Some say that this is being put on the table again because it is a quick fix, but potentially ineffective solution, proposed by the MPAA and RIAA for governments to implement. But simple logic says that this is not the answer.

If someone is sending offensive material through the post system, you prosecute the person, not demand that the postal system denies service to them. Likewise if someone drives like an idiot, you suspend their licence, fine them, prosecute them, etc and not ban car dealers from selling them a car.

The internet simply presents a new medium and a new challenge for distribution of media and intellectual property which big media businesses need to accept and embrace, rather than complain about the potential death of optical media they need to negotiate with service providers in finding new profitable means of releasing and distributing new media.

However, big media businesses will also need to keep in mind that duplication and distribution costs are far, far lower than traditional optical media channels and that most people wont tolerate paying physical media costs for electronic media formats because consumers know that the manufacturing costs just do not exist like they previously and traditionally did.

It is only when media producers try to keep themselves in their old mindset and place content out there in a digital context but keep themselves in a physical media mind and charge accordingly that piracy kicks in. This in turn makes them scream bloody murder and attempt to prosecute users, when it is their own mindset that needs to change.

Whichever way it goes, media and entertainment will never been the same again.

For taxpayers to recoup their $27 billion investment in the national broadband network, the government is betting at least 70 per cent of households will have signed up by 2025.

It is also assuming the share of homes who use only mobile phone and internet services – typically renters and share households – will increase slightly from 13 per cent today to 16.3 per cent in 2025.

But an independent review by the advisory firm Greenhill Caliburn has told Canberra to keep a close eye on those mobile-only households that are shunning fixed-line connections.

The review was commissioned by the government to assess the corporate plan for the NBN Co. An executive summary was published yesterday.

While the review said NBN Co’s corporate plan and its assumptions were ”reasonable”, it also said competition from wireless technology was a ”key risk” to the revenue raised by the NBN Co.

Amid predictions of ballooning use of mobile devices such as iPads, it said trends towards ”mobile-centric” broadband networks could affect the number of people who connected to the network.

In comments pounced on by critics of the network, the review said ”some consumers may be willing to sacrifice higher-speed fibre transmissions for the convenience of mobile platforms”.

The opposition communications spokesman, Malcolm Turnbull, said this exposed serious risks to NBN’s economic viability.

He also said the review did not address whether taxpayers were getting their money’s worth through the project. ”This report, like the other multimillion-dollar consultants’ reports the government has commissioned, fails to address the single most important issue – what is the most cost-effective way to ensure that all Australians have access to high speed and affordable broadband?” Mr Turnbull said.

But the Minister for Broadband, Stephen Conroy, said the government would make sure NBN Co was hitting a range of performance targets as it was rolled out.

”The government will work closely with NBN Co to put in place agreed performance indicators to track its performance and adjust strategies or operations as needed.”

Information Source smh.com.au

The speed is significantly faster than the maximum speeds promised by the opposition in its broadband policy, and highlights the growing gap between what a fibre-based broadband network can offer compared with existing technology.

It has also emerged that NBN Co told staff to ignore political attacks on the company by the opposition, after its finance spokesman, Andrew Robb, called it a ”stodgy” bureaucracy, labelled its staff ”talentless” and promised to close it down if elected to government.

One gigabit per second is 17,500 times faster than a dial-up connection and 167 times faster than the average ADSL broadband connection. ”I am trying to make sure people understand what it is that NBN Co is going to deliver,” its chief executive, Mike Quigley, said.

Increasing the speed would not add to the $43 billion construction price tag and the fibre could be upgraded to provide even faster speeds in coming years, Mr Quigley said.

The faster capability was already built into the equipment which the company was installing in homes and Mr Quigley said he decided to enable it after discussions with internet providers and the competition watchdog.

Telecommunications industry figures have given support to parts of the Coalition’s policy even as others decry the lack of investment and ”vision” in Tuesday’s $6 billion announcement.

The opposition communications spokesman, Tony Smith, announced the Coalition would spend $750 million on a fixed broadband optimisation grants program to overcome technical restrictions that stop 1 million households from using ADSL, the most common technology for broadband services.

The decision received praise from industry figures, who said it was a cost effective way to offer timely broadband to significant numbers of people using existing infrastructure.

”If you’re looking at an incremental approach to getting towards high-speed broadband, that’s the way to do it,” said an industry consultant, Kevin Morgan.

An Ovum broadband consultant and former Liberal policy adviser, David Kennedy, said mobile phone carriers, in particular Vodafone Hutchison Australia, had spare spectrum capacity in regional areas and could offer wireless broadband.

Ian Birks, the chief executive of the Australian Information Industry Association, said the Coalition’s plan showed a lack of commitment to broadband, but was ”reasonable” within the fiscal restraints imposed.

”I don’t think the Coalition policy recognises the vision for a digital future in Australia, that’s what makes it disappointing,” he said.

NBN Co has been instructed to replace Australia’s copper telephone network with fibre optic cable to 93 per cent of the population and high-speed wireless and satellite to remote areas.

NBN Co would offer unlimited download capacity at one gigabit per second wholesale rates to retail internet providers, but service provider Internode said it was not reasonable to give consumers unlimited downloads.

Information Source smh.com.au