[LINK] Turnbull's NBN

[Glen Turner]

On 09/04/2013, at 1:51 PM, tomk wrote
> Speeds over Copper now rival and exceed those over the Aussie NBN specified fibre.

For the typical copper lead-in to a house you're looking at a maximum data rate of 50Mbps asymmetric. That's not actually available right now in shipping equipment.

The NBN-installed fibre can run up to 10Gbps asymmetric. However the lasers and receivers for this are expensive. So the question is how slow to run the NBN last mile fibre so that it results in a service which is cheap enough for householders. NBNCo have decided that they will use 100Mbps lasers and receivers.

This is the essential difference between the two proposals: for the NBN the question is how slow to run it, and errors can be corrected cheaply enough (because such an error will result in pent-up revenue which can use used to pay for upgrades). For the Liberal proposal the question is how fast can it be made go, and if the top speed estimate is in error, then the only way to correct it is to build a NBN.

Interestingly for those who follow political philosophy, the Liberal proposal essentially nationalises Telstra's last mile copper. Not quite what you'd expect from a conservative party.

-glen