100 Megabits Never Ever for Australia.

Sitting here on throttled ISP speeds, barely able to work, gigaom is lobbying for 100 megabits in the US, which they'll get. Here in Australia we have meetings about the next meeting, and deal with non-core information. Anything to avoid risk, innovation and a punt. Thats why the niks of this world are using free fast wifi in the press corner of the web2 expo. Smart people learn to get around the default situation. which is our internet sux. Speed is not a defining characteristic of local change either : thats the beauty of oligopolies, monopolies, and not enough 'capita.

Gigaom : "Can Americans dream about a day when they get a 100-megabit-per-second broadband connection, delivered over fiber? FTTH Council, says yes, and is pushing the US government to adopt a 100 Megabit Nation policy. The Council says that we have the technology, and the carriers (and cable providers) have the networks to make it all a reality - with a little pressure from Washington D.C.. My simple argument is that what x86 was to the PC era, bandwidth is to the broadband era. The more bandwidth we have, the more innovative ways we will find to use it, thus creating another cycle of innovation."


Reading the Executive Rich BRW issue last night (a good read on the top 200 local execs re : how to use options as a CEO in financial services, private equity backed Co's and technology to make $$$), and screened the Foad Fadaghi pre-amble piece on Labour's proposed broadband rollout downunder - which has a minimum of 12 megabits per second (which is supposed to trump Liberals which show just how low the bar here is), with the legacy but not yet really implemented/marketed by Telstra et G9-11 pals adsl2 technology can only go to 24 megabits.

So the best Australia can hope for is, once there is an election promises will be made on both sides, The Future Fund will be raided, and in a couple years something will be sold to us that is at least 5 to 8 times slower than the minimum US speeds, which will also be sold to consumers at much higher prices downunder. Obviously it will be near impossible for any Australian originated, Australian based post-Youtube companies to come from here, or if they do - Total Respekt ! - If you can't use it, how can you imagine it, then turn it into a business. As Harold Mitchell says Australian govt has spent $9B billion on 6 submarines and 24 superhornet aircraft.

The fkn superhornets better be fkn superhornets ok. Typically these types of government purchases - whether they be helicopters, or state governments with trains - they buy product that is out of date, deal with bad suppliers, overpay, wait along time for delivery, then the brakes dont work and the local public train service doesnt work reliably liked happened in victoria last year;

"Sorry sir, we didnt know after you spent billions that you wanted the brakes to work, let me get you an engineer. Does anyone know where Bill is ?"

As for submarines, well maybe they will have Telstra's 3.5G wifi. Ok u can tell im pissed Optus has throttled my speeds. Maybe Fits was right and we need the Original OG, Keating. His 80's Raybans have gone full circle to be cool again. He would build it out, just to knife Hawke. Nup Telstra, ACCC and the Amigos, each earning good coin and most millionaires in their own right will just keep on with their pissing matches. The entrepreneurs in the house will keep extending their credit cards, savings, little bits of revenue to fund rollouts.... (end rant where Ben remembers deep down he once did a politics degree.. i blame duncan riley for this.. it's just fast broadband for telstra, private equity and government isnt that much coin.. 2/3rds of the Qantas deal, and it's all debt/leverage anyway, it pays itself back already.....)