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How Australia Bungled Its $36 Billion High-Speed Internet Rollout (nytimes.com)
Not very pleased with your internet speeds? Think about the people Down Under. Australia's "bungled" National Broadband Network (NBN) has been used as a "cautionary tale" for other countries to take note of. Despite the massive amount of money being pumped into the NBN, the New York Times reports, the internet speeds still lagged behind the US, most of western Europe, Japan and South Korea -- even Kenya. The article highlights that Australia was the first country where a national plan to cover every house or business was considered and this ambitious plan was hampered by changes in government and a slow rollout (Editor's note: the link could be paywalled; alternative source), partly because of negotiations with Telstra about the fibre installation. From the report: Australia, a wealthy nation with a widely envied quality of life, lags in one essential area of modern life: its internet speed. Eight years after the country began an unprecedented broadband modernization effort that will cost at least 49 billion Australian dollars, or $36 billion, its average internet speed lags that of the United States, most of Western Europe, Japan and South Korea. In the most recent ranking of internet speeds by Akamai, a networking company, Australia came in at an embarrassing No. 51, trailing developing economies like Thailand and Kenya. For many here, slow broadband connections are a source of frustration and an inspiration for gallows humor. One parody video ponders what would happen if an American with a passion for Instagram and streaming "Scandal" were to switch places with an Australian resigned to taking bathroom breaks as her shows buffer. The article shares this anecdote: "Hundreds of thousands of people from around the world have downloaded Hand of Fate, an action video game made by a studio in Brisbane, Defiant Development. But when Defiant worked with an audio designer in Melbourne, more than 1,000 miles away, Mr. Jaffit knew it would be quicker to send a hard drive by road than to upload the files, which could take several days."
A couple of points here. I live in Australia and I got to watch this entire fiasco unroll before me. 1. The conservative party got elected before the main rollout of the NBN could get underway. They had one mission: Kill the NBN anyway they could. They did this because they didn't want the Labor party to have a political victory with a major project, and because it aligned with the interests of the largest cable tv network and news corporations in the nation. Cable TV in Australia is a monopoly owned by Fox. They dominate Satellite, and fixed line pay TV. 2. The NBN Fibre rollout was delayed by asbestos inside the pits which had to be cleaned/repaired before they could proceed. This delayed the rollout by probably 6-12 months as the clearance work had to occur. There was also a political deal made where rural/country areas would be rolled out first. This combined with the fact that the backhaul services had to be built first led to an impression that the network was facing major delays and was taking a long time to be built, when it was actually on time and on budget. 3. Where it was actually deployed the Fibre to the Home NBN works perfectly and I've never heard anyone in those areas complain about having a fibre link. The same is not true of the Fibre to the Node and HFC connections. 4. Australia is not as sparsely populated as people would have you believe. 90+% of Australians live in larg coastal cities like most major countries and Australia's major cities have population densities equal to or higher than Auckland in New Zealand which has Fibre to the Home available. Density/population were never an issue with a metropolitan rollout of the NBN. 5, The conservative vision for the NBN was always a complete clusterfuck. Policy made without proper planning or consulting of industry. Done at the urging of people with a vested interest in keeping the internet speeds in Australia as low as the electorate would allow. The largest ISP in Australia has been quite happily milking ADSL 1.5mbit services for the last 20 years and only implemented ADSL2+ because competitor ISPs began taking marketshare. They refused to do any upgrades or builds involving fibre, unless they were guaranteed a monopoly and the ability to charge massive prices for it.
Speaking of monopolies!
Non paywalled link is a Murdoch paper. Coincidence that just as they look like they're about to be sold off, they speak out about the economically short-sighted move a lot of people think he lobbied for in the hope that internet broadcasters wouldn't run him and his overpriced cable out of town on the horse he rode in on? I think not xD
Sigger than your average
Didn't you read the article? The private sector, aka Telstra, reneged on the deal and shifted all of its agreed costs onto the taxpayer, then Australia elected a Libertarian government, who couldn't let a government project succeed, and thus they did everything they could to sabotage it.