[LINK] Coonan's statement -- correct or not?

[Rick Welykochy]

Jan Whitaker wrote:

> http://www.theage.com.au/news/federalelection2007/australia-in-digital-dark-age/2007/10/20/1192301086691.html 
> 
> 
> Coonan:
> She said Australia is ahead of the US, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, 
> Ireland, Switzerland and many other developed countries.
> Internet prices are competitive because the coalition government's 
> telecommunications policy has licensed 167 internet carriers, more than 
> the three licensed carriers under the previous Labor government, she said.
> 
> -=-=
> The bit I don't believe is that they 'licence' internet carriers. Huh? 
> Does the government licence ANY internet carriers? How does one set up 
> an ISP? Aren't many of the 167 resellers?

ISPs have never been licenced. Being a member of TIO is not a licencing
scheme. Silly Helen should know this. Or is she learning how to spin
from the Lying Rat?

Let me see now on price.

Shaw Cable in Canada offers 5 Mb/s, 60 GB for about AUD $33/month.
<http://www.shaw.ca/en-ca/ProductsServices/Internet/>

Rogers Telecom in Canada offers similar for about AUD $38/month.
<http://www.rogers.com/>

Even Telus (the Telstra of Canada) can do similar for AUD $44/month.
<http://telus.ca/>

These prices are considerably cheaper (about 1/2) of the equivalent
service in Aus.

Five years ago I was downloading a full Debian ISO CD image in Canada
in minutes by cable Internet, which might have cost an extra $20/mon
on top of the cable TV rental.

I would hazard a guess that USA prices are even cheaper.

cheers
rick




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Rick Welykochy || Praxis Services

When will governments realise that we do not want to live in economies,
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