[LINK] NBN white-elephant-to-be ...

[Tom Koltai]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: link-bounces at mailman1.anu.edu.au 
> [mailto:link-bounces at mailman1.anu.edu.au] On Behalf Of 
> Marghanita da Cruz
> Sent: Wednesday, 25 August 2010 2:40 PM
> To: Birch, Jim
> Cc: link at anu.edu.au
> Subject: Re: [LINK] NBN white-elephant-to-be ...
> 
> 
> Birch, Jim wrote:
> > Marghanita da Cruz wrote:
> > 
> >> In any event, the NBN in high density urban areas is a non-issue - 
> >> the
> > market meets demand.
> > 
> > Not quite:
> > 
> <snip>
> > Neither of these points are the primary reason for the NBN, 
> and they 
> > could *theoretically* be achieved in other ways, but they are 
> > significant real world benefits of the NBN.
> > 
> 
> So, is the point of the NBN to enable a student in Strahan 
> to video conference with a kid in Catherine?


Actually, yes.

Consider for a moment, all the solutions to problems that you have
arrived at by having a convo with an associate, friend, family member or
even total stranger.
Now multiply that factor by the number of people in the world that have
access to communications making them easier to reach.

This is one of the major benefits of the NBN. Social intercourse leading
to solutions leading to faster results, lower pricing and better
service.
Im not even going to examine the "information wants to be free"
misquote, yet the Net (via increased bandwidth) is allowing for the
start-up of a new consumer based video industry, a replacement to the
$2,000 per copy out of date when printed encyclopaedia and has given us
a way of getting in touch more regularly with friends and family.
No longer are we slaves to watching the postie trundle his little bag
down the street wondering if he'll stop at our door with a letter
from....

If we consider the technological advances and our enhanced lifestyle
over the last 130 years (since newspapers became a commodity) we have to
allot a certain percentage of the success and the result to our ability
to communicate cheaply.  

In 1983, a one minute phone call to the USA cost $2.47 was billed in
three minute increments and usually one had to book the call a couple of
hours ahead.

Imagine attempting to buy something from Sears and Roebuck in the
eighties from Australia...
Telex Machines were king... (at only $800 per month) BECAUSE they were
instantaneous.

Today the same phone call is virtually free and business is conducted
instantaneously with the result that we all buy more because it's so
easy...

Sometimes E=MC2 can be better expressed by examining the number of free
radicals involved before E results.
Without the free radicals speeding up to bond, there would be no
resulting E.

In other words, without Jane in Strahan, being able to chat to her
opposite number in a classroom in Katherine, Jane wouldn't know that
Fresian cows cant handle the heat in the Northern Territory and she
wouldn't be inspired to become a vet, and travel to Mexico to do a
Doctorate on ASF cows, instead she gets married to the son of the local
Strahan butcher has three children and dies at the age of 85 wondering
"whatif.....".


TomK