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The Australian Broadband Disaster

Posted by timothy on from the one-wireless-box-isn't-cutting-it dept.

David Gerard writes "Monopolies are bad, mmmkay? Robert Clark of TelecomAsia discusses the disaster that is broadband in Australia - its 2% takeup putting Australia behind such dynamic economies as Estonia. 'Telstra controls the local loop, is the largest mobile carrier with two digital networks, is the largest retail ISP, the largest wholesale data and Internet provider, and is a 50% shareholder in the biggest pay TV company.'"

8 of 432 comments (clear)

  1. It sounds better... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...than the comcast service I have right now. I swear my internet works only when no one on the block is watching cable.

    I like their customer service "Welcome to Comcast, if you are calling for customer service please hang up now and bang your head against a wall until you are hallucinating connectivity.

  2. Re:More Info by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny
    worst movies I have ever made

    Oooh, I dunno. Your performance in "The Phantom Menace" was pretty rough too.

  3. Plan pricing by sprayNwipe · · Score: 1, Funny

    The most ridiculous thing isn't the fact that we have 3gb/month limits, but the fact that to upgrade to a 5gb/month plan, you have to pay almost as much as two 3gb connections!

    It's completely ludicrous, driven mainly by the fact that our technology minister is a luddite who went on the record to say that broadband internet is only useful for porn and games.

  4. It's an injustice... by blix5 · · Score: 2, Funny

    This needs to be fixed, so that I no longer have to spend 8 hours downloading classic episodes of Bananas in Pajamas from slow Australian Kazaa servers. :P

  5. You gotta see the master plan! he's a genius! by Simon · · Score: 1, Funny
    Hey, give Alston some credit. We laughed when he tried to introduce censorship on the net. But with only 2% of Australian's having broadband and thus the technical capability for downloading and viewing today's porn, I would say that he's done a great job of keeping that nasty porn and gambling away from those poor Aussies.

    From the article:

    " It is only in the last year that Alston has come to acknowledge the importance of broadband, having previously dismissed it as primarily a distribution platform for pornography and gambling. As recently as 12 months ago he still maintained that for consumers it was mostly for "entertainment-related" activity such as music and video downloads and thus of dubious value for national productivity. "

    --
    Simon

  6. Incompetence.. by pigeon · · Score: 3, Funny

    Telstra suffers from a disease that is quite common ammong companies who have a monopoly: imcompetence. For instance, we tried to solve why our australian branch could not make an isdn connection to Amsterdam. Turned out that telstra simply forgot to route to Holland..

  7. Re:Download caps on broadband by suss · · Score: 3, Funny

    I've heard that many (all?) of the Australian broadband options have limits on how much you can download per month. I hope it's not a sign of things to come in the rest of the world.

    Yes, because we all know Australia is a trendsetter and the world will follow in its footsteps...

    So eat your vegemite sandwich and throw some more shrimp on the barbie while you watch the wombats and koala's battle it out to the death.

  8. actually using this telco. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I'm actually using this telco as we speak, and sometimes, i actually consider NOT clicking on the comments section on the fear that its not worth the 146kb ( 1024 / 14c/mb ) people think that they are giving me.

    Sometimes your comments cost ME $0.02 AUD