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Mobiles? Why not address buffering issues on fixed lines?

Oh wait, I forget the real world has great infrastructure, and not controlled by a telecoms monopoly. :'-(

Same for South Africa. It even extends to prepaid.

The Regulation of Interception of Communications and Provision of Communication-Related Information Act (RICA), requires compulsory registration of all SIM cards in use, and came into effect on 1 July 2009.

Existing subscribers will have until December 2010 to register both their prepaid and contract SIM cards.

ps. if anyone is wondering about telkom's(helkom :) service check it out here http://www.hellkom.co.za/pages/telkom-facts-and-information.php

For currency exchange it is about R7-8/$

When Telkom SA were owned by SBC (Now AT&T, surprise surprise) they slapped one of their online critics (www.hellkom.co.za) with a 'hate speech' lawsuit worth (then) almost 1 million US dollars http://www.itweb.co.za/sections/internet/2004/0408111546.asp?S=Legal%20View&A=LEG&O=FRGN

Telkom eventually dropped the case (a year later and after SBC had sold its shares in Telkom), but the action goes a long way to show where AT&T's attitude to freedom of expression really lies.

... I have to say that Telkom is absolutely terrible. Have a look here for more info.

Telkom have consistently been a stumbling block to technological progress in the country, especially with regards to internet access. Telkom owns all the international links to the rest of the world from SA, and most of the bandwidth and international calls have to be routed through them. In fact, the price of ADSL has been so prohibitive that many individuals have pursued cellular alternatives, paying per MB, for light browsing instead.

While it's easy to criticise the private companies who have been managing it, Telkom is a parastatal, and not wholly private; roughly 39% is still owned by the South African government, so I'm fairly certain they weren't too unhappy about the affair. There has been evidence of cronyism at the company, too, most likely as a direct result of this: in 2004 a government pension fund was used "to buy telecoms shares for a group of former government officials". This was part of the government's Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) requirements that firms need to be 1/4 black owned before 2010, and falls within a pattern shown, by 2004 government surveys, that "68 percent of BEE deals went to just 6 black-owned businesses, all of which were owned by top members of the ANC party."

The whole thing stinks, and Saffas get screwed, as usual.

Yep. Is there any other country in the world where you pay line rental TWICE for the same line, one rental ostensibly to be used for voice and the other for data? It's the same piece of copper running to your house, you just have to rent it TWICE from Telkom (the fixed line operator in this country), like it or not. Rental is about $15 (US) x 2, and there's no such thing as free local calls or anything like that. The Hellkom http://www.hellkom.co.za/ website can give those in first world countries a good idea of how money-grubbing politicians in this country have fucked up the infrastructure here. Our minister of communications is over 70, and doesn't even know how much a phone call costs...

This is what they were thinking, http://hellkom.co.za/ . It Rand/$ is at 7.22. These are the typical costs. 30GB International and Local (512k account) R989 incl VAT 30GB International and Local (1024k account) R1399 incl VAT (Both accounts allow for 1 concurrent connection, and have a hardcap at 30GB's) These accounts work out to less than R50 per GB! The ADSL line is R413 for a 1Mbps. So it works out at $250 per month for 30G. Now there are some accounts, where you can get uncapped for R1400 a month in total, that is $193, but these accounts were a limited offer. Internet costs are very expensive, thanks to a monopoly telecommunications industry. Keep in mind these uncapped accounts, will give you about 40kbyte/s on torrents with enough seeds. Think a prison break episode on Pirate Bay seeds.

Well, the US situation is not that bad...

Hahahaha, You have no idea how much the internet costs in Africa do you? http://www.hellkom.co.za/ispprices.php?type=adsl&o p==&cap=3 When reading this keep in mind that the minimum wage in South Africa is about R2500 One dollar cost about R8. The target market for this product is generally places that infrastructure providers consider "not economically viable".

It's "regulated" (I use the term extremely loosely) by a government that has a very hefty financial stake in the same company.

It costs roughly 2000% more to surf the internet at bottom-of-the-range ADSL (1Mbps is as fast as we can go) speeds than it does in the US of A, and UK. Oh, and lest I forget, the bandwidth usage is capped at 3GB (tho you can buy an extra gig at USD25 if you really need it). That's if they can even provide the ADSL service in your area.

Check out http://www.hellkom.co.za/ to see what other joyful benefits this company provides for the people who paid for its infrastructure with their tax bucks.

So, every time I hear an someone in the first world countries whining about the high costs of their (essentially unlimited) internet access I have a manic little giggle, and recount the days before I can emigrate from this shit tip of a country.

...is actually ahead of the US - Amazing!

PS - For the people who don't know what i am talking about, South Africa has a history of taking a very long time to deploy advances in telecoms - mostly due to our EVIL incumbent Telco, Telkom making sure they are able to rape the South African Internet population for all they are worth. Which means that typically our Internet connectivity options plainly suck. For some more information on how bad they suck, you can visit Hellkom or MyADSL.

However, we have actually had 3G technology over here for quite a couple of months already.

I'm on the continent of Africa (I was born here), thus I am an African, a South African, to be more specific. I have various boxes in my house running linux, and some other boxes running windows. I am familiar with both systems. Sure, our telecommunications company is fucking us over horribly which impedes our international "I.T" growth (http://www.hellkom.co.za/ but we do actually have the capacity to use a computer. "Africans" created both Ubuntu Linux and Impi Linux. We are not complete neanderthals.

The site that initiated the complaints is www.myadsl.co.za, a forum for users of ADSL in South Africa that got fed up with the shoddy service and lodged the complaint with the regulator. Thanks to Telkom South Africa is still in the Dark Ages when it comes to internet access. Hopefully with recent developments we'll have better service soon!

http://www.hellkom.co.za/
We All Love hellkom :)

heh, I actually used the Freedom Toaster. Keep in mind that the majority of South Africans still rely on dialup for their internet (due to our monopoly telecoms providor, Telkom, see http://www.hellkom.co.za/ for more info) Not everybody can just go and download the ISO files, for obvious reasons. And it's not as easy as getting your friend-of-a-friend to burn you a copy, because as I mentioned, chances are they are also still on dialup. The only solution is this bring&burn toaster. Ignoring the name, it actually works beautifully. While I was there I even had the enjoyment of meeting the majority of the IT campus pupils, all who seemed very interested in this whole "Open Source" business. So even though it may sound weird, or is a weird idea, fact remains, it works.

Not true of South Africa. You do find some billionaires here, eg. Sol Kerzner (Southern Sun Resorts and Casinos), Raymond Ackermann (owner of a large chain of supermarkets), Mark Shuttleworth (Thawte), but the average white (and now black middle class) South African is on par with a lower middle class US resident. The salaries are lower over here, the cost of living is higher, the taxes are 40% on earnings, plus a VAT of 14%, petrol tax, television licence tax, tax on aerial on your burglar alarm system etc. Cars, electronics etc are at least 40% more than in the States. State health is incredibly bad (although used to be one of the best in the world in the 70-80's - first heart transplant etc) most people who want some assurance of proper care need to pay hefty insurance fees (as high as 20% of their income sometimes). Cost of Internet broadband (512k max) access amounts to between 50% and 110% of the salary of the average person see
http://www.hellkom.co.za/

Regarding culture this is a backwater too, they maybe have one semi-pathetic symphonic orchestra, there is hardly and theatre, opera etc. Social serurity payouts are very low for most people.
AT present there is also a system of affirmative action excluding younger white males from jobs - who are going abroad, often to the UK or the US.

The whites here are definately not richer than most Americans, unless you only speak of trailer park residents and the homeless in US cities.

how about haveing a goverment enforsed monoply ?

read the rants
thouhgh there are worse telcoms then ours in dark africa, any one in kenya will problay have lots to say about it

In South Africa you have to pay about 180 USD for 512k upstream 256k downstream capped at 3gig.

We only have one Telecom called TELKOM and they are just about the most expensive telekom in the world. (http://www.hellkom.co.za/info.htm)

Every time you enquire about why they are so expensive they give the excuse that people in other countries have lots of other hidden costs they have to pay (yea right).

To get a 2.5 Mb fixed line from them would cost more per month then what I earn per year and I am not so unlucky with my salary then most in my country (third world)

When reading /. submissions like this, I can only shake my head in disbelief. We would love to have USA's "broadband backwater" here!

SA's telecommunications monopoly, Telkom (which happens to be partially owned by SBC Communications) has a tight fisted grip on voice and Internet connectivity here.
ADSL @ 512k is available at $150 PER MONTH! Capped at 3Gb. If you exceed the cap, traffic shaping kicks in and your connection gets routed through slower international links.
64k Diginet at $895 per month.
128k wireless broadband at $103 per month.

As a result, the vast majority of our 44 million population cannot afford to own a landline, let alone Internet connectivity. 56k dial-up is the most common method of accessing the Net, and even then the bill averages $35 - $100 for the typical net user because we don't get free local calls like you do in the States.

Ugh. A pox on SBC Communications and Telkom! See http://www.hellkom.co.za/ to see how we're getting royally shafted by Telkom!

Isn't it great to see people like Mark Shuttleworth (second space tourist, and the First African in Space) investing in these kinds of worthy programmes?
Now if only someone can convince the SA government that cheap internet is VERY important to the economy. At the moment communication in South Africa is controlled by Telkom, a monopoly. They charge more than R800 (about US$120) per month for ADSL, and they cap your bandwidth to 3 gig a MONTH. There's a good reason for the so called "digital divide" in South Africa, it's the prohibitive cost. There's a great site highlighting the grievances against Telkom, called Hellkom.

One telephone operator: Telkom and happyly charging the consumers exorbadent fees for connectivity. Monthly phone line rental: $10 per month, local phonecall: $0.10 per minute!!, mobile calls at $0.30 per minute!, ADSL: $100 per month with a 3 GIG cap.

They are making the cash and do not provide for the requirements of this developing company. One example is that because of this monopoly, bandwidth is expensive (+-$0.15 per MB), VoIP is illegal (by law) and service is poor!

We hate the monopoly, and believe that free market economoies are much more able to deliver what the consumer requires.

*vent*