I retired from personal blogging in July 2008.
But you can find me over at http://blog.xero.com.
I was invited back to speak at the Wellington Council Meeting this morning and was delighted to see that the recommendations have been adopted with a strengthening of the wording in section 6.
6. Agree that the Council will have a role in facilitating provision of the broadband infrastructure required, and in developing demand.
ENABLING ECONOMIC TRANSFORMATION THROUGH BROADBAND
Congratulation to Bryan Patchett and team for getting this through and well done Wellington City Council for having the vision to adopt this strategy and express a desire to create a competitive advantage for our city.
My understanding of the process from here is the strategy team now consults widely to establish what it might look like to put a plan forward by June. This is beginning of the journey but a great step forward.
blog
Why would they need to develop the demand side as well? Isn’t it already there?
Sure demand is there, but not the current opportunities.
Creating demand could also be read as investing in ideas and start-ups that use the broadband and technology.
I can’t believe that people are seriously considering letting a government body set up a backbone provider.
I think my comment on Rod’s previous post describes my position best. :)
http://www.drury.net.nz/2007/02/27/wellington-20-progress/#comment-40908
Jason
Jason, I think if you read the report that Rod has linked to above it will put your mind at rest.
The model is likely to comprise a form of JV or public-private partnership with the council acting as a “facilitator” rather than lead provider.
Pleasing to note that the report mentions the digital content initiative currently being developed by ICT Capital.
I did read it, and it scared me even more. The poor analogies, bad statistics and other fluff was really, really scary.
I really enjoyed the comparisons with Singapore. Nothing like comparing Wellington to a really, really densely populated city.
How much cheaper per person is it to install broadband if there are 6200+ people per square kilometer than a density of 620+ people per square kilometer. Yes, that’s right there is an order of magnitude difference in there! I didn’t believe it myself. It’s two orders of magnitude if you look at the Wellington Region!
So, it makes poor comparisons to support it’s claim. The analogies are wrong and don’t work. It ignores the capabilities of the existing networks entirely.
Just to be clear, I don’t work for any of the existing carriers or ISPs, I do have TCLs 80G plan, and I did consider moving into Wellington to be able to connect to CityLink.
Does anyone remember FreeNets? They were big in the US and Canada for a time. You could dial in for free, read email, do some basic surfing and read the newsgroups. It was busy, overloaded, but open access.
My inherent problem is with the “Open Access” portion. I don’t want an open access network. I want more than one cable into my house. I want to be able to switch providers if one technology doesn’t work quite right, or if the provider has a problem with the substation in my neighborhood. I want to have the option of easily and quickly stringing a cat6, fiber, or any other cable between two offices downtown. If I want a private network, I want to be able to do that without having to purchase a router to encrypt my traffic!
That’s what the council should be making cheap.
At this point in time (and the foreseeable future), bits are not interchangeable. The wire they arrive on makes a huge difference. Vodafone bits are different from Woosh bits are different from TCL bits are different from TNZ bits. Simply going from 10->100mbps isn’t going to make these differences go away. Any more than I can stream video over a 10mbps lan connection, but I can’t over a 10mbps wifi connection.
I like having that choice, please don’t take it away from me by having a competitor that is “the government”, supported by my taxes instead of any actual risk benefit analysis.
Here’s a challenge: Name a state owned enterprise that doesn’t sell it’s product at a loss (isn’t supported by government funds) and is in a vibrant marketplace with at least 2 competitors.
Jason
Reading this report makes me wonder what the goal is with this and why local councils need or should be involved. On the last point are councils doing such a great job with roading, sewage, transport that we now need to involve them with communications? And if they are not (and I don’t think any city council in NZ is that flash hot) why entrust them with another infrastructure service.
The diagram on page 7 has me confused. What is so important to the economics of Wellington to have -
IP Telephony - you have phones already
Teleconferencing - available now
Online Games - well gee this sounds import doesn’t it
MP3 Streaming - ditto above
Multi- Player Games - ditto above
Video on Demand etc - you have Youtube not that its the cure for cancer
Virtual Reality - how about Reality itself
Very little of the above (a shorten list from the report)is needed to make a city an economic powerhouse.
Unless you have companies developing this stuff and exporting it overseas and earning foreighn currency, whats the point?
Why does anyone in business need 100mb Internet connections? To play games and watch video on demand?
Of all the companies in the Wellington region that needed huge capacity, Weta did and got it from Telecom.
Or is the real reason for this push that you expect the council to provide free fast Internet for everyone.
There are options available to businesses, large and small in most NZ cities. Its just the options that are being marketed are slow ADSL ‘party line like’ connections.
IT businesses shouldn’t be running on the same compromised, slow lines that consumers use. Spend some money and get a decent service. They are available.
And no I don’t work for any telco, but I have found that the infrastructure is there and good services are available. But not to people with short hands and deep pockets.
The ironic thing about this report is they use roading and highway examples and compare this to communications. Did the person or committee that wrote this document not look at the state of the roads.
The real people you should be targeting Rod is the telco’s because they can make it happen.
I agree with Jason who I do not know, there is a lot of fluff and poor analogies in this report.
In saying the above, if you can make a difference then all power to you.
Here is a tip
When looking for an ISP to supply you with Internet services, go to http://www.ispmap.co.nz and click on the TOPOLOGICAL MAP OF NEW ZEALAND INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDERS. See how many lines between you and the major players in the US. Go to someone who buys from multiple suppliers.
Do the research.
“Unless you have companies developing this stuff and exporting it overseas and earning foreighn currency, whats the point?”
That is exactly the point. Isn’t it?
Wellington is a hive of creativity in terms of software and digital media. We can demonstrate some initiative by better connecting those creative people and industries, or we can stand by whilst other Pacific Rim cities overtake us. The chief economic argument in favour of doing this is that our city is competing globally for talent, ideas and capital. We need all the competitive advantages we can muster.
But the graph on page 7 does not say or indicate this. The proposal is woolly at best.
Plus if you need to develop all of these services with all your “creative people”, why do you need this new council driven and bankrolled connectivity?
My point is there is the existing connectivity services available; just spend a little money and get the services that exist now.
What this should really be is a pressure group to lean on Telecom and Telstra with councils backing, not a plan for the council to start funding infrastructure.
I agree that the entire debate would benefit from further economic analysis. But having spent the last few months talking to a lot of people involved in this sphere, one thing is very clear. The region is in danger of missing an opportunity to demonstrate leadership on a global level.
There are small businesses out there right now trying hard to “export knowledge” but whom are struggling with connectivity. Eventually these guys are going to give up and go elsewhere. Worse yet, smart people will stop moving here or wanting to do business with us.
Yes, if you are a Weta and co, you can get all the fat pipes you need laid on (for a price). But there is also a demonstrable public good in opening up that opportunity to smaller enterprises (for economic growth) and consumers (for reasons of lifestyle attractiveness).
Dermott mentioned that we need a “pressure group” to lean on the incumbent carriers. Umm…I’d be surprised if they weren’t paying attention already!
Dermott - is your comment tongue in cheek I mean, computers, woopdeedoo, who needs them? If you are trolling I’ll bite.
For example, you say:
“IP Telephony - you have phones already”
I used to live somewhere where we shared a line with our neighbours. It was called a “party line”. Interruptions to conversations were frequent, privacy non-existant. Also, if you wanted to call overseas, or even out of our region you had to book a call. You hoped that someone was at the other end to take the call. When your time was up, or close to up, an operator would cut in and let you know.
In short, we had phones back then. They were useful and very expensive, but they are a damn site more useful in this day and age. IP telephony and the services that that can be wrapped around it are another quantum leap in utility.
Paul Spence I think answers your other points. The council document *may* be woolly, but plenty people understand what they are on about and why it is important that they think about these issues.
If you are trying to “export knowledge”, why would anyone host anything in New Zealand? You are much, much better off buying hosting closer to your customers, and this broadband initiative isn’t going to change that.
For example, let’s look at the cost of traffic, a large variable cost for a knowledge company. If you’re exporting, it’s NZ$1.75/GB wholesale. At dreamhost.com (who is hosting drury.net.nz), a US hosting company it’s US$7.95 for 1.6TB, or NZ$0.007/GB. Even better, that US$7.95 includes hosting! That’s where your costs are, and this plan isn’t going to change any single part of that equation.
A friend just pointed out, “Why would you want to host in NZ? Even with peering, you’re still just a slashdot post away from bankruptcy”.
As for shipping large amounts of data around? As the textbook says, “Never underestimate the bandwidth represented by a station wagon full of tapes.”
My points are that this has a lot to providing broadband access to everyone in Wellington and very little to do with broadband for businesses. The list on page 7 is about people using those services not about developing for those services. While people might develop for those services, that is not the main thrust of the councils vision if the Stuff news item on the weekend is accurate.
The reason more people in Wellington don’t have broadband is because (a) they choose not to (b) cannot afford it (and changing the infrastructure won’t help here) or (c) don’t have a computer at all.
Plus the council wants central government funding as well. And they are talking about using fibre over the tramline (very tacky) or underground (best solution).
But the last mile will be copper or wireless, which really defeats the whole idea I think.
I don’t see considering the above what is stopping businesses develop any of the services mention using the existing infrastructure. Sure you have to pay for it but why should the rate payers pay for a duplicate infrastructure. And the councils wires are going to have to feed into ISP’s somewhere.
I dont live in Wellington so I have not vested interest either way, but you have Telecom and Telstra and Paradise Net (now Telstra) but you have historically had more Internet infrastructure than most NZ cities.
So at the end of the day sure you cannot run HDTV over your ADSL connection but why does the council seem to think this will bring economic value to the city?
I wish you well because our infrastructure in NZ could be much better (roads, sewerage, water, power and communications) but historically councils and central government have never stepped up to the plate.
Dermott, well, our business experiences on the whole “infrstructure” issue obviously differ.
“I wish you well because our infrastructure in NZ could be much better (roads, sewerage, water, power and communications) but historically councils and central government have never stepped up to the plate.”
For sure. But they are reasonably appropriate for our population right now. *If* we are serious about supporting the so called “knowledge econcomy” then what is being proposed is all part of that.
To answer Jason’s point - if your clients are exclusively overseas, sure place your servers close to your clients. However, NZ companies stand little chance of developing services here, building a business locally and then taking it overseas if the environment is so different that we are not living and breathing the environment available to overseas customers.
Sure, we can develop dial up applications really well right now, and Dermott has a phone, we should be happy, right? But without efficient infrastructure and a savvy local audience that will remain about our limit. You will note that Trade Me, our biggest and most successful internet operation, has no value whatsoever in overseas markets. At least, according to their former owner.
You have the same chance of building it here and taking it over there. In fact, I would say that you would want to host it in the US to serve your NZ customers anyways. The costs are just that much cheaper. This WCC plan won’t change those economics.
Perhaps I’m looking at a different market than you are. Which market do you consider indicative of your overseas customers? Singapore? South Korea? Japan? I’d say the US, Canada, UK and Australia. All are around the same broadband speed as NZ, between 7-30mpbs.
Personally, I can’t find any evidence of a causal link between increasing the network bandwidth from 10-100mpbs and any amount of increased creativity on the part of the residents of Wellington.
However, carriers are seeing the value in the network upgrades and are moving forward with their own roll-outs.
ADSL2+ is available in parts of Aus and the US, offering up to 22mbps. TNZ has already started friendly customer trials of ADSL2+, with a roll out supposedly starting in June.
Cable networks in the US are around 30mbps shared, and Telstra has the capability of doing that today. In fact, the existing cable infrastructure has a _lot_ of headroom in it. I expect to see a 30mpbs plan as soon as TNZ announces ADSL2. For more information on what cable can do, read up on DOCSIS.
Add in Woosh, wireless.co.nz, Vodafone, TNZ mobile and citylink. We have a pretty healthy competitive environment in Wellington.
For more information on my “all bits are not created equal” concept, try looking at the problems people have been having running skype over Woosh.
I’m still waiting for a crown corporation in a healthy market…
Now, I’m looking for an example of a service that cannot be offered at 10mbps but can at 100.
Jason
Jason, that sounds very much like the IBM guy that said “I think there is a world market for maybe five computers”
Hah! Welcome to the discussion Rod!
No, I can see how it would be very cool to have 100mbps to my house. As I said, if I didn’t have pets, I would be living in the center of Wellington with CityLink installed.
However, I don’t see a compelling reason for the Wellington City Council to short circuit competition and roll out their own network, obviating all of the investment that existing carriers have made. I believe all of my posts have indicated several reasons why this is a poorly thought out direction, and a waste of taxpayer funds. I am surprised that you chose to respond to the last sentence of the last post.
The point is, is there anything that I can do on 100mpbs that I can’t do on 10, or even 1?
Let’s take IPTV. I don’t watch broadcast TV anymore except for the news. When I want to watch a show, I schedule it to be recorded, wait for it to complete and then watch it at a later time. When I tested bittorrents of TV shows, I was able to download a 40+minute show in 20mins on my connection across the international link, in other words, faster than real time.
So, follow me here. The future of TV is a PVR. Since TV shows are scheduled in advance, and available to the broadcaster at least 3-5 days before broadcast, that means it is possible to push them to their PVR viewers prior to scheduled availability - much like a World of Warcraft patch. You schedule a show, such as “House”. The network device then pulls “House” down to your set top box when it is made available by the broadcaster. You are then able to watch it at your convenience. Even better, this is done in the small hours of the morning (or middle of the day) when bandwidth is more plentiful on the consumer network. You could even multicast to remove duplication on show downloads. This is precisely how Microsoft delivers nightly OS builds to it’s development and test teams.
The only change to the service when you scale up to 100mbps is that it takes less time to do the push every night. Hardly something new. Definitely not earth shattering.
Jason
Jason, what are you smoking.
1. Just because you can’t imagine an example when you would need more bandwidth does that mean there are no applications? Of course not. High resolution Video Conferencing is a simple example. We can always have more. Innovation will come from a 16 year old still in school who thinks of something wonderful to do in a bandwidth abundant environment. It’s more than importing TV. Building export businesses is around applications and content, and communicating with people globally.
2. The carriers are not going to role out fibre to the suburbs. There is no business case for them to do it. However the business case for Wellington doing it gets spread amongst many other factors like attracting new businesses, keeping people, social responsibility objectives and so on. Big pipes are competitive advantage to a City. The council gets that.
3. The carriers win as well. If there are better networks they can role out more services. You aren’t hearing the carriers arguing against this anywhere are you?
3. I’m not arguing for tax payer or rate funding. It may be that the cost benefits justify such funding but the point was we are already spending the money. In this case central and local government act as a coordinator so we get better service. Users still pay. Driving the physical connection to a cost plus model should create innovation at the apps and content layers.
If we want to live in this cool place we need to export more. Broadband at a local and international level puts us closer to customers. That is my motivation.
Thank you for you comments and I love the discussion.
Rod, I don’t smoke, and never have. I did manage to have 1/2 a cigar on my wedding day, but my wife took it away from me. ;)
I never said that there weren’t any applications, I questioned the value of the ones that were presented in the report, and specifically the statement that they were only possible with the presence of 100mbps+ bandwidth. I particularily questioned the belief that “if you build it, they will come”.
High Resolution Video Conferencing…
Who would you call? WCC rolling out fiber won’t give you video conferencing with anyone you couldn’t have reached with at most a 10 minute cab ride. How many 10 minute cab fares in $30m?
As for carriers not being against it, I haven’t heard them say anything on the subject at all. I would love to see a statement from a carrier that is either pro or con the plan. Personally, I think that they are too scared to say anything. Either that, or they have no faith in WCC’s ability to pull it off.
My belief is that we can see examples of a carrier’s true opinions by looking at reactions to municipal wifi networks in the US. Based on that, I don’t think NZ’s carriers will like it at all.
As for already spending the money, what money are we talking about? I thought the $30m was new funding that the WCC was spending?
Still, going all the way back to my original point, which has been lost in all this cruft. I’m starting to sound like a luddite!
Sort out the rights of way, make it cheap to lay cable and watch what happens. The expense of creating a network is in the digging, not in the fiber. Please don’t encourage a city council, with an investment view measured in decades to make purchasing decisions measured in weeks to months. People have a high likelihood of choosing the wrong technology, and politicians have an insanely bad habit of never admitting they made a mistake.
http://www.drury.net.nz/2007/02/27/wellington-20-progress/#comment-40908
Jason
Seems we’re not the only ones thinking about this …John Howard agrees ;-)
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/3/story.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10427074
Australia planning big spend on broadband
John Howard: “”Later this week there will be announcements made which will greatly enhance the access of Australians to broadband services. These are but some of the infrastructure investments that the commonwealth is making. They are important to our economic growth and to our future.”
“In fact, I would say that you would want to host it in the US to serve your NZ customers anyways.”
Bingo…and you can’t see how broken that situation is?
If you can make light travel faster when travelling to NZ, maybe it wouldn’t be such a but thing, but until you do come over to this side and look at the alternative solutions being proposed.
My final comments on this subject which I think has been beaten to death are these.
The so called commercial professional organisations that are mean’t to provide these type of services (Telecom et all) have problems with their infrastructure from time to time and then the whole pack of cards comes tumbling down.
In suggesting a city council setup infrastructure like this, do you really think you will get red hot service when a car knocks down a power pole carrying your fibre? And do you have any idea how hard fibre is to rejoin?
If they are as fast as filling a hole in the road with tarmac it will not make for a very commercial business model.
There is nothing wrong with what WCC is proposing except -
- they are not the people to be doing it
- the financial numbers don’t add up - $30 million to provide infrastructure so consumers can watch youtube!
- personally I cannot see hordes of businesses wanted to move to Wellington
Someone has to pay for this and I find it hard to believe that Telecom and Telstra have not run the numbers for Wellington and other NZ cities and cannot make the numbers work. So don’t think it will be free or cover the Wellington region.
From the article on Stuff -
“In the first stage of the project 100 kilometres of fibre-optic cabling would most likely be strung out across the city’s network of trolley bus wires – a move that would reduce cabling costs by as much as 80 per cent.” - dumb move put it underground, very short minded thinking.
“In the final stage of the project, connections to homes, business and schools would be completed using either copper, wireless or cable.” - now this sounds like what you have now. Who wants to run broadband (we are talking fast broadband here not 1mb) over wireless. I don’t, been there done that.
The council would be far better to invest in two other areas.
1. Longer airport runway
2. A roof over the city
Don,
Nothing that the WCC is proposing will change anything in my recommendation to host in the US. The WCC is proposing to lay fiber. That doesn’t provide cheap national peering, or in any way lower the cost of international traffic. That’s an entirely separate discussion.
My recommendation is based on some pricing knowledge. It has to do with how bandwidth is sold, and hiding in the margins. Traffic is charged in aggregate. The average cost to deliver a packet is worked out and that charge is passed down to the customer. Since the average cost to deliver a packet in NZ is rather high (being predominantly international), that sets the cost at a high level.
In the US, the average cost to deliver is much much lower. There is a lot more traffic moving around, and a lot of it is national in nature. This means that it is possible to hide in the margins and make a non-average use of high cost bandwidth and save money.
It is possible to see the same pricing behaviours in long distance phone charging in the US. Most individuals pay a flat rate for their long distance. For most US destinations, the cost of termination is minimal. However, some destinations (such as Iowa - the 712 area code) cost more, a LOT more. I understand that carriers pay 8-10c/minute to terminate a call into Iowa. However, because the calls to Iowa are so small in total minutes, the charge is swallowed in the noise. In fact, there are several VoIP carriers offering free international calling through the 712 area code, making money off of the termination fees paid by the long distance providers.
In other words, it’s cheaper to host in the US because the bandwidth price in the US does not reflect the actual price to deliver the traffic I wish to have delivered (to NZ). Someone on the chain will be losing money in the transaction. I believe the technical term for this is “arbitrage”.
Jason
Much of this discussion seems to hinge on the idea that ratepayers should help with the costs of establishing (and potentially maintaining) the network, yet it seems that most of the benefits would accrue to the leading-edge technology businesses that can make use of the bandwidth.
This sounds like a subsidy to me.
Is there any particular reason why ratepayers should be expected to stick their hands in their pockets to subsidise a small group of private sector companies?
Clarke, see my comment above. It should be a user pays model, but there may be justification for some investment. Everyone wins if business is successfull as it attracts new workers and more rates.
Also the council does have networks in place already so there hopefully will be cost offset opportunities.
I’d also point out that the Trolley Bus wires is just an option. That may provide an interim step forward but the council is aware that underground would be better and I’m sure would have a strategy to gradually move the network underground. Underground is much more expensive but I’m sure there will be some ‘if the road is open throw some glass in’ type pragmatism.
“Everyone wins if business is successfull as it attracts new workers and more rates.”
This is demonstrably not the case. Adding more workers has absolutely no impact on the rating base, unless someone gets around to constructing a new office block! Simply adding more staff to an existing business in an existing building doesn’t change the rating levels one iota.
“’I’m sure would have a strategy to gradually move the network underground. Underground is much more expensive but I’m sure there will be some ‘if the road is open throw some glass in’ type pragmatism”
Sadly, the Council has no such strategy, and there’s no evidence of them applying any kind of pragmatic approach to undergrounding. In my neighbourhood, we have power poles cluttered with electricity, trolley bus feeds, Telstra’s cable and Telecom’s copper, and when the footpaths were being resealed the Council said they wouldn’t undergound the cables unless the residents paid - despite the fact that they collect nearly $6 million per annum from us in rates. In this respect, the Council are all talk and no action.
I don’t have any issue with the plan per se - in fact, I think it will benefit the city overall. It’s just that the same goal can easily be achieved by a separate non-profit organisation, and there is absolutely no need for the council to spend yet more ratepayer dollars to benefit a segment of the business community.
What!?!?
We’re hiring new people, who move to Wellington, buy houses (keeping prices up) and pay rates. They also buy dinners, go the movies, put kids in school, invest locally etc.
The council team, lead by Brian Patchett is all over this pragmatic approach. The team now inside council are very capable and passionate.
Yes councils are slow but I think they now get it and we are seeing progress.
This is a really, really good thing.
“We’re hiring new people, who move to Wellington, buy houses (keeping prices up) and pay rates. They also buy dinners, go the movies, put kids in school, invest locally etc.”
And you’d still achieve all of these benefits if the network was funded through an independent non-profit, rather than through ratepayers. Besides, since when has increased population in Wellington resulted in lower rates for existing residents? Despite the changes in demographics over the last 15 years, rates increases have consistently outrun inflation, which rather undermines the “more people = wider rating base = lower individual rates” argument.
My point is that I’m struggling to see a causal link between the council making a network investment and a tangible return on that investment for the ratepayers.
“The council team, lead by Brian Patchett is all over this pragmatic approach. The team now inside council are very capable and passionate.”
Of course they’re enthused - it’s election year! :-)
I rather exhusting and interesting debate (my eyes are tired reading it all).
The key assumption that the main-stream national telco can’t be relied on to deliver a world class infrastructure across all of Wellington City (and region) is the key assumption that started CityLink and that assumption is still valid in my mind. It’s obvious that they struggle to deliver anything more than their average solutions in any one city/community/geographic locale. And just like other utility pipe services (water/sewer/stormwater/gas/electricity) it’s really up to the local community (WCC, HCC, PCC, GWC, etc) to face up to the responsibilty in it’s own patch and ensure this community has appropriate infrastructure capability.
The measurable benefits of the Citylink type of open access infrastructure (and subsequate services marketplace) is often debated and it’s really difficult to measure (just like other pipe network) in terms of economic benefit. The telco networks (CityLink, etc) are most often not front of mind until they don’t work. And here at CityLink we know how relient Wgtn business are on what we do in the CDB and we know rather quickly when it breaks.
CityLink was started without the end in mind (also without much $, just real passion from a small bunch of people). It was a big (perhaps blind) belief in what the Internet promised that drove the like of Richard Naylor to just stop talking and get on with it. We don’t no what we don’t know (thank god for that) but why should that ever stop us. Taking risks is part of the territory.
The strategy that WCC are shaping has two parts; a vision for the City; and action plan to do stuff. It’s the doing stuff that at the end of the day that changes everything in ways that none of us can predict. It maybe WCC doing stuff; it maybe WCC encouraging or partnering industry to do stuff.
At the end of the day hurray to doing stuff and let’s acknowledge WCC are showing leadership on behalf of this city to ensure Wellington will continue to have world class Broadband (read Internet) infrastructure whatever it may look like.
Ok, the nay sayers have convinced me. I think rate payers should not have to contribute anything to anyone. I think they should spend their out of work hours hiding behind lace curtains, twitching the corners ready to report citizens who might be outside enjoying themselves … at someone else’s expense. I think we should all have Dairy Board jobs sorting cubes of butter into appropriate piles ready for export to our Mother Country.
It’s the New Zealand way, isn’t it?
C’mon Don. It’s unfair to bring the primary sector into this debate. We fed your family through and between two world wars. This paid for the copper in the ground! We deserve free STUFF [insert fav news site] for breakfast!
Rod - can you ask Council to pass a bylaw banning fax machines and posties at the same time. This will clearly drive broadband adoption, create B2C efficiencies and reduce dog attacks. Now we’re thinking.
[...] believe it’s been six months since this event. Rod Drury has really picked up the ball and run with it.  The Wellington 2.0 group has been formed to advise, comment, promote. It’s time for [...]
Interesting to see what the USA is doing - local government is starting to provide network infrastructure and seeing benefits from doing so:
1. Fixing the “last mile” problem
2. Removing the unrealistic expectation that a single provider (Ma Bell) will provide a neutral network infrastructure for competitors to benefit from.
“No one wants to pay for another guy’s tank of gas”
From Wired Magazine Jan 07:
“Local governments are building neutral infrastructures that allow anyone, from ISPs to community networks, to use and extend blisteringly fast broadband networks. At the end of its first year, a project in Sandoval County, New Mexico, for example, already provides many in the area with more than 10 times the capacity than anywhere else in the US.”