NBN Discussion

[wafliron]

The majority of the public support it? Really? Did I miss a referendum on the topic?

Last public opinion poll I've seen on the topic is the one talked about here: NBN enjoys prolonged popular support | Delimiter. The column marked "Total" is the results from a Feb 2012 poll (and older results are also displayed, for reference). 56% support, 25% oppose, 19% unsure.

There may have been more recent polling reported on... I haven't been following too closely recently.

FWIW I'm firmly of the belief that the NBN will be as successful as Kevin.

Let's not restart that debate... time will tell - or, may tell, depending on which government wins the next election I guess.

 

[ric_melb]

The public support it only because they don't understand the real cost. The NBN will never produce a return to the taxpayer, hence taxpayers will pay the cost.
So if you said to the public, are you happy to pay say $500 to establish the NBN do you support it,the support would quickly vanish.

 

[serfty]

Reversal by the Libs, yes, but not by the public - the majority of the public support it (admittedly not by a large margin). Unless you meant public opinion with regards to the probable next federal government...

Don't put words in my implication.

I was directly referring to either:

Reversal of the public in relation to ongoing opinion polls and not voting the current government out

or

reversal of the current opposition policy who change it after being elected as a new government and not stopping any further rollout.

It's not relevant to public support of the NBN itself - although if the general public realised they'd have to fork out an additional base cost each as well as higher ongoing costs to get and keep as much they have now the percentages should vary.

 

[simongr]

So for clarity as a tax payer I will fund the building of the network, then as a consumer I will pay for usage that then generates a return for the government...

 

[medhead]

So for clarity as a tax payer I will fund the building of the network, then as a consumer I will pay for usage that then generates a return for the government...

and you, the taxpayer (by extension)


Sent from the Throne

 

[pshepvic]

For those that think the coalition will scrap it, think again. There may be some changes to the technology (which will be for the worst, because the current program is the best TECHNICAL solution, although not the cheapest) but NBN is here to stay in one form or another: http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/government-it/we-will-not-cancel-the-nbn-turnbull-20120629-217f3.html



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[pshepvic]

The public support it only because they don't understand the real cost. The NBN will never produce a return to the taxpayer, hence taxpayers will pay the cost.
So if you said to the public, are you happy to pay say $500 to establish the NBN do you support it,the support would quickly vanish.

There are people outside the NBN Optic Fibre footprint willing to pay thousands for fibre to be connected, so I don't agree with this comment at all.


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[lovestotravel]

So how far into the roll out and it's already running behind schedule and over budget ?

Just like anything the ALP touches, this will continue to blow out in cost and time...

 

[pshepvic]

So how far into the roll out and it's already running behind schedule and over budget ?

Just like anything the ALP touches, this will continue to blow out in cost and time...

The original budget was $42b. It's now $37.5 due to cost savings resulting from the Telstra deal and other measures. Not to mention the fact that additional scope has been added to include New Developments/Estates that were not originally within the project. In some areas the project is actually ahead of schedule with the number of homes passed and customers connected. So saying it is behind and over budget is not accurate. Don't believe everything you hear in the news (around here people should be well aware of that!)

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[amaroo]

Remember the "Hood" from Thunderbirds...looks like he's living up to his name

Interesting how many of the people in the background are still there:!:

 

[lovestotravel]

In some areas the project is actually ahead of schedule with the number of homes passed and customers connected. So saying it is behind and over budget is not accurate.

Not quite right.....

Original price was $42 Billion
Then it was reduced to $ 35.9 Billion - You missed this point..........
Now back up to $37.4 Billion

Oakeshott not worried about NBN blowouts - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)
NBN Co estimates construction will cost $37.4 billion, a four per cent increase on the previous estimate of $35.9 billion.

http://nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbn-co-corporate-plan-6-aug-2012.pdf
The $37.4 billion total Capital Expenditure forecast to the end of the Construction period is 3.9% higher than the 2011-13 Corporate Plan at $35.9 billion.

Added to this they are also saving "hundred of millions" of $$ but not forcing people to have battery backup... Going to be great in an emergency situation and people can't use their landline......

www.theage.com.au - NBN costs blow out by billions
In the last corporate plan, written in December 2010, NBN Co forecast it would have 419,000 premises connected by June 2013. A total of 92,000 will be connected by mid-2013



So not sure how being 327,000 customers behind is not behind.. Of course some small areas may be ahead, but overall it's taking far longer than planned to get people connected.


I like the project, but I think it could have been done far far cheaper... Easy to say this from an armchair though.

 

[markis10]

There are people outside the NBN Optic Fibre footprint willing to pay thousands for fibre to be connected, so I don't agree with this comment at all.


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Pity it would cost millions to connect them though, which is why they are not in the footprint!

 

[markis10]

The original budget was $42b. It's now $37.5 due to cost savings resulting from the Telstra deal and other measures. Not to mention the fact that additional scope has been added to include New Developments/Estates that were not originally within the project. In some areas the project is actually ahead of schedule with the number of homes passed and customers connected. So saying it is behind and over budget is not accurate. Don't believe everything you hear in the news (around here people should be well aware of that!)

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy S2

And dont believe everything posted on internet forums either:



Those forecasts are looking to be as accurate as certain toll road forecasts of late! Of the 2011 connections, 25% are for wireless and satellite that were not even part of the 2010 plan.

As for additional premises being covered, not so, in fact the latest report sees 73000 premises being passed back to Telstra that were to be covered in the 2010 plan.

As for expenditure, dont forget the original cost was capex and this was reduced by moving some items to opex, its interesting to note that both capex and opex increased, Capital expenditure is going up 3.9 per cent from $35.7 billion, to $37.4 billion, and operating expenditure is increasing from AU$23.2 billion to AU$26.4 billion.

http://www.zdnet.com/nbn-corporate-plan-2010-vs-2012-7000002369/

 

[drron]

There are 3 basic issues-Will the public like the NBN-no doubt about the answer-a resounding yes.
-Will it be value for money-obviously too early to say but I am doubtful.
-Will it improve productivity?Well we will have numerous reports for sure about people,businesses who will report it as fact.However in Medicine we are very wary of acting on case reports-often not what the majority results are.When South Korea introduced fast broadband productivity dropped.One explanation was more employees began playing games instead of working.So this point also needs time to assess.

 

[wafliron]

Don't put words in my implication.

Sorry, clearly I misunderstood...

It's not relevant to public support of the NBN itself - although if the general public realised they'd have to fork out an additional base cost each

How could they not realise? If there's one element of the NBN that has been done to death in the media, it's the build cost...

as well as higher ongoing costs to get and keep as much they have now the percentages should vary.

This part isn't true... by now plenty of ISPs have released their NBN product line-up - simply compare those to the current DSL offerings....

For those that think the coalition will scrap it, think again. There may be some changes to the technology (which will be for the worst, because the current program is the best TECHNICAL solution, although not the cheapest) but NBN is here to stay in one form or another: We will not cancel the NBN: Turnbull

True that they have altered their stance (i.e. will not scrap it), but based on their current position the NBN would turn into a very different (and inferior) beast.

So how far into the roll out and it's already running behind schedule and over budget ?

Just like anything the ALP touches, this will continue to blow out in cost and time...

Delays and budget extensions are never good, but it would be helpful to at least consider the reasons for them rather than going straight into "ALP sucks and can't manage money, la la I can't hear you" mode. www.theage.com.au - NBN costs blow out by billions has a pretty good summary of the reasons for the cost increases and some of the delays.

The key points are that most of the delay so far is due to protracted government-Telstra negotiations and having to restart an early tender process (in an effort to keep costs under control). Yes, they probably should have predicted some of this (particularly how long it took to finalise a deal with Telstra), but as reasons for a delay go it's a pretty good one. Looking only at the cost increase also ignores the important point that an amount of this (can't find an exact figure unfortunately) will be offset by increased revenue from 2018 onwards compared to last year's plan.

How they track against their revised plan over the next 12 months will really be the telling stat I think - there are far fewer "known unknowns" now then there were 12 months ago, and most of the "conditions precedent", as Conroy put it, to getting the rollout-proper moving have now been satisfied.

As an aside, the cynical part of me reckons they've deliberately overestimated the cost and underestimated the number of premises connected by June 2013 in the latest plan update so that the government can announce the NBN is now under budget and ahead of schedule sometime before next year's election.

 

[wafliron]

I read an article today that may be interesting for those who have, rather unfortunately, been misled by various politicians and "commentators" into thinking fibre is not the "best" technology for the NBN / will be outdated by the time the rollout is done / will cost a fortune to continue to update in the future / etc: Pipe goes for 100 Gbps on PPC-1 subsea cable - Telco/ISP - Technology - News - iTnews.com.au

The article is not about the NBN, but rather is about a capacity upgrade currently being performed on PPC-1, one of the high-bandwidth fibre-optic cables that carries data from Australia to the rest of the world and vice-versa. The type of fibre technology used on this sort of cable is different to that being used by the NBN, but the upgrade described in the article still does a fabulous job of demonstrating two of the most important characteristics of fibre - characteristics also shared by the particular type of fibre technology being used by the NBN:

1) Raw speed - the upgrade will increase PPC-1's capacity to 3Tbps (3,000 Gbps / 3,000,000 Mbps), which is about 125,000 times faster than the "best case" for ADSL2+ and about 30,000 times faster than the "best case" for 4G wireless (remembering the real-world speed will be much lower than best case, too) - and this speed is delivered over a grand total of four hair-thin strands of fibre-optic cable ~6,900KM long. On top of that, the article states that 10Tbps is possible using current technology - so the cable could be over thrice as fast again with upgraded equipment at each end. The fibre technology used by the NBN is nowhere near as fast, but this example still demonstrates that it's possible to cram well over 1+Tbps (1,000+Gbps / 1,000,000+ Mbps) over a single strand of fibre using current technology - and in the NBN model each fibre loop (strand of fibre) is only shared by 32 (or is it 64? Can't remember) houses. That's a lot of potential bandwidth per house, if it's ever needed in the future.

2)More importantly, upgradability - and "cheap" upgradability at that. The PPC-1 upgrade increased capacity on the cable ~15-fold, all by simply upgrading the equipment that plugs into each end of it. No changes to the cable or any other "infrastructure" components - just plug-in-plug-out changes at each end. No changes to the fibre itself means the upgrade was cheap, too - it only cost "a couple of million dollars", compared to a ~$200 million build cost - so they achieved a 15-fold speed increase by spending 1-2% of the initial build cost. Again, the NBN technology is different, but the principle is the same cause it's fibre - once the cable is in the ground, speed upgrades are cheap. Spending 1-2% of the NBN's build cost in 10-20 years time to increase speeds by 10x+ nationwide, if it's needed by then, seems pretty palatable.

 

[whatmeworry]

Re: What's your prediction on the Australian Dollar?

Fast rail from Mel to Bne??

Where is the feasibility for that?

Are you suggesting the gov should get into the rail business?

At least MEL to SYD via CBR and then maybe BNE.

Feasibility studies are a cop out from the vision this country needs. (Ok sometimes they are needed )

For example the fast broadband network is now accepted despite the benefits might not be realised for decades...

 

[Sprucegoose]

Re: What's your prediction on the Australian Dollar?

At least MEL to SYD via CBR and then maybe BNE.

Feasibility studies are a cop out from the vision this country needs. (Ok sometimes they are needed )

For example the fast broadband network is now accepted despite the benefits might not be realised for decades...

NBN not accepted and will be changed with the new government.

 

[HarryB]

What's your prediction on the Australian Dollar?

NBN not accepted and will be changed with the new government.

We'll see about that. The government has to change in the first place and then the new government has to get their policies through the parliament so it's hardly a done deal.

 

[Sprucegoose]

What's your prediction on the Australian Dollar?

We'll see about that. The government has to change in the first place and then the new government has to get their policies through the parliament so it's hardly a done deal.

Correct.

I have assumed there wont be any impediments to both events occurring. We shall know by the end of this year.