[LINK] My Last day

[Adam Todd]

Dear Linkers,

Today is in some ways a good day and a sad day.

It's my final few hours now before I commit and hold a promise I made to my 
wife last year.

I said that I'd retire from consultancy to ISPs and Most Telecommunications 
related projects if the Industry itself did not pull itself together for 
the betterment of the Country and the users.

The clock ticked hard and long.  The seconds counted down and sadly the day 
arrived and the industry hasn't changed.  Actually, it's probably become worse.

I'm not talking about commercial competition.  I'm talking abut the ability 
for the industry to do more than yapper on a mail list and hope that the 
public, media and politicians will take notice.  Mail lists are a great 
tool, but most of the worlds "manner of operation" hasn't caught up 
yet.  Certainly parliament hasn't.

With the recent and ongoing battle in the Federal Court for Viper 
Communications and Albury Local Internet, although a surprising number of 
ISPs have dipped in to help, the majority are emailing in private stating 
they are too scared to stand up and be counted.  The exact behavior the 
Government wants.  A Divided, scared and shaking industry.

The more segregated and individual ISPs are the easier the industry is to 
control, regulate and manipulate.

Lets face it, being an ISP use to be fun.  You had time to spend with your 
users, chatting on-line, on the phone, or in person.  Today, I can't get 
five minutes to myself, yet alone to support a client.  And I'm not even an 
ISP.

ISPs use to be creative, design solutions to get around TElstra created 
problems.  We use to devise and create software.  But today, we're just a 
level in business that can be closely compared to a cog turning in a 
watch.  ISPs aren't the Hands that are read by the wearer, nor is the ISP 
the battery or spring coil used to drive it.  They are merely a medium in 
the middle to assist with the aggregation of the traffic and user flows.

At the end of the day, the dollar ends up in the Federal Governments pocket 
through tax and such anyway.  What doesn't end up there ends up in 
Telstra's pocket.  Users use Telstra phone lines, ISPs, use Telstra 
services, Uplinks resell Telstra services, it's all the same in 90% of 
cases anyway.

When you look at the cost differences between the United States and 
Australia you have to wonder.  Sure not all things are great there, but 
certainly the data digital age isn't great here.  We're so far behind the 
"1st world country" we're very close to 3rd world.

Ever wondered what a 2nd world country was?

I can work in Australia designing a web page for $60 an hour, or do the 
same work for $60 an hour in US Dollars.  Strange isn't it.

So with my gripes and grumbles out of the way, I announce today my 
retirement from the ISP and Telecommunications Sector.

I know I did this in 1993 and got sucked back in, but this time I've got 
other considerable projects that need my time and attention.  One being my 
growing family.  The others - you will have to wait and see.

I'll still be helping Ross and Mark as far as they want to go with their 
battle against the ACA.  I'm not dropping what I've started.  Same way I'll 
continue with the various projects that haven't yet completed.  But taking 
on NEW ISP related work, sorry.  It's been too costly in more ways than one.

I sometimes wonder if I'm jumping ship too early, like dropping my ISP 
services in 1993 because there were so few modem users around, but I've 
given over 15 years to the encompassing industry and really not got 
anything back.  (Not even a reasonable salary at the end of the day! Well 
what I'd consider reasonable!)

The Freebies have now dried up.  Time to let the maturity of the market 
find it's own feet.  Two industries I won't be working in are 
Telecommunications and Pharmaceuticals.