Some big news in NBN world this week, Malcolm Turnbull announcing the Libs’ plan to kill the NBN regardless of the cost, Netgear’s Patrick Lo voicing his thoughts on the network and a tropical cyclone throwing everything into turmoil.
• The week started with a bang, with Malcolm Turnbull admitting to ARN that the opposition would look to kill the NBN in its tracks should they get into power. Regardless of the cost. At the same time, he refused to give a detailed breakdown of the opposition’s alternative to the NB until we get closer to the next federal election.
• The debate around whether or not money from the NBN should pay to help flood victims continued this week with some surveys showing around a third of people (who partook of the survey) thought that money from the NBN should replace the flood levy. This got way more attention than it should have. We already know some people don’t want the NBN and we know people hate extra taxes.
• Exetel’s boss John Linton got some press this week thanks to his outspoken comments on the NBN. He certainly didn’t hold back when he told ZDNet:
“There is no justification — it was, and remains, [former Prime Minister Kevin]Rudd’s legacy to his overarching ego that he was an unbelievably pig ignorant man that had tried to win an election making stupid promises and a refusal to face the reality that he was catastrophically wrong.”
Ouch!
• The floods in Queensland, backed up by tropical cyclone Yasi, has created a bit of a skills shortage which could effect the NBN. It seems that the workers who would be installing the NBN will be needed to help repair the disaster areas around Australia at the moment, which could delay the network’s rollout.
• A report out of The Institute for the Broadband Enabled Society (IBES) at the University of Melbourne has deemed that the coalition’s much demanded cost-benefit analysis would be a challenge thanks. ITWire quotes the report as saying:
“The basic issue is that we do not have much revealed information about private willingness to pay for broadband under the future NBN setup. This is because the product essentially does not currently exist in Australia, and so market price information is limited”
The final conclusion is that the CBA isn’t impossible, but would be difficult and conclusions may not be perfect.
• Cyclone Yasi hit Townsville pretty hard. The thing is that Townsville had a good chunk of NBN fibre cables already rolled out on telegraph polls, which were blown over and damaged by the 250km/h plus winds. Comms minister Stephen Conroy has said that it’s still too early to tell how much the rollout has been set back.