[LINK] NBN white-elephant-to-be: better spend the $$$ on other things

[Ned Lukies]

On 17/08/2010, at 11:43 PM, Robin Whittle wrote:

> Its a mistake to think all this could be done for $43B.  This sort of
> massive expenditure would have to be at the expense of other vital
> priorities such as health, welfare, education, renewable energy
> research etc.  Most people having fibre is a luxury we can't afford.
> DSL is fine for most purposes.  The only thing fibre does better is
> support high quality video streaming.  Why spend tens of billions of
> dollars for the benefit of couch potatoes?

I would be happy with DSL, even happier with ADSL2. My ADSL2+ connection currently syncs at about 1900kbs, and drops out about 8 times a day (more when it is raining, where it can become unusable). Telstra have looked at the line many a time, nothing can really be done about it. No, I don't live in the middle of nowhere, I am less than 2km from the Brisbane CBD. 

DSL is great when it works, but there are a large number of places and situations where it doesn't and from my understanding, the problem is only going to get worse as more and more people use it. The situation at my work is even worse, the lack of DSL ports has lead us to purchase a 4mb symmetrical fibre connection with 60gb of data per month. All for the measly price of $140 per day, yes per day. At that rate, ~$2000 to install fibre to the house doesn't sound like a lot. 

Some of us need a reliable Internet connection to work. I am sick of people assuming that just because I think fibre is the way to go I must sit around downloading pr0n and warez all day. 

Ned