04/09/coalition-releases-long-awaited-rival-nbn-policy/). You’ll also be paying $66 for that 12Mbps according to that…
2. For those people who want really fast speeds, when you compare $3000 install cost up front for FTTP with the wholesale AVC cost for 1Gbps of $150/month ($1800/year), the coalition plan seems like a much better outcome.
NBNCo pricing is “in stone” thanks to the ACCC, where’s that commitment from the Libs version? Considering the $66 mentioned as “estimated retail price/month” for the 12Mbps “Plan chosen by most users” I suspect at least one of these numbers is false….or Malcolm lost his calculator.
3. People in rural towns who Labor were having DSLAMs replaced by wireless have a strong chance of FTTN or at worst redeployed ADSL2+ DSLAMs.
With the Liberal FTTN plan only covering 70% of the population, I seriously doubt it. The reason NBNCo didn’t run a fibre backbone to them is the exact same reason the Libs won’t run a fibre backbone to them (only the Libs will be running a lot less than Labor were going to).
Hoping a “same as what you have now, but for $30B” plan would be better than the NBNCo plan was always a fools errand…
Have you ever heard of this little thing called upload speed? Do you know it will max out at about 5mbps on copper? (If you’re lucky). Not even enough to stream TODAY’s HD video standards both ways (forget about future 4K conferencing technology). And that is ONE single application at a time, when in reality the house of 2015-2020 (and even my house in 2012) will have many devices simultaneously connected to the net. In fact I have no less than 16 devices already, spread throughout the house all struggling on a 18/1mbps ADSL2 connection. It’s the upload speed that kills the experience now, and it will be the upload experience that kills it on FTTN (and that’s if you’re lucky enough to live in an area that will even get FTTN).
One of the most awesome aspects to Labor’s NBN is that there is even wholesale price regardless of location, and that as many regional places as possible would get FTTP, with only 7% of Australia on fixed wireless/satellite. This will create true ubiquity, allowing all sorts of new bandwidth-intensive applications to be used by people in cities and regional areas alike. The coalition’s plan by contrast shafts the bush, and will concentrate on “commercially viable” areas for FTTN. This destroys the whole “bridging the digital divide” promise of Labor’s NBN.
Malcolm’s policy is a joke in every way. It’s not even in the same league as Labor’s NBN and simply provides a mish-mash of dated technologies that will set the country back a minimum of ten years in our inevitable eventual path to FTTP for all Australians. Turnbull wouldn’t even admit on 7:30 last night that any Australian will everneed anything over 25mbps (again no mention of upload speed as though it doesn’t even matter) which is less than twice the speed I get in 2012. By 2016 25/5 will be completely inadequate for my needs, and only if I’m lucky will I even have the option to pay thousands of dollars to upgrade to FTTP. Which also means all the lesser off people in Australia will never have the money to upgrade to FTTP. Something 93% of Australians get for free under Labor’s plan.
I could go on for another hour with everything I hate about The Coalition’s rival policy, but I’m sure you get the point.
Spot on about upload speeds Simon! I can’t believe no one has asked Turnbull about it.
Hey everyone, it’s gotten a little feral on here over the weekend, so I’m closing the NBN threads for now. I’ll re-open new NBN threads on Monday after everyone’s had a bit of a chance to calm down. If you want to continue to debate this stuff right now, there’s always the forums.
Cheers,
Renai
Editor + Publisher, Delimiter
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