NBN a “horrible hoax”, says Turnbull

45
The claim by Shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull that Labor’s National Broadband Network project will take 20 years and up to $100 billion has been pretty comprehensively debunked at this point, NBN Co’s latest rollout speed downgrades notwithstanding. However, the Earl of Wentworth continues to trot it out during his visits to small community meetings.

Leighton confirms telco business sale

0
You may recall that diversified contract and industrial group Leighton Holdings has been looking to sell its NextGen, Metronode and Infoplex telecommunications and technology businesses for some time. At one stage interested bidders apparently included Telstra, but as it turns out, a somewhat different organisation has bought them.

Vote for Delimiter to be Australia’s best blog

42
We'd be mighty chuffed if you would vote for Delimiter in the 'People's Choice' component of the Best Australian Blogs Competition for 2013.

Screw cloud: Coogans upgrades mainframe instead

4
To paraphrase Francis Urquhart, you might very well think that no Australian organisation would be spending much money these days upgrading their old mainframes or deploying new ones. Isn't everything about cloud computing these days, after all? Well, true, it is, but that hasn't stopped some Australian groups from hanging onto their old mainframe infrastructure and even pushing it further.

Non-4G Lumia 720 hits Australia

3
Finnish smartphone manufacturer Nokia announced today that its Lumia 720 model would come to Australia. Unfortunately, while the model is quite high-end -- it comes with a 4.3" screen, a 1GHz dual-core CPU, Windows Phone 8, a 6.7 megapixel camera on the back, 512MB of RAM and 8GB of storage space, plus the ability to take a microSD card up to 64GB -- it does not support the 4G networks already launched in Australia by Telstra and Optus, being limited to 3G.

Dick Smith deploys Google Apps

4
The latest Australian company to deploy Google Apps as its document management and collaboration suite appears to be electronics retailer Dick Smith, at least according to a post on Google's Australian blog today.

Australia trains more fitness than IT professionals

19
From the thought-provoking blog of REA Group chief information officer Nigel Dalton and his consulting colleague James Pierce comes the news that Australia is currently training many more fitness instructors than IT professionals.

John Birmingham skewers Game of Thrones pirates

142
Personally, I have been somewhat stunned about the incredibly vitriolic reaction which so many readers have responded with, after our article yesterday reporting that Australia, on a per-capita basis, pirates Game of Thrones more than any country in the world.

Healthcare Australia dumps in-house Exchange for cloud

5
The shift to cloud computing/software as a service models in Australian enterprise IT circles is endless, it appears. Yesterday it was retailer Dick Smith switching to Google Apps, and today it’s medical recruiter Healthcare Australia switching off an in-house version of Microsoft Exchange and onto Office 365.

Digging into the Creative Cloud cost picture

2
Local Melbourne blogger Dawnstar Australis has found that Australians may end paying substantially more over the long-term to use Creative Clowd than traditional boxed copies of Adobe software.

NBN debate full of falsehoods, say academics

80
It should come as no surprise to regular Delimiter readers that our National Broadband Network debate has been poisoned by a constant series of inaccurate and misleading statements. It’s the done thing, after all — politicians are doing it, newspapers are doing it, television stations are doing it — why wouldn’t everyone want to get in on the bandwagon?

Chromebooks for Port Macquarie school

8
It’s only been a few weeks since Google’s Chromebooks landed in Australia, but at least one organisation has already started deploying them. According to Computerworld, St Columba Anglican School in Port Macquarie, NSW, is fully into Chrome OS.

Coalition policy claims NBN to cost $90bn

52
This morning the Daily Telegraph reported that an analysis contained in the Coalition's rival policy purported to show that the real cost of Labor's NBN project would be up to $90 billion.

Optus loses networks chief Ottendorfer

0
Optus revealed last week that it's losing its highly regarded networks chief Günther Ottendorfer, who's been the driving force between the rapid rollout of its 4G network. To put it mildly, this is a huge loss for Optus

WikiLeaks to run in Vic, NSW and WA

15
Thought you wouldn't be able to vote for Julian Assange's WikiLeaks political party because you don't live in Victoria? Worry not. Come the September Federal Election, voters in NSW and Western Australia will also be able to back the transparency horse, according to an extensive press conference the party's Victorian headquarters held over the weekend.

Can man survive off Bitcoin mining alone?

8
Melbourne geek Anthony Agius’ newest venture is attempting to ascertain whether he can make enough money from mining the Bitcoin virtual currency to keep himself in new servers and fast broadband in the style to which he has become accustomed.

Samsung skips Exynos CPU for Aussie Galaxy S4’s

7
Most of you probably already suspected this, but just to put it on the record: Korean smartphone giant Samsung has confirmed that its flagship Galaxy S4 smartphone will ship in Australia in the lesser quad-core version of its processor rather than the top of the range eight-core Exynos processor which many people have been looking forward to.

IBM received leaked info during Qld Health payroll bid

0
The somewhat disturbing revelations from the Commission of Inquiry into Queensland Health’s payroll systems disaster just keep on coming. The Brisbane Times reports today that prime contractor IBM was actually forwarded leaked information that could have helped it win the payroll upgrade contract.

Actually, Australia trains more IT than fitness staff

9
Remember last week when REA Group chief information officer Nigel Dalton published a somewhat disturbing article on his site noting that Australia currently trains more fitness instructors than IT professionals? As it turns out, Dalton may have been wrong.

PM Gillard meets global Huawei chair

2
Julia Gillard meets with Huawei's global chair during a visit to China.

Kogan drags ISPOne into court over mobile

6
blog Remember how Kogan issued a strenuous denial that it was its fault that high-usage customers were being dumped from its fladgling "unlimited" mobile...

25Mbps in flats? Turnbull “dreaming”, says strata association

17
The issue of how to treat those Australians living in multi-dwelling units such as apartment blocks has always been a thorny one for both Labor and the Coalition.

$94 billion NBN? It’s a nice, unproven, soundbite

0
One particular aspect of the Coalition's NBN pitch cannot go unchallenged: The constantly repeated claim that Labor's current NBN policy will cost $94 billion -- $60 billion more than Labor is claiming.

The Reject Shop deploys Win7, InTune

1
A case study published by Redmond this week details how retailer The Reject Shop deployed Windows 7, plus Microsoft’s remote management tool InTune, to its several hundred PCs and other devices across Australia.

TechOne saves 20-30 percent in Gmail switch

1
Australian software vendor Technology One deploys Google's Gmail email platform.

Google Play Music finally hits Australia

12
Were you there when Apple’s iTunes Music Store first launched in Australia? I was. It was back in October 2005 and I was a journalist at technology news site ZDNet Australia. At the time it was a huge deal for Australian music fans, who had previously been resorting to naughty platforms such as Napster to get their digital music fix on. Well, things have changed a lot in the IT industry, but the iTunes Music Store is still around and kicking. Now it’s got a new competitor: Google.

Pia Waugh takes control of data.gov.au

13
Long-time IT industry openness advocate Pia Waugh takes control of Government 2.0 initiatives in the Federal Government.

FTTN cabinets “hideous”, say designers

34
Not everyone is particularly enthused by the idea of placing tens of thousands of broadband cabinets around Australia to realise the Coalition's fibre to the node National Broadband Network vision. And one of those not happy with the idea is UNSW building academic Alec Tzannes.

Twitter buys Aussie startup We Are Hunted

0
Australian startup We Are Hunted, which was formed out of Wotnews as a side project and survived its death, has just annoucned that it has been bought by social networking site Twitter.

FTTP too hard: Informa analyst backs Coalition

19
Informa senior analyst Tony Brown backs the Coalition's Fibre to the Node vision for the National Broadband Network.

Turnbull has “saved” the NBN, says Kohler

37
It's hard to recall, given Tony Abbott's enthusiastic support for the Coalition's 'NBN lite' policy released this week, but there was a time when the Opposition Leader and others in the Coalition had pledged to "demolish", "dismantle" and any other 'd' word you can think of, Labor's National Broadband Network policy. Until Malcolm Turnbull took control.

Australian Bitcoin mining probably not worth it

6
You may recall that MacTalk founder and all-round geek Anthony Agius has been conducting something of an experiment to determine whether an Australian Bitcoin miner could make enough money to justify the practice. Well, the results are in: And the answer is: “Most likely not”.

Greenfields lobbyist sees nine-figure windfall in Coalition NBN

12
blog The Coalition’s NBN policy launch may have been variously greeted with both strong derision and cautious support in varying measures, but with Labor’s...

Some Delimiter housekeeping

25
Just a quick note to let readers know that for the next couple of weeks I'll be getting some assistance with Delimiter from long-time and very experienced technology journalist David Braue.

Retail giant gets wild-and-Woolies with Google Apps

5
Point-of-sale terminals may seem to be changing on a weekly basis, but it’s not every day that the country’s largest retailer makes a major back-end platform shift. Little surprise, then, that there has been such great interest in a company blog post announcing that Woolworths has decided to shift its 26,000 employees to the cloud-based Google Apps platform.

Absolutely phabulous: When is big, too big?

19
Just when is a smartphone too big? Manufacturers have been pushing the boundaries for some time as they dance with higher resolutions and larger screens, but the latest offerings from Huawei and Samsung may have clinched the deal as both companies produce 'phablets' – smartphones with screens in the six-inch range.

Would your company ban Facebook Home?

15
It’s only been two weeks since Facebook launched its home-screen replacement for Android phones, and hours since it was launched in the UK. But as privacy advocates wrestle with the ever-increasing efforts of Web giants bent on collecting and utilising personal information to line their own pockets, some in the security community are calling for companies to ban Facebook Home for the myriad and untested security vulnerabilities they fear may be hiding inside it – as well as the usual concerns over Facebook’s (often-questioned) privacy.

Australia’s 4G mobile services more reliable than 3G: J.D. Power

7
Emerging 4G networks are proving to be more reliable and deliver a better wireless experience than established 3G networks, a J.D. Power and Associates study has found. The 2013 Australia Wireless Network Quality Study measured problems per 100 (PP100) based on ten common problems that impact overall network performance, including dropped calls, calls not connected, audio issues, failed or lost voicemails, and more.

KIRA elaison: Has Toshiba burned Apple’s Retina Display?

17
Laptop stalwart Toshiba has beaten Apple to the punch by offering an extremely high-resolution display in a slimline Ultrabook that has been clearly designed to appeal to buyers’ deep love of everything shiny.

Game on: NBN Co fires broadband afterburners with 1Gbps services

136
The election’s just months away and it’s game on at NBN Co, which this morning announced it will add three more speed tiers to its services, now offering a maximum 1Gbps wholesale service at a wholesale access price of $150 per month.

NBN Co cranking up rollout to eleven – but can it rock ‘n’ roll?

87
A week after the Coalition debuted its anxiously-awaited alternative NBN policy, Labor seems to be cranking the project up to eleven as it works to reverse months of problems and improve the appeal of its NBN policy to voters. Telecommunications industry figures, however, aren’t convinced NBN Co can deliver on its promises, according to a report on technology site iTnews.com.au.

Pushed for Coalition contingency plan, NBN Co reveals rollout costs

109
A growing amount of information on the costs of NBN Co’s fibre-to-the-premise (FttP) rollout may have brought some long-wanted clarity to the national broadband network (NBN) debate, but calls by NBN joint parliamentary committee chair Rob Oakeshott for a revised NBN Co corporate plan – to account for potential changes due to the election of a Coalition government and implementation of that party’s alternative NBN – confirm the government is facing increased scrutiny as observers push for further transparency in the pre-election NBN debate.

Dream or nightmare? IT dept from scratch

7
It's not often that you see a whole new IT department and associated systems set up from scratch, but that's kind of what appears to be happening at ice cream giant Peters, which was recently bought by a private equity firm and is currently separating its systems from global food manufacturer and ex-parent Nestle.

Spend-less Shoes replaces dated ERP platform

0
Speaking of ERP platforms, as we were earlier this morning, news arrived last week that local footwear retailer Spend-less Shoes will deploy a new platform. The company has picked Microsoft’s Dynamics AX 2012 for Retail platform, as detailed in a statement issued by Redmond.

‘Digital dividend’ spectrum battle will be over quickly: analysts

10
Australia’s long-awaited ‘digital dividend’ auction kicks off today, but may be a relative non-event with the reserve set relatively high and Telstra expected to dominate proceedings as it rushes to snap up as much spectrum for its 4G LTE services as possible.

Big fish, bigger fish: iiNet, M2 considered merger

19
Australia’s market recently dodged a potential merger that would have created an NBN-era telecommunications behemoth by combining M2 Telecommunications and iiNet.

Privacy commissioners issue please-explain about Google Glass

25
It’s been hailed as the vanguard of wearable computing, derided as a plaything of perverts and stalkers, and in a Seattle bar even though it’s not broadly available in the wild and is still untold months from release. No doubt about Google Glass is already brewing a firestorm of controversy – and its possibilities for public snooping have proved worrying enough to Australia’s privacy watchdog that he has requested a meeting with Google to discuss its implications.

Samsung Galaxy S4 hits Australia, but will it match the S3’s success?

15
If there was any question whether Samsung has become a superstar of the smartphone market, it was put to rest with last night’s Sydney Opera House launch of its flagship Galaxy S4 phone – in which the mobile giant pulled out all the stops to show the world the device that it hopes will consolidate its market lead over rival Apple’s iPhone 5.

Delimiter named among Australia’s five best business blogs

23
Delimiter was named as one of five finalists in the AWC's Best Australian Blogs 2013 Competition, which recognises excellence in Australian blogging and brings together entrants in categories including commentary, lifestyle/hobby, personal and parenting, business, and words and writing.

Customs foregoes standalone CIO role in IT shakeup

0
The status of the title of Chief Information Officer continues to wax and wane as Australia’s Customs and Border Protection Service eliminates the role’s standing as a separate concern during a shakeup of its IT operations that began earlier this month and is expected to be complete by 1 July.

Despite Aussie windfall, does Apple profit slide suggest hard times ahead?

3
blog Even as it marks the tenth anniversary of iTunes and its companion iPod device, Apple’s first profit decline in a decade has many observers contemplating the future of the pioneering company – and asking whether Steve Jobs’ spirit of innovation has in fact passed along with the company’s co-founder.

Consoles to suffer as tablets triple mobile games downloads by 2017

4
Tablet makers are set to reap a windfall in coming years as gamers continue to shift their gaming dollars away from dedicated gaming devices and into the wallets of increasingly agile mobile-gaming developers, new figures from Juniper Research have suggested.

Jetstar deal the Asian wind beneath Telstra’s wings

0
Telstra is talking up the international prospects for its Network Applications and Services (NAS) arm after securing a significant contract to manage IT management and procurement on behalf of expanding regional budget airline Jetstar.

Gen-i Australia may completely shut down

6
You couldn’t exactly say that the Australian division of IT services company Gen-i was in rude health, with the company revealing in mid-March that it would sack most of its staff and stop competing for most local contracts, as it shifted focus to only serving Trans-Tasman contracts as per the instructions of its parent Telecom New Zealand. However, according to CRN, things may be even more dire

NSW Govt consults on ICT policy

0
The New South Wales Government, which has already been making waves in the IT industry for its comprehensive and forward-thinking ICT policy, has kicked off consultation on the next iteration of the strategy.

UNSW deploys Cisco 802.11ac Wi-Fi

6
It’s a slow process, but gradually the 802.11ac Wi-Fi standard is making its way into consumer and corporate locations to gradually upgrade 802.11a/b/n installations. 802.11ac wireless routers are being sold in stores and mobile devices are gradually getting support. One of the first major organisations in Australia to deploy the technology en-masse will be the University of NSW.

Telstra has 2.1 million 4G customers

8
This morning the telco’s deputy chief financial officer Mark Hall casually told Macquarie Bank’s Equities Conference that Telstra already has 2.1 million customers on its 4G network.

“Truth”: Kogan wins ispONE fight

11
If you were watching Ruslan Kogan’s Twitter feed closely this afternoon, you would have seen the Kogan chief claim victory in his company’s contentious court battle against mobile wholesaler ispONE.

HP Slate 7 to land in Australia shortly

0
If there's one thing we like more than hot new gadgets entering the Australian marketplace, it's inexpensive hot new gadgets, and this appears to be precisely what global tech giant HP is about to deliver with the Australian launch of its Slate 7 Android tablet.

Productivity Commission chief is ex-DBCDE head

15
It escaped our attention at the time, but the more astute among you may have noted in November last year that Peter Harris, the head of Communications Minister Stephen Conroy’s Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, was appointed to chair the Government’s Productivity Commission.

It’s official: Alphawest is now just Optus

0
Now, according to an Optus media release issued yesterday, there is no difference. Alphawest is Optus. Optus is Alphawest. It's a giant "synergy", or "integration of some kind".

Rumours swirl around ANZ Indian IT sale

0
According to the Hindu Business Line, one of the country’s main business papers, top-tier Australian bank ANZ may be looking to sell its Bangalore operations to Indian IT outsourcer Wipro, which has long had a relationship with ANZ.

QBE shifts 100 IT roles to India

2
Insurance giant QBE continues restructuring operations in its IT department by offshoring 100 roles, according to the Finance Sector Union.

NBN: Can’t we all just get along?

9
So far the National Broadband Network debate over the past several years since Malcolm Turnbull became Shadow Communications Minister has been broadly polite, with both sides rationally examining and critiquing each other’s policies in a calm manner, while engaging in a friendly rivalry about who has the best polic. Oh, wait, I’m wrong. It’s actually become a a bile-filled cesspit of misleading statements, public slander, irrelevancy and flat-out lies. How could I forget?

Adobe dumps Creative Suite: ‘Cloud’ subscription only for next version

15
Overnight in the US, Adobe revealed it would exclusively focus on its subscription offerings in future. That's right: If you want to buy Photoshop or other applications in Creative Suite in future, you won't be able to -- you'll only be able to lease them.

VMware talks Aussie datacentre

3
Apparently virtualisation giant VMware isn't content with having its software used by virtually every major organisation in Australia, and wants to push things a little further by launching its own public cloud offerings globally. And an Australian datacentre appears to be on the cards.

Cisco picks up 4G work with Vodafone

6
When you get into the datacentres of Australia's big telcos (as I've had the chance to do on occasion), what you'll find is that their network infrastructure is highly heterogenuous. You get a lot of Juniper, a lot of Alcatel-Lucent, a lot of Ericsson, a lot of Nokia-Siemens Networks and if you look hard enough you'll even be able to find some old Nortel gear tucked away in a corner and even some (gasp!) Huawei. However, if I had to make a bet, I'd say that the most ubiquitous brand in the core is Cisco.

It’s not just HP: Boral picked Oracle too

0
Oracle takes a chunk of Boral, alongside HP.

Google’s Sydney HQ gets hacked … kind of

4
The security staff at Google Australia’s flashy new headquarters in the Sydney CBD most likely spend most of their time worrying about physical breaches of the building’s security, making sure that the company’s local network routers and PCs aren’t broken into by Internet nasties and trying to keep nutbag journalists from conducting satirical exercises outside their front door. But do they spend much time worrying about the in-building network controlling functions such as air conditioning? Probably not. However, if this article by Wired is any indication, perhaps they should be.

AFP questions Attorney-General for not switching off phone on plane

37
Oh, dear. It appears as though Australia's new Federal Attorney-General is at least as arrogant as the previous two. An article in the Daily Telegraph published late last week tells us that Mark Dreyfus, who replaced Nicola Roxon in the portfolio in February, refused to turn off his mobile phone in a recent flight and was subsequently met by the AFP when the plane landed.

Vic Govt splurges on IT in budget

8
Those of you with your eyes on public sector IT spending will no doubt be hanging out for next week's Federal Budget, where there are always a few multi-million-dollar gems laid out in terms of big-spending IT packages. However, it's not always the Federal Government which splurges on major IT projects, as this week's budget in Victoria showed.

ShoreTel iDevice dock: Is this actually useful?

11
We couldn't help but goggle when we received a media release yesterday from enterprise telephony vendor Shoretel pushing what the company dubs "the first enterprise-grade docking station for Apple iPad and iPhone".

Huston calls for active FTTP NBN

78
There are actually few Australians who your writer considers to be actual, verifiable experts on the current class of broadband technologies being debated as part of the National Broadband Network discussion. However, Geoff Huston is one of them.

The perfect demonstration of an NBN false dichotomy

169
We couldn't help but be amused by the brouhaha caused when smart cookie, self-confessed Liberal voter and Redditor James Brotchie created the very Web 2.0-ish site How Fast is the NBN, which attempts to graphically demonstrate the difference between the rival National Broadband Network policies of the two major sides of politics.

Did Conroy’s AFP filter wrongly block 1,200 sites?

18
According to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, it appears that the limited ISP-based filter which several of Australia’s major ISPs (Telstra, Optus and Vodafone so far) have implemented with the assistance of the Australian Federal Police may have suffered a massive false positive event in early April and wrongly blocked some 1,200 websites, including community group the Melbourne Free University.

Finally, a local Windows 8 tablet trial

1
News arrived last week courtesy of iTNews that the Tasmanian Police force is about to kick off a trial of Windows 8 tablets.

The undiscovered country: When a Microsoft fan goes Apple

10
Microsoft Office 365 MVP Loryan Strant reveals he's taking a walk on the wild side with Mac OS X and iOS.

They just keep on quitting: NBN Co loses wireless exec

23
NBN Co has lost the executive in charge of its wireless rollout, according to the Financial Review.

Sony Xperia Z tablet hits Australia

0
Sony’s last clutch of Android tablets, as with the offerings from virtually every other manufacturer, failed to make much of a dent on the Apple-dominated tablet market. However, Google’s recently had a series of hits with its Nexus line-up, and Samsung has also recently stepped up to the plate with its ‘Note’ series of tablets. Can Sony be the third party to succeed in breaking through in the hyper-competitive Android tablet market?

Tapestry.net picks up $400k investment

0
Not every Web 2.0 startup is for sexy young things who are devoted to sharing every instant of their “social universe” online. Some startups aim at different categories. A good example is Tapestry.net, which just picked up a cool $400k in investment from government group Commercialisation Australia.

News Ltd builds classifieds site on Google cloud

5
It's not often you see Google's App Engine mentioned in Australia in the context of cloud computing. However, at least one decently-sized implementation has surfaced, courtesy of Google Australia's blog this week.

Ludlam to do Reddit AMA this Wednesday night

11
Just a very brief message to let y'all know that Greens Senator, Communications Spokesperson and William Gibson fan Scott Ludlam is planning to open up his world to all and sundry this Wednesday night -- 15 May, from 7:30 to 9PM, for a Reddit AMA ('Ask Me Anything') session.

IT in the budget? Move along, not much to see

4
Curious about what technology-related iniatives came out last night's Federal Budget? So were we, given that the release of the budget had been being hyped for weeks (months?) by much of the mainstream media as part of its continual fixation on the fraught battle between the various sides of politics. However, unlike previous years, this yaer there wasn't much in the 2013 Federal Budget to interest technologists.

Alleged LulzSec hacker charged with trivial offence

5
Remember how the Australian Federal Police’s high-tech crime unit held a high-profile national press conference in late April to announce that they had charged a 24-year-old Australian man with hacking offences? Well, it was revealed today that the AFP has basically charged the man with … almost nothing.

Kogan loses licence in high-speed police chase

10
We know we’ve pinned Ruslan Kogan for a certain degree of … arrogance, previously, but we really didn’t expect the maverick online retail and consumer electronics guru to go quite this far in proving our point.

Google’s new Aussie MD: Zero tech/media experience

5
This morning search advertising and technology giant Google appointed a new managing director for its Australia and New Zealand division. While Maile Carnegie is a very seasoned executive with a few decades at consumer goods company Proctor & Gamble (P&G), we'd have to question her fitness to provide vision for Google's local operations ... given that the executive appears to have zero experience in either the technology or media industries, which is kind of where Google specialises.

Telstra suffers another data breach

5
It hasn’t been a good few years for the nation’s biggest telco Telstra when it comes to data breaches. It almost seems like every three to four months, there’s a new chunk of Telstra’s customer data leaked onto the public Internet, and the company has to make yet another apology to those affected, as well as kicking off another ‘review’ of its systems.

‘The filter is back’: Blocked site tells its story

4
In a lengthy piece on the ABC’s The Drum website this afternoon, the convenors of the Melbourne Free University site tell their story and argue that the situation with Australian Government website blocking is just not good enough.

32 years later, CGU replaces insurance IT platform

13
Think core banking platforms last a long time? Check out the gray hairs and wrinkles on the positively ancient insurance IT system which CGU is still running. This thing is so old it should be code-named 'Methuselah'.

Is FTTN vectoring just a pipe dream?

137
If you believe Shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull, a technology known as 'vectoring' has the potential to dramatically enhance the speed of a fibre to the node network such as the Coalition is planning to construct under its rival NBN policy. However, significant doubts have recently been raised as to the extent to which vectoring can be implemented in Australia -- and at what cost.

Retail POS startup Kounta kicks off investment

3
We're seeing a great deal of investment in Australian technology startups at the moment. After years in the wilderness after the dot com crash, the local funding scene appears to be running hot. The latest cab off the rank is point of sale startup Kounta, which last week announced it had kicked off its first venture round, with Reckon founder greg Wilkinson kicking in an unspecified amount and joining Kounta's board.

Optus launches TD-LTE 4G trial in Canberra

2
The nation's number two telco Optus has made a series of major announcements this morning regarding its 4G network, which now extends through five capital cities as well major regional centres such as the Gold Coast, Coffs Harbour and Byron Bay.

Australia’s universities hacked on a regular basis

1
Not all of the hype around IT security can be believed at the moment — several times when your writer has investigated so-called ‘hacking’ attacks in recent months, we’ve found only low-level script-kiddie-type of behaviour at the bottom of the situation. However, there definitely are some serious break-ins around, as chronicled in this somewhat disturbing article published in late April by citizen journalism site The Citizen.

‘Gross abuse of power’: IPA columnist condemns ASIC filtering

25
It seems that the move by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission to unilaterally decide to start blocking websites it deems to have illegal material has outraged basically everyone with any interest in the Internet in Australia. Perhaps one of the most outraged is Chris Berg, a research fellow with the Institute of Public Affairs, a long-time advocate for free speech, and, dare we say it, a thorn in the side of powerful government authorities exceeding their mandate.

Telstra set for massive internal restructure

7
Telstra tends to go through at least one to two major or minor restructuring rounds per year, and the cuts that the telco has announced internally appear to help align Telstra's costs to the more profitable and growing areas of its business, while taking resources away from areas where its losses are accelerating.

Ministerial request: Conroy wants Section 313 transparency options

11
According to Computerworld, Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has asked his department what can be done to provide more transparency around the government use of Section 313 notices under the Telecommunications Act (you know, the ones which financial regulator ASIC recently used to unilaterally block a cluster of websites).

Perpetual dumps CIO after Fujitsu outsourcing

3
It appears that the outsourcing arrangement between Perpetual and Fujitsu has gone well — so well, it appears, that Perpetual no longer believes it needs its chief information officer, Jenny Levy.

Surprise! Xbox One neutered for Australia

53
Look, I don’t know what y’all were expecting at this point. But if you’ve been reading Delimiter for a while, you may be aware that global technology giants do not always launch the same products in Australia that they launch internationally, they don’t always launch them at the same time, and they almost never launch them at the same price point. That’s why we’re not entirely surprised to find that some of the key features hyped this week as part of Microsoft’s Xbox One reveal won’t be available in Australia, at least initially.

HP forces MicroServer fan page offline?

9
Some of you may be aware that local IT professional Joel Dickins has for some time been running a rather useful Facebook page dedicated to the HP MicroServer, an excellent HP line which are used by many geeks in their households for varied duties from media serving to NAS functionality and so on. The only problem? HP has had the page taken offline.

3G ASUS 7″ Fonepad lands Down Under

5
ASUS announces that its 3G, 7" Fonepad has landed in Australia, at prices starting from $329.

Kindle Fire HD finally lands in Australia

6
Amazon has gradually been opening up its Kindle range to Australians, culminating in the news overnight that the Kindle Fire HD models are now available.

NEC keeps parliamentary IT services work

1
Remember how a damning report was published in October 2012 noting that the IT systems running Australia’s Federal Parliament were a complete shambles? Remember the litany of complaints which politicians and their staff filed with the Department of Parliamentary Services over the issue? Well, things might be gradually improving at the Parliament courtesy of its new chief information officer, but at least one thing is going to remain the same: The IT services firm servicing the politicians’ electorate offices.

Gillard watches Game of Thrones legally

54
This day had to come. Ladies and gentlemen, the science fiction and fantasy worlds so beloved by IT geeks the world around have now gone mainstream. The Guardian's Australian edition reports this morning that Prime Minister Julia Gillard is a huge fan of Game of Thrones, the popular TV adaptation of George R. R. Martin's excellent A Song of Ice and Fire epic series. And what's even more interesting is that the Prime Minister is watching Game of Thrones completely legally.

Govt updates on ICT strategy progress

0
This morning AGIMO’s Andrew McGalliard, from the agency’s governance and policy branch, published an update on the Government’s progress on delivering on the strategy, and contrary to my initial expectations, it appears as though there are in fact quite a few initiatives getting under way.

ASIO blueprints hacked, claims Four Corners

6
To the extent that you still trust Four Corners' reporting on the IT security scene, the program last night made a somewhat audacious claim: That international interests had successfully stolen the blueprints for the new Canberra headquarters of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO).

New Govt cloud computing strategy: Foggy, or healthy cumulus?

14
One could be forgiven for thinking that the word “cloud computing” is in vogue in Australian Governments at the moment.

NBN: Isn’t Siobhan McKenna just doing her job?

38
One can't help but be amused by the ruckus which the Financial Review newspaper has raised (and which the Opposition is echoing with vitriolic fervour) around the renewed attention which NBN Co's board has reportedly been paying towards the stewardship of the National Broadband Network Company.

Qld Education Dept buys 14k Win8 tablets

35
If you were the chief information officer of a major education department and wanted to deploy a mass tablet rollout to thousands of students, would you pick Apple’s dominant iPad platform, which owns the majority of the tablet market? Or perhaps you’d go with the fastest-growing competitor and pick Android? That’s probably what we’d do. However, Queensland’s Department of Education has ignored both these options and gone for a Windows 8 model from Acer.

Bulletproof poaches Rackspace MD

1
Australian hosting company Bulletproof poaches the local country manager of international hosting giant Rackspace.

NBN Co’s wireless rollout also behind

15
Bad news upon bad news is continuing to pile on for the Federal Government's National Broadband Network project. Hot upon the heels of the asbestos scandal which continues to plague Telstra as it remediates its pits and pipes for the NBN infrastructure, the Financial Review has reported this morning that the wireless component of the NBN rollout is also significantly behind.

Qld Health payroll gets another $384 million

8
Those of you who thought that the Queensland Health payroll debacle had gone away, think again. The LNP State Government landed its annual budget this week, and included in it is a massive dollop of change for the ailing project, which continues to bedevil the department and the State Government at large, as well as the politicians and partners involved.

Defence has 200 Australian ‘datacentres’

12
A new revelation by the Department of Defence this week, as it gets ready to changeover its massive centralised processing contract, shows that some departments just have more legacy than others.

Quickflix lets users buy TV shows, including Game of Thrones

19
One of the disadvantages of an online IPTV service such as Quickflix is that up until now, you haven't been able to buy distinct television shows through the service to own permanently; users have only been able to get access to the shows they want if they're paying a monthly subscription. However, all this is set to change, according to a media release issued by Quickflix today.

Attanasio takes NSW RMS CIO role

0
Former Customs CIO Joe Attanasio takes up the equivalent role at NSW Roads and Maritime Services.

Future IT project fail? NSW Police gets COPS replacement funding

33
If you've been following state government IT in Australia for as long as I have, it starts to get easier and easier to see major IT project failures before they even happen. And NSW Police just popped up a doozy.

Was 7:30’s TCS takedown fair?

39
Was 7:30's attack on the 457 Visa practices of Indian IT services giant TCS last night fair? Or did it lack context?

Yet another disastrous Vic Govt IT project

25
I often think that things couldn’t possibly get any worse for State Government IT operations in Australia, considering that major audit reports in both Victoria and Queensland have found over the past year that the states are broadly incapable of delivering IT services and major IT projects to their departments and agencies. But every time I think that, things do get worse. Today’s new nightmare is a bungled student management system in Victoria’s TAFE colleges.

Double R18+ fail: State of Decay banned

18
It's times like these that we have to wonder what the point of Australia enacting an R18+ rating for video games is, when the Classification Board seems intent on banning popular games regardless.

Shock: Qld Govt succeeds in IT project

10
Police Minister Jack Dempsey announced yesterday that the Queensland Police Service had successfully delivered a new Online Crime Statistics Crime Portal that allows residents to access crime statistics for any area in the state, all through an interactive web portal.

IBM Australia jobs going across the Tasman? Great, says New Zealand

0
We can’t help but be amused by this article in New Zealand’s premiere business newspaper, the National Business Review. In it, veteran technology reporter Chris Keall lampoons an email received by subscribers of the Australian Financial Review, in which the paper’s editor in chief Michael Stutchbury laments IBM Australia’s decision to send jobs offshore, including to New Zealand.

NBN chair seeks Quigley replacement?

8
Indications continue to firm up that NBN Co chief executive Mike Quigley is not long for the position, despite the pivotal role he has played in getting the NBN -- Australia's largest-ever infrastructure project -- off the ground.

Apparently people still buy SPARC servers

19
According to a media release issued by Oracle Australia this morning, apparently SPARC servers are still in vogue. Who knew?

UNSW publishes detailed cloud/data sovereignty toolkit

3
The University of New South Wales's widely respected Cyberspace Law and Policy Centre has published what I would consider to be a very useful whitepaper investigating data sovereignty issues related to cloud computing in the Australian context.

iiNet threatens to ditch NBN altogether

56
In one of the more outlandish statements we've seen regarding the at-times fraught relationship between NBN Co and its bevy of retail ISPs (RSPs), the nation's number three fixed line telco iiNet has publicly threatened to walk away from its relationship with NBN Co, in a move which would mean NBN services would no longer be available through the telco.

Informa analyst slams NBN ‘political sideshow’

25
We can’t help but agree with wise comments by seasoned Informa telecommunications analyst Tony Brown. In an opinionated article, Brown broadly argues that the NBN is pretty much a normal infrastructure project — but that the political debate swirling around it has obscured the actual project and outcomes.

Will a Coalition Govt pump IT outsourcing?

4
Those of you will long memories will recall that it was the Howard administration which first kicked the Federal Government into gear back in 1997 in terms of the now-common practice of outsourcing key IT services to the private sector. And now there are fears an Abbott administration could push down that road strongly again.

Watch this space

54
Over the next two days (today and Thursday), Delimiter will be on a publishing hiatus, while we work on a substantial other project behind the scenes, entitled Delimiter 2.0. If really important news breaks, then we will cover it, but for this two day period most of our energies will be going towards a separate project.

Can agency-led innovation help transcend failing Whole of Government ICT strategies?

9
According to Ovum research director Steve Hodgkinson, there are lessons to be learnt from the poor outcomes of whole of government ICT strategies in Australia; revolving around the need for innovation to be pushed through individual departments.

China’s Aussie ambassador denies Huawei spying

23
If someone has some direct evidence that Huawei has been spying for the Chinese Government, then let them come forward with that evidence. So far all we have is hearsay and innuendo. And that is not enough, as Huawei and China’s Ambassador to Australia have clearly stated, when we’re talking about billion dollar contracts and the reputation of one of the world’s largest technology vendors. As Huawei has said, on this issue, “put up, or shut up”.

Chinese spy concerns: Key Australian defence agencies ban Lenovo

47
According to the Financial Review, PCs made by Lenovo have been banned from the “secret” and ‘‘top secret” ­networks of the intelligence and defence services of Australia, the US, Britain, Canada, and New Zealand, due to similar spying concerns as have been published about Chinese networking vendor Huawei.

Wollongong club group ditches email

10
Matt O’Hara, a club owner in Wollongong, has largely gotten rid of email for good, and is reportedly happier for it.

Yes, the AFR’s Lenovo story is still accurate

41
Right now, without saying where we have obtained our information, it seems clear that the Financial Review's report on this issue is broadly accurate. In short, although the specifics of the ban are unclear, the newspaper is correct that Lenovo machines are not used in certain areas of Defence.

Brisbane City Council loses CIO Brant

3
Brisbane City Council chief information officer Nicholas Brant is to leave the organisation, right as Brisbane, the largest council organisation in Australia is in the middle of several major technology initiatives, including offshoring a substantial number of IT roles, shifting some work into the cloud and spending $353 million on a comprehensive, SAP-based businesses administration system.

Federal Govt releases big data strategy

0
The Federal Government has this afternoon released the formal version of its whole of government big data strategy, which whole of government chief information officer Glenn Archer and others in the Canberra public sector have been working on for some time.

Crystal ball gazing? Politics? AFR claims NBN Co will miss 2014 targets

21
Just how far out ahead is NBN Co able to predict the progress of its network rollout? Quite far, according to the Financial Review newspaper, which this morning published a front page article claiming it had seen internal projections that already stated NBN Co would miss its June 2014 rollout targets.

Cloud, Windows 8 may sneak into Canberra through Tourism Australia

0
At least one Federal Government agency, Tourism Australia, may be on the verge of taking the cloud computing plunge on multiple fronts.

NBN Co’s constant network launches: Breaching the Caretaker Conventions?

24
Over the past week, the National Broadband Network Company has held no less than five launch events to mark the switch-on of its fibre network infrastructure in Queensland and Western Sydney, locations which will be critical to the Australian Labor Party if it is to retain power in the upcoming Federal Election. All of the events have been dominated by the attendance of Labor politicians, and have been broadly interpreted by the media as being election campaign events. NBN Co claims the events are just business as usual, but even if that's true, Labor is still using them to gain a massive election boost.

No matter who wins the election, here’s why Telstra should build the NBN

63
The issue of how the National Broadband Network should be rolled out is an extremely fraught and highly debated one. But one thing has become very clear over the past several years: The rollout has not progressed as fast as Labor said it would; in fact, far from it. One reason for this may be that the organisation with the most expertise in rolling out telco networks hasn’t participated in the construction effort, unlike in virtually every other country in the world. If we want this rollout to happen, it is definitely time to turn back to Telstra to get this thing done.

WikiLeaks Party implodes, candidates quit

18
WikiLeaks Senate candidate Leslie Cannold quits the party, alleging impropriety in its internal processes.

WA Govt puts one foot in the cloud

0
We're gradually seeing government departments and agencies around Australia deploy bits and pieces from the huge kit-bag collectively known as cloud computing. It's been a slow journey, but it's getting there. News of new steps in the Western Australian Government comes this week from iTNews, which reports on several small cloud-based projects which have recently taken place.

HP brings SAP’s hosted HANA on-shore

0
SAP and HP announced this morning that they would be provided HANA as a service, and (for once), Australia is the first location globally to be able to access it.

Fujitsu/SAP project goes off the rails in NT

11
An IT project go off the rails in Australia? One involving a government department? Off the rails in terms of its project implementation timeframe and its budget? And most of the problem stemmed from its poor project management and governance structures? Who would have thought that this could possibly happen in a million years?

NAB loses CIO Denis McGee

0
As reported by half a dozen media outlets over the past 24 hours, long-time National Australia Bank senior IT executive Denis McGee, who has most recently held the post of chief information officer, has resigned.

Getting beyond the cloud hype: A great interview with DFAT’s CIO

5
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade CIO Tuan Dao talks about his belief for cloud computing technologies, while also noting that he doesn't buy into the hype around the new paradigm.

Telstra trialling 450Mbps 4G, says AFR

15
It’s only been a couple of months since mobile carrier Vodafone started claiming it’s got Australia’s fastest mobile broadband network, and although our tests show it has some basis to the claim, it appears it’s not a claim Telstra is going to take sitting down. The Financial Review newspaper reports this morning that the big T is testing mobile broadband speeds up to 450Mbps.

$530m telco deal: ANZ Bank re-signs Optus

0
Those of you with long memories will recall that one of Optus’s most significant corporate telecommunications deals in Australia was signed back in May 2009 with Australia and New Zealand Banking Group. Well, it looks as though ANZ must be at least a little happy with Optus, as yesterday morning the bank issued a joint media release with the telco noting it had resigned the deal for another five years, in a contract worth $530 million.

People power: NBN dissent raises its head

27
With the election over, there is a growing body of evidence that more mainstream dissent against the Coalition's inferior fibre to the node-based policy is growing fast. There's suddenly a new public enemy #1, when it comes to broadband. And his name is Malcolm Turnbull.

How NBN spite has damaged the Turnbull brand: Get a free Delimiter 2.0 article

0
It’s been several months now since we launched Delimiter 2.0 with a subscription model. Since it’s been a while, we thought it might be a good time to give those who have yet to subscribe a taste of what they’re missing. This morning we disabled the paywall on one specific article, entitled: Conduct unbecoming: How NBN spite has damaged the Turnbull brand.

Following CenITex: NSW may outsource ServiceFirst functions

0
The NSW Government has finally confirmed it is looking to follow Victoria with CenITex and may outsource key chunks of the IT shared services work being done by ServiceFirst and Businesslink.

NSW, SA lose Health CIOs

2
From Intermedium this morning comes news that health departments in both South Australia and New South Wales are looking for new chief information officers, with their long-time incumbents departing and making way for new public servants in their roles.

Why Simon Hackett should be on the NBN board

52
There's no doubt about it: Internode founder Simon Hackett is a perfect candidate to sit on NBN Co's board, and what's more, he has the time these days to make a solid contribution.

This is what happens with vertically integrated monopolies

26
If you were under any illusions about Telstra's nature as a vertically integrated telecommunications monopoly being wholly intact in Australia, just case your eye over what's happening with the ongoing attempts by Foxtel to launch its own broadband service in Australia.

NAB moves website into Amazon cloud

0
In an article in The Australian newspaper this morning, it was revealed that NAB had switched its entire public-facing website into Amazon’s cloud (excluding, of course, sensitive areas such as Internet banking).

NBN Board: Turnbull not taking his own advice

0
If you've been following the ongoing speculation around who, precisely, new Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull is planning to appoint to his refreshed NBN Co board, you will be aware that the Member for Wentworth has been beating a constant drum about NBN Co's board needing more talent with direct experience rolling out telecommunications networks. The only problem is, Turnbull doesn't appear to be taking his own advice.

Um … what? No open tender for Qld’s cloud email

15
Queensland IT Minister Ian Walker has been vocal about wanting to adopt a whole of government email platform based on cloud computing, rather than the internally-deployed approach that failed Queensland last time around. The only problem is, according to iTNews, now that the state has decided to progress with a cloud-based email platform, it's not doing so via open tender.

Why NBN Co should finish Tassie FTTP rollout

0
If you've been reading Australia's technology media recently, you will not have been able to escape the fact that quite a few people in Tasmania are more than a little bit unhappy about the fact that they may not get the Fibre to the Premises-based National Broadband Network they were promised. Well, as I argue on Delimiter 2.0 this afternoon, the FTTP-based NBN rollout should proceed as planned, due to the specific situation in the state.

Turnbull stacks NBN Review with Telstra cronies

0
You can find my thoughts on Justin Milne and other recent NBN appointments under the new Coalition Federal Government in a piece published on Delimiter 2.0 this morning that I titled 'Stacking the deck: NBN Review filled with Turnbull cronies'.

AAPT is up for sale … yet again

9
The Financial Review reports today that Telecom New Zealand is once again trying to offload its AAPT asset (when is it not?)

Exposing whistleblowers: AFP logs phone calls of MPs + journos

8
Are you a journalist or a politician? Do you use your telephone to have private conversations about sensitive information? You do? That seems logical, given the position that you're in. Well, you may want to have a re-think about just how private that avenue of communication is, given that the Australian Federal Police recently revealed it occasionally examines the call logs of MPs and journalists (without their knowledge) in an attempt to track down whistleblowers or leakers within the Government.

Corruption raises its ugly head in Australia’s technology sector

0
The newspaper alleged, and Leighton has substantially verified, the fact that staff from Visionstream were suspected of aiding Silcar staff in stealing Visionstream tender files relating to a $240 million contract to deploy Optus’s 4G network, which the two contractors were competing to bid. I’ll have a separate article on that situation shortly. What you may not realise is that this not an isolated incident.

Federal education dept in major AWS cloud pilot

2
It's not often you see examples of cloud computing deployments in major Federal Government departments. With the exception, it turns out, of the Federal Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, which went a little cloud-crazy before it was split in two after the Federal Election.

Bedevilled by politicians: Tasmania’s 12-year FTTP failure

0
You may not realise it unless you’re a Taswegian, but Labor’s National Broadband Network policy is not the first time residents of the state have been promised a Fibre to the Premises rollout by politicians. Nor is it the second time. In fact, the current NBN promises with regard to Tasmania are the end result of at least 12 years of political pledges made to residents in businesses in the state that they would get better broadband.

Another view of Greg Adcock’s appointment

1
If you were reading Delimiter and Delimiter 2.0 yesterday, you may have seen that we took a fairly strong view on the departure of NBN Co chief operating officer Ralph Steffens and the appointment of Telstra’s NBN lead executive Greg Adcock in his place. However, in the interest of balance, and with particular reference to our new formal Code of Ethics published last night, we believe it’s worth alerting readers to another side of this story.

BoQ, AMP open up major IT outsourcing deals

1
Wow. It's been a huge week or so in Australia's financial services IT scene, with revelations that two massive, long-running IT outsourcing deals which have been in place for a decade or more may be finally opened up to rivals.

Yet another major Australian bank goes hard with Amazon cloud

6
It seems like it was only yesterday that Australia’s major financial services organisations were holding their noses and sniffing at the bad smell that they associated with ‘low-grade’ cloud computing services operated by offshore technology giants such as Amazon Web Services. It was only last month that it was revealed that National Australia Bank had switched its entire public-facing website into Amazon’s cloud, and this week Suncorp joined the throng, planning what The Australian describes as a “complete transfer” into the cloud.

Tasmanians have copper cut off before NBN connected

16
You would think ... you would really think, that there would be no possible way that NBN Co, Telstra and retail ISPs like Eftel could so badly coordinate the changeover process from Telstra's copper network to NBN Co's fibre network that any resident could be left without telecommunications access. You would think.

Turnbull reportedly hires Henry Ergas for NBN cost/benefit analysis

25
If you were seeking to hire independent experts to conduct a cost/benefit analysis on an important piece of national infrastructure, you would probably seek to hire, well, experts who were independent, right? Experts who hadn't previously formed a fixed view on what would be the best way to deploy that infrastructure? Wrong, at least if you're Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull.

Worst CIO job in Australia?

14
Spare a thought for Eija Seittenranta, who was appointed Department of Parliamentary Services chief information officer in January this year. Not only did Seittenranta find the department’s IT operations to be an absolute shambles when she arrived, but the poor IT executive has to contend with feisty parliamentarians such as Greens Senator Scott Ludlam, who took Seittenranta to task in this extraordinary Senate Estimates hearing (we recommend you watch the video) about the fact that the US National Security Agency may have a back door into the Microsoft software used at Parliament House.

Xbox One goes off with a bang … but will the PS4 launch eclipse...

15
Which console launch are you most excited about, and why? Am I right that the PlayStation 4 has most of the momentum at this point? Or is underdog Microsoft making a comeback with the Xbox One?

“Maddening, dispiriting, radically unbalanced”: A full legal analysis of the TPP leaks

4
In Australian intellectual property circles, there are few names which are more respected than that of Kimberlee Weatherall. That’s why we were personally thrilled to learn that Weatherall has recently published a mammoth blow by blow analysis of the enforcement provisions contained in the recently leaked draft of the Trans-Pacific Partnership IP chapter.

CommBank CIO rich enough to buy own island

4
Just how rich is Commonwealth Bank chief information officer Michael Harte? Rich enough to buy his own mediterranean island, according to Ninemsn, which today detailed the executive's attempt to buy the island of Budelli off the coast of Italy.

Super funds botch major technology project

0
Sometimes it appears as though Australia's Federal and State Governments are the only ones botching major IT projects. And that makes sense, given the frequency of IT project failure in the public sector, and the public nature of the audit reports which examine them. But the private sector also has its failures, as the Financial Review chronicles this week with respect to a number of major superannuation funds.

Slow day ahead! Your mileage may vary

4
Apologies, but you're not going to see a lot of stories from Delimiter today. I'll be spending the rest of the day thinking and planning, with a view to making Delimiter better in future. In fact, there's been a fair bit of this going on this week in general.

Defence finally allows staff iPhones, iPads

21
iOS is generally considered a very secure and modern mobile platform — certainly more secure than Android and a heap more modern and functional than BlackBerry’s various offerings. Yet it has taken five years for the Department of Defence to allow its staff to procure iOS devices.

Payroll disaster: Queensland sues IBM

3
The Queensland Government has been threatening to sue technology giant IBM over the Queensland Health payroll systems debacle for years, and who could blame it? Well, the only problem is that the former Labor Government actually already settled with IBM over the issue due several years ago to the need to get the system up and running. Despite this, the LNP administration in Queensland confirmed overnight that it had taken IBM to court.

Screwed: Australian PS4, Xbox One lack basic functionality

27
Are you one of those Australians who lined up at midnight to buy some of the first next-generation video game consoles to go on sale? Have you spent some time exploring your new PlayStation 4 or Xbox One? Then you would be aware that when it comes to Australian support for their new consoles, both Sony and Microsoft appear to have screwed Australians pretty badly.

Ingogo picks up another $3.4m funding

0
What this investment, as well as the planned ASX listing and its past healthy fundraising efforts, shows is that ingogo is pulling in substantial revenues.

Vodafone’s Morrow new NBN Co CEO: AFR

11
Wondering who the new National Broadband Network chief executive will be? So are we, and reportedly we're going to find out very shortly.

Please accept my apologies: I was wrong about Malcolm Turnbull

189
I am here today to formally apologise. I was wrong to have faith in Malcolm Turnbull and the Coalition on this issue. You were all right. Turnbull does indeed appear to be attempting to "demolish" the NBN.

Fascinating case study about open source cloud

0
Most of the cloud computing stories we hear about involve major vendors. You know the ones we're talking about: VMware, Microsoft, Salesforce.com, Amazon and so on. These are household names. But what you may not realise is that there are other options out there for building cloud computing stacks. And some of them are not based on proprietary technologies and vendor lock-in at all.

Qantas can’t afford to replace 26-year-old IT system

10
So, it turns out the Queensland and New South Wales Governments are not the only major Australian organisations running short of much-needed cash when it comes to critical IT upgrades. According to the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper, national carrier Qantas also can’t afford to keep its IT up to spec.

NBN Strategic Review shows FTTP still very viable

41
If you believe NBN Co executive chairman Ziggy Switkowski and Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull, the NBN Strategic Review released last week is all about re-using HFC cable, implementing Fibre to the Node and minimising the use of Fibre to the Premises. However, a close reading of the document shows that it also finds that Labor’s original FTTP vision can still be delivered very affordably and in a timely manner.

SA Govt under constant cyberattack, claims CIO

3
South Australia's outgoing whole of government chief information officer Andrew Mills, who this month took up the same role in Queensland, has dramatically revealed the extent to which the state's IT infrastructure is being targeted by online attacks against.

Video games are art: And this awesome Kickstarter project will prove it

6
The debate over whether video games can be classified as art has been a long and bitterly fought one. To explore this issue in greater depth and champion the idea that games can have artistic merit, Australian gaming journalist Matt Sainsbury has started a Kickstarter project to fund the development of an in-depth, 200 page, premium quality hardcover book which will tie in conversations with some of the gaming industry's artistic titans.

Victorian agency reports schoolboy to police for informing it of IT security hole

20
Public Transport Victoria has reportedly reported a 16-year-old Melbourne schoolboy to Victoria Police for merely informing it of substantial security holes in its IT infrastructure.

TPG’s PIPE Networks anti-competitive? Who would have thought?

15
If you didn’t laugh, you’d have to cry. Your writer has watched with great amusement over the past week as Megaport chief executive Bevan Slattery has been bitterly complaining about the fact that TPG Telecom has blocked certain types of third-party access to PIPE Networks’ datacentres. You can find Slattery’s problems outlined here on the blog of Megaport, which aims to build an interconnection fabric between various carriers and cloud computing providers.

NBN Strategic Review misrepresents HFC adoption

26
Those of you who’ve actually read the National Broadband Network Company’s Strategic Review document will be aware that, as I wrote in late December (Delimiter 2.0 link), it’s actually surprisingly favourable to use cases involving ubiquitous fibre broadband being deployed around Australia. Although it’s the Coalition’s preferred HFC/Fibre to the Node-focused ‘Multi-Technology Mix’ approach which has gotten all the airplay, in actual fact the document itself is quite positive to the use of Fibre itself. Telco commentator David Braue reminds us of this fact in a well-written piece for ZDNet.

99designs co-founder directly siphoning Aussie IT talent to Silicon Valley

5
Heard the term "Australian brain-drain"? You're probably not going to see a more blatant attempt at it than this.

MacTalk founder’s Love Letter to the Mac

11
As you might have noticed, Apple is currently celebrating the 30th anniversary of the birth of the Macintosh. Anthony Agius, the founder of Australian Apple forum MacTalk and long-time Mac lover, has posted what he bills as "a love letter for the Mac" on his blog.

Toshiba Chromebooks hit Australia

2
Japanese electronics giant Toshiba has announced its Chromebook laptops are available in Australia. Announced at CES 2014 in Las Vegas earlier this month, the devices ship with a 13.3" display and run Google's Chrome OS operating system. Australian recommended retail price will be $399.

Voda Win: Vodafone’s back, baby

0
You might have noticed that there's a decidedly positive tenor to the announcements which ailing mobile telco Vodafone Australia has been making recently. The company's leadership in 4G mobile broadband speeds, its appointment of a qualified executive from Europe to replace outgoing leader Bill Morrow, and this morning, the news that it has a million customers on its 4G network.

Lenovo’s IBM server + Motorola buys will raise new security questions

4
Remember when the Financial Review reported in August that devices manufactured by Chinese vendor Lenovo (including its extremely popular ThinkPad line) had been banned from use in the “secret” and “top secret” networks of the intelligence and defence services of Australia, the US, Britain, Canada and New Zealand, because of similar espionage concerns as have been leveled at Chinese networking vendor Huawei? Well, Australian government agencies just got a whole new kettle of fish to worry about, with two key acquisitions by Lenovo which have taken place over the past week or so.

NT gives every police officer an iPad

2
The Northern Territory has reportedly confirmed plans to deploy Apple iPads to all of its frontline officers, in the latest local wide-scale deployment of tablet technology in a police force.

Great debate on the lack of diversity in IT startups

4
Clune's right: Australia's IT startup scene is predominantly composed of white, middle class males, a physical form which venture capitalists usually identify with. But Liubinskas is also right: Things are more complicated than that in real life, and opportunities do abound for the passionate or determined, regardless of who they are. Perhaps the passion and diversity in this debate do much to illustrate the sector as a whole.

Australia’s IT industry just isn’t sexy enough

8
Those of you who've been following Delimiter over the past several days might have noticed that I've gotten a little bit on my high horse over the issue of industry subsidies. I was a little shocked by the massive national ruckus created by the request by fruit processor SPC Ardmona for millions of dollars worth of government assistance for its plant in Shepparton, Victoria, when larger issues in the nation's technology sector are almost completely ignored. Today I've published a further view on the issue on the ABC's The Drum site, arguing that it's because the IT industry just isn't sexy enough.

Telstra to offshore another 1,000, says AFR

0
Thought Telstra was finished with its wide-ranging outsourcing and offshoring initiatives? Not by half, if a report in the Financial Review newspaper this morning is to be believed.

Union issues ‘please explain’ on 400 Sensis job cuts

1
Well, it didn’t take long. Just one month (one month!) after Telstra agreed to sell 70 percent of its ailing directories and advertising business Sensis to US-based private equity firm Platinum Equity, up to 400 jobs are reportedly set to be cut at the division.

Woolworths dumping Windows for Chrome OS

37
Huge news coming from Computerworld today with respect to retail chain Woolworths, which is reportedly set to switch 85 percent of its PCs across to Google's Chrome OS operating system, shifting off Windows in the process.

Ludlam a hot bachelor with “magnificent” hair

14
If you've been following the technology portfolio in politics for a while now, you'll know that we're pretty much spoilt for choice when it comes to the physical attractiveness of our representatives. Certain women of your writer's acquaintance have been heard to refer to Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull as "the Silver Fox", for instance, while Senator Kate Lundy has always been a favourite amongst the gentlemen. But now there's a new entrant onto the scene: Greens Communications Spokesperson Scott Ludlam.

AUSTRAC tracks every AUD-Bitcoin conversion

5
The Australian Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre (AUSTRAC) admitted in a Senate Estimates session in Canberra this week that it is literally tracking every conversion between Bitcoins and Australian dollars. Wow. Talk about privacy-invasive.

Reality check: Tasmanian overhead FTTP trials have already been done

20
As the Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union argues today in an extremely valid point, there's no real need for more overhead FTTP trials in Tasmania -- those have already been done. I'd like to hear an answer from the Minister as to why we need more trials of overhead FTTP infrastructure in the Apple isle, when so much work along these lines has already been done.

Cloud: It’s about opportunities, not obstacles

2
One of the key messages that is coming out of the cloud computing camp at the moment is the concept that those who are thinking about this new paradigm of IT infrastructure purely through the lens of the old are missing out on the opportunities that it offers. A good piece on the issue comes from Rackspace Asia-Pacific chief technology officer Alan Perkins, formerly an influential chief information officer who had been an early cloud pioneer in Australia.

IBM Australia to reportedly slash 500 staff

7
The new year has not started well for Australian technologists in terms of the jobs situation. Qantas is cutting IT workers, Sensis is cutting workers, Telstra is cutting workers, the Victorian Government is looking into offshoring, and now, according to The Australian newspaper, IBM Australia has embarked on another major redundancy round.

Telstra wants its foreign ownership rules reviewed

11
In the wake of the news that the Federal Government will try to weaken some areas of Qantas' foreign ownership rules in an effort to provide the airline with a level playing field with Virgin, Telstra chief executive David Thodey has called for the same debate to be held with respect to Telstra.

Hitting the pause button on Delimiter 2.0

13
Delimiter 2.0's model is proven, and it's a viable slice of the Delimiter business which is expanding. In an age where media outlets have struggled with revenue models, it represents a little bright spot, and I may come back to it one day, at the right time. However, as with all businesses, I have to face facts and invest my time where the greatest return on investment is to be found. Right now, and in the short to medium-term, that's definitely Delimiter 1.0.

Huge Chrome OS success for Fire + Rescue NSW

2
Those among you with longish memories will recall the slight hullaballoo which emergency services agency Fire and Rescue NSW caused in November 2012 when it revealed it had dumped plans to deploy new traditional PCs throughout its operations in New South Wales, opting instead for a widespread deployment of 400 units of Google's Chromebox cloud-based desktop platform. Well, according to to the group's IT director Richard Host, the rollout has been a huge success.

Did Apple shift $9bn of profits out of Australia?

19
The Financial Review newspaper reports that Apple has shifted some $9 billion in profits out of Australia, avoiding a normal tax situation being applied to them.

SA Police want face recognition CCTV everywhere

10
I'd just like to be able to pop down to the shops quickly now and then for a packet of chips without some police system automatically scanning my face for matches with some massive crime database. Is that too much to ask?

IT security as a service explodes in Australia

9
A very interesting article on Techworld last week highlights the fact that IT security as a service is currently exploding in Australia, with smarter, sleeker, cloud-based alternatives to the old models coming to the fold.

Virgin wants in on Australian IPTV scene

9
It seems that no matter where you look, someone is trying to fix the Australian Internet television market. Attorney-General George Brandis, as his Labor predecessor Mark Dreyfus did before him, is trying to block Internet piracy. Quickflix and FetchTV are still trying to create viable competitors to Foxtel's pay TV operation. And Foxtel itself is obviously trying to make as much hay as possible while its sun still shines. Into this fraught situation comes Richard Branson's Virgin Group.

Comcare goes cloud for DR

0
Cloud computing projects in the Federal Government are a little thin on the water these days, despite the fact that the previous Labor administration tried to push for further adoption in the public sector, and despite the fact that cloud is all the rage in state governments at the moment. That's why we're particularly interested in this little gem posted by Australian Government chief technology officer John Sheridan on his blog today.

Telstra pays tiddlywinks for huge privacy breach

6
We can't help but suspect that the telco considers itself to have gotten off relatively scot-free from the debacle, paying an infringement notice of only $10,200 in relation to its contravention of an earlier direction on the issue by the Australian Communications and Media Authority.

‘Severe impact’: Rival FTTB plans worry NBN Co

17
If the Coalition had stuck with Labor's largely Fibre to the Premises NBN policy, of course, all this wouldn't be an issue. Talk about unintended consequences. Setting regulatory frameworks can often be like this; you need to think through several steps ahead, especially when it comes to a long-term project such as building a national broadband network.

Devine accuses Ludlam of “viral hate speech”

36
Just when you think you've seen it all in Australia's mediasphere -- all the crazy and technically illiterate pronouncements from radio shock jocks, all the denouncements of Labor's NBN policy from right-wing bloggers and so on -- something new appears to prove that still more can be dredged from the depths.

Vic Govt mulls choose your own device policy

1
When it comes to working in government departments and agencies, you know the drill when it comes to personal IT infrastructure. Public servants are typically issued with an ageing desktop PC bought about five years ago and running Windows XP (or sometimes, God forbid, Windows Vista), a BlackBerry for their mobile phone, and they'll have to argue with their IT support team to get permission to install something as basic as Mozilla Firefox. We've all been there at one time or another. However, if an article published by Intermedium last week is to be believed, the Victorian Government is seeking to shake this paradigm up.

IT upheaval at Qantas as IBM wins big

3
Remember how embattled airline Qantas revealed plans in late February to cut some $200 million out of its technology budget over the next three years? It seemed at the time like an impossible dream that the company would never be able to achieve. Well, The Australian has published what appears to be Qantas’ comprehensive roadmap for hitting its goals. As the newspaper writes, the solution is … outsourcing everything to IBM.

Victorian tries to fly drugs into prison with drone

7
Australia’s law enforcement agencies have for some time now been demonstrating their interest in using remotely controlled drones to tackle crime. The military already uses them, South Australia’s police force went to market for a whole bunch last November, and Queensland Police is also keen on the technology. But what the law may not have quite anticipated is the degree to which criminals are also interested in using drones for their own, not quite as legal purposes.

Bitcoin miner lists on ASX

3
If you needed any further indication that we now live in the science fiction future long ago mapped out for us by visionary authors, then look no further. News arrived this week that an Australian digital currency company and Bitcoin mining concern, digitalBTC, has listed on the Australian Stock Exchange through a backdoor listing.

Great article series on Australian DevOps/agile

0
If you've spent any time working in the global technology industry over the past five years, it would have been pretty hard to miss the growing importance of the 'DevOps' movement -- in short, the increasingly powerful attempt to break down the traditional disconnect between 'development' and 'operations' activity within IT shops, particularly associated with agile development techniques. So what's happening in Australia in this area? iTNews has this morning published several excellent feature articles on this topic, and we recommend you spend this morning reading them instead of actually doing work.

Coalition faces internal e-safety dissent

3
Remember how the new Coalition Federal Government issued a detailed discussion paper in mid-January canvassing various options through which it can deal with the issue of children’s safety on the Internet, including the potential establishment of a children’s e-safety commissioner? Of course you do. Well, now Malcolm Turnbull’s Parliamentary Secretary Paul Fletcher, who is spearheading the policy, is facing opposition from a new front: Coalition MPs.

Delimiter is giving away a Nexus 5!

8
As you may know, we're big fans of Google's Nexus line-up in general here at Delimiter towers. Nexus 4, Nexus 7, Nexus 10 ... we love pretty much anything Nexus. Because of this, and because we're still seeking to boost our newsletter subscriber numbers, today we're kicking off a new competition to give away one of Google's new Nexus 5 smartphones.

50 awesome Australian female programmers

1
Over at Pollenizer, long-time startup industry figure Bronwen Clune has published a list of Australia's top 50 female programmers.

ATO may investigate Apple, Google

7
Remember that year when search giant Google made revenues from its Australian operations estimated at north of $1 billion, but paid corporate taxes of just $74,000? Or the year that Apple made $6.1 billion in revenue but paid just $36 million in corporate tax? Yeah, good times, good times. Well, the good times may well be over for these technology giants, with the ABC reporting that the Australian Taxation Office has (finally) set up a dedicated task force to tackle the situation.

Quelle surprise! Cisco supports a HFC cable NBN

20
Call me cynical, call me a jaded old journalist who’s seen too much in his short life, call me suspicious, but I have to say I wasn’t precisely surprised to see the news that US-based networking equipment giant Cisco Systems is spruiking the benefits of a National Broadband Network project based on HFC cable technology. After all, Cisco does have a sizable business selling HFC cable equipment, especially in the US, the global home of HFC cable.

Surprise! Govt botched NDIS IT systems

4
A government department botching the delivery of a new IT platform? Shocking, I know. This has never, ever happened before. Unbelievable. Today's public sector IT blunder comes from the pages of Intermedium, which tells us that the National Disability Insurance Scheme developed by the previous Government has been hamstrung by the poor quality of the IT systems put together to support it.

New $50m fund to target Aussie IT startups

2
If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: Now is a fantastic time to be involved in an Australian IT startup. It used to be that it was tough to find finding for great new ideas in the Australian technology sector, but the plethora of sizable investment deals over the past several years proven that the local funding environment has changed substantially.

Blizzard finally starts adding Australian servers

14
Those of you who've been long-term fans of the excellent video games produced by Blizzard Entertainment (StarCraft, World of Warcraft, Diablo) will recall that Australians have been fighting for many years to get the company to set up local servers to service the multi-player aspects of its games. Well, Blizzard has finally cracked, and Diablo III is the first cab off the rank to get the local seal of approval.

Ludlam wants Senate to question Assange, Snowden

6
Greens senator Scott Ludlam is reportedly trying to have Edward Snowden and Julian Assange called before a parliamentary committee to give evidence into what they might know about mass surveillance of Australian citizens.

Could Turnbull truly become the “Earl” of Wentworth?

18
Seasoned Delimiter readers will know that your writer is fond of gently teasing Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull over his aristocratic bearing, by use of several honorifics. At times we have dubbed the Liberal MP 'the Duke of Double Bay', 'the Viscount of Vaucluse' and so on. But by far the most common title we have awarded to Turnbull has been one that made it onto the floors of Parliament this week.

Introducing Australia’s (eventual) game classification system

2
Those of you with a long memory will recall that Australia’s video game classification systems hasn’t precisely always been without controversy. Well, in what looks like a good move on the surface, Australia appears set to join a new international system for video game classification.

Forget it, Australia: No Amazon Fire TV for you

13
Global content Amazon giant overnight unveiled Fire TV, an Apple TV-like set-top device which is designed to stream movies, TV shows to consumers' televisions, as well as providing video game functionality. However, as with many of Amazon's product launches in the past, there appear to be no immediate plans to ship the device to Australia.

Madness? Holmesglen TAFE upgrades GroupWise

29
It’s been a while since I’ve seen any Australian organisation of any kind have any words of praise for Novell’s ailing GroupWise collaboration suite. The trend is overwhelmingly that organisations are continually ditching it for alternatives, typically Microsoft’s Outlook/Exchange platform. However, if an article published by ZDNet is to be believed, at least one organisation is sticking with the Novell warhorse.

Govt seeks private/public big data proposals

0
Interested in working with the Federal Government's massive datasets? Got a knack for making meaningful information out of huge piles of numbers and letters? I've got some good news for you. The Australian Government Information Management Office is looking for proposals for joint projects between the public and private sector that will leverage big data technologies.

Why broadband is too important to be left to the private sector

7
Vox Media in the US has recently published a fascinating interview with Susan Crawford, former Special Assistant to President Obama on Science, Technology, and Innovation Policy. In it, Crawford expresses a view very similar to that taken by the Australian Labor Party — that the development of broadband is too important to be left to the profit-focused private sector.

Finally some action on Windows Azure in Australia

8
Remember when software giant Microsoft made a big deal back in May 2013 about how it was going to launch two new Australian datacentres for its Windows Azure cloud computing service? At the time it seemed as though the company’s plans were quite advanced and that we’d be seeing Australia-based Azure in short order. Well, almost a year has come and gone since that time and Microsoft has so far failed to deliver. The latest blip of news on the cloud front from the company comes in an article published by The Australian newspaper this morning.

Website blocks, court orders, three strikes: Rights holders want it all

20
So you've seen the reports about Federal Attorney-General George Brandis resuscitating the failed talks between ISPs and content owners about the pesky problem of Internet piracy? Have you ever wondered what measures the rights-holders feel should be taken to address such issues? Fear not, industry publication Mumbrella has published an extensive article detailing their demands. And it appears they want rather a lot.

Once again, Australia sets new Game of Thrones piracy record

15
It probably won't come as a surprise to those who have followed Game of Thrones piracy news over the past several years (an important genre in technology journalism in its own right), but Australia appears to have set a new record in terms of copyright infringement of the flagship HBO series.

Hospital IT booking system ‘putting lives at risk’

7
A new IT booking platform at the Austin Hospital and Olivia Newton-John Cancer and Wellness Centre in Melbourne is reportedly placing the welfare of patients with serious conditions at risk.

Businesslink cancelled Office 365 rollout

3
Microsoft has been on a bit of a tear recently in Australia with its cloud-based Office 365 platform, signing up major customers such as the Queensland Government, Qantas, V8 Supercars and rental chain Mr Rental. And it’s not hard to see why, with the platform’s hybrid cloud/traditional deployment model giving customers substantial options. However, as iTNews reported last week, it hasn’t been all plain sailing for Redmond in this arena.

Android in the enterprise: Three Aussie examples from Samsung

3
Forget iOS and Windows. Today we present three decently sized deployments of Android in the Australian market on Samsung's hardware, which the Korean vendor has dug up from its archives over the past several years for us after a little prompting :)

Hills dumped $18m ERP/CRM rollout for Salesforce.com

0
According to a blog post published by Salesforce.com today, one of Ted Pretty’s first moves upon taking up managing director role at iconic Australian brand Hills in 2012 was to halt an expensive traditional business software project and call Salesforce.com instead.

NBN Co considers third satellite

8
NBN Co is reportedly considering launching a third satellite in an effort to provide better broadband access to the small percentage of Australians in remote areas.

Cinema execs blame piracy for $20 ticket prices

43
If you've attended an Australian cinema recently, you'll be aware that $20 ticket prices are now a thing. If you just hit up a film every couple of weeks and avoid the cinema's high-priced junk food aisle (your writer habitually goes to Woolworths for some snacks beforehand), then this mark may not seem like such a huge deal. But if you throw a family into the mix, a night out at the movies can now seem a little too exorbitant for many. According to several cinema executives, one of the central reasons for the ongoing price increases is Internet piracy.

iiNet to splurge $350m on content, media

19
Over-the-top plays have not always gone well for Australia's telcos and Internet service providers. While the sector's big players -- Telstra, Optus, TPG, iiNet and Vodafone -- have proved themselves able at selling telecommunications services, in most cases they have also found it hard to make money from content or services sold over the top of their telco packages. But this doesn't appear to daunt iiNet, which tells the Financial Review this week that it has a war chest for just this purpose.

NBN questions needed for Q&A

34
I thought I would do a quick post noting that Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull will be appearing on the ABC's Q&A program tonight. If you have questions that you would like to see the Earl of Wentworth respond to, on any issue, but especially the hot button topic of broadband policy, then I recommend you submit those questions as soon as possible online here.

Google protecting pirates, says film giant

12
Film and entertainment giant Village Roadshow is decidedly unhappy with Google Australia for taking what the search giant believes is a realistic approach to dealing with Internet piracy. Go figure.

ATO considers how to tax Bitcoin

0
Those who have been wondering when the Australian Taxation Office would follow the US Internal Revenue Service and make a formal ruling on how cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin should be taxed now have an answer. According to the Financial Review (we recommend you click here for the full article), the ATO has just opened a review into the issue.

Danger, Will Robinson: Commission of Audit wants Centrelink core IT systems outsourced

45
Yours truly hasn't yet had the chance to comb through the recommendations contained in the Abbott administration's Commission of Audit report released this afternoon; that will take the better part of a week. However one notable item which has already been picked up by technology media outlet iTNews this afternoon is that the report includes some rather ... drastic recommendations for Centrelink's extremely complex and high maintenance core IT systems.

Brandis’ anti-piracy proposals hit Cabinet already

45
Remember how Federal Attorney-General George Brandis a while back publicly floated several ideas about how the Federal Government could tackle the thorny issue of Internet piracy? Remember how most people kind of assumed there would be some kind of consultation process where industry and hell, you know, ordinary Australians, could put forward views on the issue? Ah, those were the days. News arrived from the Sydney Morning Herald this morning that Brandis has already developed several proposals and is taking them to the Abbott Cabinet.

Defence dumps IBM from datacentre deal

0
Those of you who keep an eye on the extremely large IT purchasing habits of the Department of Defence will recall that the Department has had a long-running tendering initiative going for what it calls “Centralised Processing” services. The contract has been out to market for some time, with IBM, HP and Lockheed Martin previously being the players in contention. In September that list shrunk down to two, with Defence knocking HP out of the running at that point, and last week the list shrunk again, with Big Blue losing out and Lockheed Martin winning preferred tendered status.

Cloud-first: SaaS “the ultimate buy”, says Coles

0
We’ve been hearing rather a lot about the philosophy of buying corporate IT platforms on a “cloud-first” basis recently. The US Government more or less kicked off the trend several years ago, and over the past 12 months the Queensland, New South Wales and Victorian Governments have followed. Only last week the new Coalition Government’s Commission of Audit recommended a cloud-first approach for the Federal Government. So we’re not surprised to hear that the private sector has gotten on the bandwagon as well.

Turnbull’s NBN mess ‘escaping public scrutiny’

62
Controversial commentator Van Badham has not been dismayed by having her NBN questions shut down live on Q&A last week by host Tony Jones and has penned a fiery piece slamming Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull's 'Multi-Technology Mix' vision and the poor media coverage of it.

Hackett wants tax breaks for electric cars

30
Internode founder, NBN Co board director and all-round superhuman Simon Hackett is well-known as being one of Australia’s main electric car evangelists. The entrepreneur imported Australia’s first Tesla Roadster and recently teamed up with another former senior Internode executive and two early executives from electric car pioneer Tesla to found a new startup focused on building a new type of electric car specifically designed for high-speed performance racing. With the news that Australia may shortly see its first Tesla Model S units shipping locally, Hackett has been investigating the regulatory settings for the emerging industry and found them wanting.

NSA intercepts US routers, implants spyware

8
Remember how the US Government made such as a huge song and dance about the claimed security implications to buying networking equipment from Chinese vendor Huawei? Well, it turns out that this was squarely a case of the pot calling the kettle black.

Policy innovation: Govt replaces cloud computing panel with … new panel

16
What’s not precisely clear at this point is how this new panel will differ from the old one, or how the new ‘cloud-first’ policy will differ from the old one.

Budget 2014: NICTA will be heavily affected by funding cut

0
Just a day or so ago, National ICT Australia appeared relatively unfazed by the Coalition Federal Government’s decision to entirely cut its funding within two years, vowing to seek alternative options. But an interview with the group’s chief executive Hugh Durrant-Whyte in the Financial Review newspaper yesterday paints an entirely different picture.

Global hacker crackdown hits Aussies

4
Picked up a copy of the 'Blackshades' remote administration tool recently? You may be on the FBI's target list. The Wall Street Journal reports in the US over the weekend that US authorities have worked with law enforcement authorities in a range of countries to raid the homes of those who have been using the software.

Liberal Democrats oppose data retention

1
Into the e-surveillance miasma comes David Leyonhjelm, the new Senator-Elect for the Liberal Democrats, who will take his chair in just six short weeks. In a piece for the Financial Review newspaper late last week, Leyonhjelm makes it very clear where his party will stand on this issue: In opposition to data retention and similar initiatives which erode Australians’ privacy.

BoQ cuts down outsourcing list to four

0
Those of you who follow the big end of the IT services market in Australia will recall that November last year Bank of Queensland revealed plans to finally chop up its extremely long-running comprehensive IT outsourcing deal with HP, with the effort being led by the bank's chief information officer Julie Bale (pictured). Well, things have been moving along at a rapid clip and the bank has reportedly now cut down its list of prospective partners to four.

SA e-Health system could cause fatalities

1
It used to be pretty rare that Australia would see an IT system implemented or maintained so poorly that it had the potential to cause fatalities or serious injury. But not any more. This year we’ve seen three such cases in Victoria alone, linked separately to failing IT systems at Victoria Police (which actually did result in several deaths), a Victorian hospital and, most worryingly, with relation to children’s safety under the care of the Department of Human Services. Well, last week South Australia got its own potentially fatal IT system.

RIP telco luminary Alan Kellock

4
If you've been in Australia's telecommunications industry for a long time, you may recall the name Alan Kellock. There's not a lot of information about him online, but Peter Kellock, who appears to be his son, published an obituary of Kellock the senior through The Age newspaper recently. I don't want to go too far into Kellock's history, but suffice it to say that he was instrumental in setting up Telecom (now Telstra), as well as the international telephone system that we all enjoy today.

Budget 2014: Govt doesn’t grok ICT, says Atlassian

5
I have to say, it’s hard to disagree with the Atlassian gurus on this one. Comprehensively, if there was a measure which was aimed at assisting Australia’s ICT sector (particularly fast-growing startups), it appears as though the new Coalition Government was determined to cut it. Regular Delimiter readers will be aware that I didn’t find some of these programs very effective, but there is at the least no doubt that the Coalition certainly didn’t replace them with anything either. Tony Abbott, Joe Hockey and company appear to believe that the sector — responsible for huge ecoomic outcomes in other countries — has little relevance to the land Down Under. Strange stuff. Why wouldn’t you want to have a bevy of high-powered tech firms like Atlassian calling Australia home?

Aussie email firm Atmail beats Gmail, Office 365 to Raine and Horne deal

6
Those of you with long memories may recall that Australia has its own version of Google’s Gmail or Microsoft’s Office 365 email platforms. The company is called Atmail and it’s based in Queensland. In November 2012 it picked up a cool $2 million in venture capital from Australian VC firm Starfish Ventures. Well, already Atmail looks to be picking up new local corporate clients. The AustralianIT reports this morning that real estate agency Raine and Horne recently picked Atmail for its new email platform, serving some 3,500 mailboxes.

Tell them they’re joking: Telstra still wants to own copper or HFC

67
What we're seeing here with Telstra during the negotiation process over access to the telco's networks is Telstra leveraging its position of strength over the Government to get the best possible result from the negotiations. Under Labor, the Government had Telstra up against a wall, because it fundamentally did not need Telstra's assistance to build its NBN fibre infrastructure. It had the advantage. Under the Coalition, Telstra has the advantage -- because the MTM mix approach cannot be delivered without Telstra's active assistance. And Telstra is leveraging that situation to the hilt.

Why is Transport for NSW signing a 10-year, 1bn deal with IBM?

5
IBM might have been banned from signing new contracts with the Queensland Government over the Queensland Health payroll systems disaster, but that apparently hasn’t stopped other Australian jurisdictions from dealing with the vendor. The Financial Review reports this morning that Transport for NSW (which was formed from the merger of the NSW RTA, maritime, transport construction authority and Country Rail groups) is poised to jump into bed with Big Blue in a big way.

AngelCube opens 2014 startup intake

0
I just wanted to post a quick note to let readers know that AngelCube, the Melbourne-based startup accelerator, has opened the doors for applications for its 2014 intake. If you don't know about AngelCube but you are interested in starting your own IT startup, you had better familiarise yourself quickly, because you only have a few days to file your entry.

Samsung offshores Aussie mobile support

1
As Korean giant Samsung has grown its presence in the mobile phone space to rival and even exceed that of industry leader Apple, it has also had to grow its support network. This is to be expected. But what many readers may not have realised is that much of the company’s support for its devices in Australia was actually supported from Australia, with a call centre based in Wollongong. Unfortunately for those concerned, according to Ausdroid, those jobs are now to be offshored.

Internet nasties lock out Aussies’ Apple devices

2
Own an Apple device, use the vendor's iCloud online synching service but haven't been able to get access to one or more of your devices this week? Congratulations: You've fallen prey to what are probably a bunch of Internet script kiddies attempting to ransom your data for a hefty fee. ZDNet has a solid local story on the phenomenon, which so far (weirdly) appears localised to Australia.

NBN/Telstra deal could be six months late

30
It’s extremely hard to see this as a surprise, given the fact that NBN Co’s previous delay with Telstra was extensively delayed, and given that as late as mid-January the pair had not even begun talking, but the Financial Review reported today that NBN Co’s negotiations with the nation’s largest telco Telstra over access to its copper and HFC cable networks could run up to six months late. Yup.

Slow day at Delimiter today

22
Just a quick note to let you know that we're having a slow day at Delimiter today as I am away. It's actually a terrible time for it, as there are a stack of amazing stories I want and need to write -- the Internet piracy (Attorney-General's) and NBN stuff coming out of Senate Estimates, a bunch of enterprise IT stuff (especially the banks, and the Federal Government procurement situation), further stuff about the ABC's NBN coverage and more. But this one has been scheduled in for a while, so it's unavoidable.

Huge surprise: FTTN trials already delayed

44
Well, we knew it was coming. The extensive delays suffered by NBN Co during its rollout under the previous Labor administration are starting to hit the project under the Coalition as well. Last week it was revealed that NBN Co's new deal with Telstra may not be inked until the end of 2014. And later on in the week ZDNet confirmed that NBN Co's trials of the Coalition's preferred Fibre to the Node technology have also been delayed. Surprise!

Major report on crowd-sourced equity funding

5
Those of you with an interest in the technology startup equity funding space will be interested to know that the Federal Government's Corporations and Markets Advisory Committee this week delivered a major report into the possibility of allowing so-called Crowdsourced Equity Funding in Australia (CSEF). The concept, which is not dissimilar to the crowdfunding techniques used by sites such as Kickstarter, but with an ownership component, has been introduced overseas.

Apple Australia wages not insanely great

21
Given the size, volume of sales and complexity of Apple’s retail footprint, as well as the extreme level of revenue Apple makes in Australia in general, you would have to say that most people would probably expect Apple Store employees to be making a little more. As it stands, the lowest-level employees will barely be making more than minimum wage. And that’s just not insanely great.

Recipe for disaster: NSW Education Dept turfs 600 techs

23
If you assume, as I do, that many of these staff spent much of their time 'putting out fires' -- reacting to the latest crisis in terms of their schools' IT infrastructure -- then removing those staff will create chaos across the board.

“Nightmare scenario”: Vodafone reveals extensive Govt wiretapping

3
If you thought you had a solid grip on just how extensive Government surveillance of our electronic communications systems was, think again. The revelations just keep coming. Late last week mobile telco Vodafone revealed an extensive bucket list of surveillance measures which are used by governments in dozens of countries it operates in — including Australia — to retrieve information about its customers.

Surprise! PlayStation Now delayed for Australia

8
From the Department of No Surprises comes the news that Sony’s cloud-based PlayStation Now service — which allows users of its gaming consoles to play games online without having to download the content — will not initially be available to Australians when it launches in the middle of this year.

iiNet launches Budii Lite modem

9
I know that mentioning consumer-grade modems such as the Budii Lite on Delimiter can be fraught with danger -- many readers, including myself, prefer options such as FRITZ!Box, D-Link or Linksys. However, I wanted to flag this as something that readers may especially find useful to recommend to friends and family. I get constantly asked by personal connections for broadband recommendations.

Apologies! Slow days this week

10
Just wanted to let readers know that Delimiter will be having a slow couple of days today (Thursday) and tomorrow (Friday), with only a couple of articles being posted on each day.

Australian IT should play to mining, farming strengths, says Fletcher

10
I don't want to comment too strongly on the substance of the speech at this point, but I wanted to make readers aware that Malcolm Turnbull's Parliamentary Secretary Paul Fletcher has delivered a major speech on the Coalition's vision for the Digital Economy.

Spirit deploys 200Mbps FTTB to Southbank

11
It’s only a very limited rollout so far, but Melbourne residents might be interested to know that local telco Spirit Telecom has deployed what appears to be a Fibre to the Basement broadband rollout in the Triptych apartment facility in the Southbank area. It appears that Spirit has been able to achieve speeds of up to 200Mbps by using Fibre to the Basement and then deploying its own in-building network to extend broadband to each apartment — skipping the existing in-building copper infrastructure.

NZ Govt pushes hard into cloud

4
New Zealand's national Government announced a whole of government contract this morning for what it terms 'Office Productivity as a Service' services. This includes email and calendaring services, as well as file-sharing, mobility, instant messaging and collaboration services. The contract complements two existing contracts -- Desktop as a Service and Enterprise Content Management as a Service.

Anti-piracy laws will increase piracy, says Budde

22
It's no secret that a large percentage of the technology sector thinks that the current proposal by Federal Attorney-General George Brandis (pictured) to crack down on Internet piracy will have little impact, given that most such attempts in the fast have broadly failed, and the commonly held belief that commercial avenues represent the best way to handle the situation. However, some commentators feel things will go still further. Veteran telecommunications analyst Paul Budde wrote this morning on his blog that he expects the anti-piracy measures to actually increase piracy.

Facebook wants to hide its Australian earnings

5
It has become more or less the norm for global technology companies to minimise their Australian tax liability in a way that much of the local population finds at least mildly objectionable. Well, perhaps the most arrogant of the bunch (surprise, surprise) has turned out to be social networking giant Facebook, which has filed a form arguing it doesn’t need to disclose its Australian earnings at all.

‘Thriving’ Aussie tech incubator scene a ‘mirage’

3
If you've been involved in Australia's technology startup community over the past several years, you will be aware that there have been multiple incubator programs that have been made available to entrepreneurs. Programs such as Startmate, PushStart, Telstra's Muru-D and so on have made early stage seed funding, mentorship and even physical work facilities available. However, according to one business consultant, the 'scene' is actually a lot more undeveloped than it seems.

NBN debate heats up at IEEE conference

45
I don't want to get too deep into commenting on the merits of the various arguments coming from each side, but I wanted to make readers aware of a somewhat extraordinary debate which has been happening at, and on the sidelines of, the IEEE's International Conference on Communications, being held in Sydney last week.

Delimiter’s journey is coming to a natural end

210
Today I write to let the Delimiter community know two things: Firstly, Delimiter will cease publishing new articles on Friday 5th July. And secondly, I have a new job.

ABC tech reporter founds micro-transactions startup

16
Some of you may remember the name of Nick Ross, the editor of the ABC’s Technology & Games site who wrote several in-depth articles criticising the Coalition’s rival National Broadband Network project. Well, what you probably didn’t know is that Ross has also been spending a great deal of time and effort on a side project. Known as ‘Nanotransactions’, the project is micro-transaction technology which Ross hopes will “save high-quality journalism”.

No Amazon Fire Phone for Australia yet

2
You might have noticed that global online retailer Amazon launched a new phone overnight in the US. With a new feature called ‘Dynamic Perspective’ (which delivers 3D depth to some apps), a customised version of Android and solid integration with Amazon’s world-beating content ecosystem, this model is getting some plaudits from technology reviews. However, for Australians the phone itself may not be as interesting as Amazon may want it to be. That’s because there are no signs it’s coming to Australia yet.

Coalition, Labor support new surveillance laws

0
The Daily Telegraph reported this morning that the Coalition would shortly introduce a raft of new surveillance laws based on almost all of the recommendations handed down last year in a report by the the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Intelligence and Security on potential reforms to Australia's National Security Legislation.

Turnbull outlines Govt ICT vision

0
Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull has published an extensive article arguing that the Federal Government needed to do a better job of connecting with Australians via digital channels and that public sector IT projects needn't cost the huge amounts that some have in the past.

Palmer pushes for minimalist NBN policy

0
The National Broadband Network Company's Strategic Review found conclusively that under almost every model, the company's network rollout would make a long-term return on investment, ultimately costing the Federal Government nothing due to the cost being reimbursed by subscriber fees paid by millions of Australians. Despite this, Palmer United Party leader Clive Palmer this week referred to the cost of the NBN and how it could be brought down further.

WA Govt can’t fund school IT upgrades

0
In news from The Department of Disturbing Facts, iTNews revealed late last week that Western Australia's Department of Education has run out of money halfway through the deployment of new fundamental IT infrastructure to the state's schools.

“Rational debate” needed around surveillance

0
In the wake of the news yesterday that the Coalition and Labor are supporting a raft of new electronic surveillance measures, the Pirate Party of Australia has called for a rational debate to be held over the issue, in the context of widespread opposition to increased surveillance by the Australian public.

Ministers’ cloud approval lasted just a year

0
Remember how twelve months ago, the Federal Government released a new cloud computing security and privacy directive which required departments and agencies to explicitly acquire the approval of the Attorney-General and the relevant portfolio minister before government data containing private information could be stored in offshore facilities? Remember how the policy was strongly criticised by Microsoft, Government CIOs and Delimiter? Well, it looks like the policy is about to be reversed.

LG Android smartwatch available online now to Australians; Samsung’s not so much

0
If you caught Google’s I/O conference overnight, you will be aware that one of the highlights of the show was the fact that several smartwatches running Google’s new Android Wear operating system supposedly went on sale. However, as regular readers will be aware, “on sale” doesn’t always quite mean in Australia what it means in the US, with devices typically launching in Australia at a later date than they do in America.

Telstra gets $150m for NBN FTTN trial

0
Remember how in early June, Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull revealed that Telstra was working on a wide-scale trial of the Coalition’s preferred Fibre to the Node network rollout style that would encompass about a thousand nodes? Well, it looks like the pedal is about to hit the metal with the trial, with the Financial Review quoting Turnbull this week as stating that the two telcos had signed a deal which would see the trial go ahead.

Will Netflix launch in Australia, or not?

0
Over the past week several fascinating articles have been published speculating about the possibility of US-based IPTV giant Netflix launching in Australia.

Westpac dumps desk phones for Samsung Android mobiles

0
The era of troublesome desk phones tied to physical locations is gradually coming to an end in many workplaces, with mobile phones becoming increasingly popular as organisations' main method of voice telecommunications. But some groups are more advanced than others when it comes to adoption of the trend. One of those is Westpac.

Qld’s Grant joins analyst firm IBRS

0
This week it emerged that Peter Grant, the two-time former Queensland Whole of Government CIO (pictured), has joined well-regarded analyst firm Intelligent Business Research Services (IBRS). We’ve long had a high regard for IBRS, and so it’s fantastic to see such an experienced executive join its ranks.

What should the ACCC’s role be in guiding infrastructure spending?

0
Those of you who have been in the industry for some time may recall that the national competition regulator played a substantial role in the previous Labor Government deciding to restructure the telecommunications sector through implementing an all-fibre model for its National Broadband Network project. This week, Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull made a few somewhat controversial comments about the ACCC's historical role in the situation.