NBN

I note that a lot of comment on the internet about NBN seems to revolve around “it’s NBN or nothing” as in ” if Abbott gets in bye-bye NBN” Silly really, rusted on ALP supporters seem to be treating NBN as a synonym for broadband. It’s more a synonym for “Rolls Royce” I’m a bit of a geek and fully acknowledge the superiority of optic fiber but that certainly doesn’t mean I think everyone in the country should have access to it. I don’t need it, nor do millions of other people who use the internet for generally seeking knowledge, communicating with family or generally finding out what is going on in the world. Several of my children and their friends don’t even have hard wired broadband, they are happy with wireless and over the time it will take to implement the NBN, they will be become happier as technology improves. The planned NBN will not take advantage of any of these developments in wireless delivery or other developments that we don’t even know about yet. It is, in effect, putting all it’s eggs in one basket. I might be happy in the metro area but I know my country cousins are less so. A lot of them don’t even get reliable mobile services due to their isolation so they do deserve something better. However, when I did a tour of Queensland and the Territory in 2004 I kept on bumping into Telstra gangs that were busy laying fiber to Indigenous settlements. That’s six years ago so something may have come of it. It does mean that the bush has been getting some attention but obviously not enough. For those who think the ALP invented fibre note this map; People have commented that the copper system we have now is getting old but that only means we should be upgrading on a maintenance programme. It certainly doesn’t necessarily mean we should replace the entire network overnight. Industry, commerce generally and governments should have access to high speed fiber and I’m fairly sure that a lot already do. There is a case to develop infrastructure to ensure they all have it but I’m not convinced every house in every town should have or needs to have it. Not immediately, anyway.