THERE is more than a technological difference between the Coalition’s new broadband policy and Labor’s National Broadband Network.
The Coalition wants to save $17 billion or so by doing fibre optic to nodes and having the existing copper wire take signals to and from households from there — a sort of copper wire bottle neck. Labor’s NBN would take the fibre optic all the way to each household.
Under the Coalition’s model any individual household that wanted to bring the fibre optic from the node to the household could do so by paying for it privately — several thousand dollars.
It is a classic Tory model — provide a basic service to keep the peasants from revolting and then ensure that the elites can buy the extra to lift them above the masses.
Even the basic service they would provide begrudgingly.
Provide the absolute bare minimum health services under Medicare or educational services under the public education system to keep the masses placated and then graft on a system under which the rich and powerful can add some dollars to get the best.
Top Hat Turnbull’s new internet scheme for Australia is hauntingly similar to to Coalition’s view of health, education and even roads — not a universally available service under which the government takes advantages of its purchasing power for the benefit of all, but an elitist scheme of poorer service for the have nots and a superior service for the elites.
Turnbull, of course, represents a seat in wealthy eastern Sydney. Private telecommunications companies have always served wealthy metro areas lavishly. But how does this sit with his leader who is a bundle of confusion over battlers, user pays, neo-classical economics, fiscal conservatism and rural socialism?
In eastern Sydney, one of Australia’s most densely populated areas, the “node” in fibre to the node might be on the pavement outside a apartment block — just a short run to the home and perhaps a few hundred dollars.
But out in St George, Queensland, to pick a random example of a regional town, the node might be many more metres and many more dollars away. An accountant, even from that remote town, should be able to see as much. And should also be able to see the merit of the saying: “While you have got that hammer in your hand.”
It makes good economic sense to put the fibre from the node to each house as you install each node — the ground is dug up, the equipment and workers are there.
In some respects, Labor deserves a bit of a bollocking over not being entrepreneurial enough over the NBN. Recall that Labor gave in to the demands of rural independents Tony Windsor and Rob Oakshott that there should be an early roll out of the NBN in their electorates.
That is not how business works. You first go for the easy customers who can be provided cheaply and then go on to the fringe market.
It meant NBN spent too much with too little return in the early stages. If it had hit Sydney and Melbourne early it would have got a better income stream and better media coverage. Huge numbers of people would have vouchsafed that NBN was vastly superior to previous offerings. And there is nothing like word of mouth.
As it is, the Coalition will once again chisel away at a nationally significant element of progress. As it has done in education and health, it will warp was envisaged as a universal, cost-effective scheme capturing economies of scale. In its place will be a scheme giving more to the rich and powerful but at a cost of undermining the overall effectiveness of a national scheme.
Wither Medicare. Wither public education. Wither the NBN. National economies of scale and national benefit surrendered to the powers of elitism and privilege.
The Coalition pays lip service to equality of opportunity. Everyone has equal opportunity provided you can pay privately to bring fibre from the node to the home.
Equity and economy aside, the Coalition’s policy fails to take account of a combination of technology and marketing forces that has hitherto left those with less bandwidth to flail.
Every time bandwidth expands for the bulk of the market, web designers add more and more complex content to each page. That is great for those with bandwidth in the capital cities, but it is hell for those in the sticks. They have to wait for ages for a lot of inane video clips and other trash to download before they can get to want they want.
You can bet that without universal NBN to the home, web designers will cater for the majority of city slickers who have paid for the Turnbull add-ons, and people in the sticks, say in St George,Queensland, will have to wait even longer online to get what they want.
DOT DOT DOT
Speaking of fast Internet, I see that this year’s Law Via the Internet conference is to be held on the beautiful Channel Island of Jersey in September. Silly me, I thought it would have been held in cyberspace.
Papers — yes, papers — for it closed yesterday.
More seriously, though, the conference is being held by the Free Access to Law Movement which began 11 years ago.
Now, statutes and case law are available free in most countries. But textbooks and commentary are not — nor are they in most other fields of study.
Sadly, most publishers are charging huge amounts for online books, similar to what they charge for printed books simply because the market seems to bear it.
It is time for legal and other academic publishers to abandon hard print, to print only electronically, and pass all of the savings on to students and researchers while still giving authors a fair return.
To do otherwise invites piracy and diminished returns for authors and publishers alike.
This article first appeared in The Canberra Times on 13April 2013.
CRISPIN HULL