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Comments: 144 +- Your Rights Online: AU Goverment To Break Up Telstra; Filtering News on Tuesday September 15, @11:21PM
Posted
by
kdawson
on Tuesday September 15, @11:21PM
from the breaking-up-is-hard-to-do dept.
from the breaking-up-is-hard-to-do dept.
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benz001 writes "The Minister who has pushed the ridiculous broadband filter plan has at least won a few brownie points with yesterday's press conference, in which he promised to force Telstra to split its network and wholesale businesses. Australia's largest ISP, and the country's main infrastructure owner, will be given a chance to implement the structural separation voluntarily; if it does not, the Government will step in with legislation. Here is the Minister's official press release." And speaking of the filtering program, reader smash writes "After several years of debate and electioneering, some statistics on the Australian national web filtering effort have been disclosed. Apparently, the typical Aussie web surfer is 70 times more likely to win the national lotto than stumble across a blocked page. Additionally, despite the claim that the main aim of the filter is to block child pornography, only 313 of the 977 total sites blocked is on the basis of child porn. At $40M AU so far in taxpayers funds, the cost so far is around $40,900 per blocked URL. Government efficiency at work..."
Executive ability is prominent in your make-up.
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It's hard enough dealing with ONE Telstra (Score:2, Insightful)
Let alone two.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
My bet is that it will be situation normal whether they are split or not...
Re:It's hard enough dealing with ONE Telstra (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
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This is exactly what they hope to accomplish and exactly what Telstra is doing.
Re:It's hard enough dealing with ONE Telstra (Score:4, Informative)
Indeed, and any suggestion otherwise is merely FUD.
Having worked for Telstra, their attitude toward wholesale customers is absolutely terrible. They are deliberately given worse service than Telstra customers, even though ALL Australians paid for the network they "own". This is great news and I have been pushing for this as a viable alternative to the mess that is Aussie telecoms - mind you, most people have no idea of the real impact and just parrot the FUD spreaders.
I wouldn't be surprised if bloodhawk is in Telstra middle management.
Parent
Re:It's hard enough dealing with ONE Telstra (Score:5, Interesting)
There are astonishing anti-competitive roadblocks to wholesalers. I recently looked into converting my internet service into a naked service, but the caveats and hoops they have to jump through made me give up for now.
The internet service stays the same, the physical wire stays the same, the exchange connections pretty much stay the same, all that I wanted to change was moving the line rental from Telstra to my ISP. To do so would require a totally new service to be commissioned with extended outages, and was told this is an artificial limitation.
Parent
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My daughter spent 2 hrs on a kids games website at her grandparents house not long after they signed up to Telstra. This put their account over the limit, and combined with all the other traffic that went across the account in the first month, they received a $280 bill. Despite my repeatedly telling them that they should choose
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Is it flexible? No. Would I ever use a telstra plan? No. (I signed my parents up to Internode) Would I recommend Telstra as an ISP to anyone? No. Could you get much better value for the same $30 from another ISP? Of Course. Is it likely a 200 meg plan would suffice for many elderly couples and their for
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Until a windows service pack is released which blows it all in one go.
Re:It's hard enough dealing with ONE Telstra (Score:5, Insightful)
No, this is excellent news, should have been done years ago. The problem with Telstra is that, as well as being a front-end retailer and ISP, they own all of the back-end infrastructure. Despite regulations that are supposed to allow access by other providers to the back-end infrastructure, Telstra have always managed to find a way to charge more for other companies to use the infrastructure than it costs themselves, giving Telstra (ISP) an unfair advantage over other ISP's.
Now, the retail end of Telstra (the part that would presumably keep the brand name) will need to compete on a level playing field with the other telcos for a share of the wholesale bandwidth. There is no reason for there to be any kind of special relationship between the separated arms of (former) Telstra, anyway there are plenty of existing laws (eg, price fixing!) to discourage that.
I don't agree that "people don't know better" than use Telstra. That might have been true for the first decade after deregulation, but no longer. Telstra is universally loathed in Australia, and people who still use it tend to only do so because in some markets (but by no means all) they are the cheapest.
Parent
Re:It's hard enough dealing with ONE Telstra (Score:4, Informative)
Absolutely true.
I have seen something similar going on in The Netherlands, where KPN (traditionally the only fixed-line telephone provider) has been forced to give access to other companies to their network, at good rates. Those rates are determined by the government, periodically reviewed, and are cost plus reasonable profit for the maintenance of the existing network.
It took a while, but first the IDD providers got in - users had to dial a four-digit prefix to select the carrier. Then those IDD providers also started to provide long-distance calls, with the same four-digit prefix. Then small devices came that would dial that prefix for you automatically and transparently. And now even that is not necessary anymore, users can directly set the IDD and long-distance carrier. And are billed by that carrier.
The same of course for ADSL services provided over the POTS network. First KPN's own povider Planet Internet was basically the only one, now there are dozens or even hundreds competing on the ADSL market, providing great choice for the consumer.
The only problem left is that because KPN owns the cables, so it is always a KPN technician that comes to your home to make necessary connections. And the communication between you (consumer that wants a connection), ISP (that has to set up your account) and KPN (that has to connect the cables) is not always going perfectly well.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
I first got broadband in 2003 on a 2 year conract, 512/128 1gb download limit (with uploads counted!) and excess charges for $70AUD a month through Telstra.... In 2004, I bought out the contract and switched to iiNet... 256/64kbps 4gb download limit (Uploads not counted) with excess usage capping for $60AUD. Oh how things have changed since then. I
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Hahaha. Your standards are so low it's laughable. "Generous download allowance" of 35 gigabytes? Your attitude is mind-numbingly ignorant.
If most of your data went through underseas cables, then why does your cap apply to all traffic?
You also realize most of the popular sites Australians visit are hosted locally in Australia, right? This reduces costs for the content providers as well as the ISPs.
Japan is a similarly isolated island country, and yet affordable 1 gbps connections are proliferating in urb
Re:It's hard enough dealing with ONE Telstra (Score:4, Informative)
Japan is a similarly isolated island country, and yet affordable 1 gbps connections are proliferating in urban areas.
Population density of Japan: 337.6/km2
Population density of Australia: 2.833/km2
Theres a reason that 1gbps connections are available in Japan, but not Australia. For how isolated we are as a country here, its remarkable that we have the internet as good as we do.
Parent
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Japan is a similarly isolated island country, and yet affordable 1 gbps connections are proliferating in urban areas.
Japan has many times the population density of Australia. Their telecommunication markets are not comparable. The Japanese are a race. They really do look to their own country for content. Australians exchange data with countries which have comparable cultures. Europe and the USA.
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This is not true at all. We will have one that manages infrastructure, that will deal with all companies equally. You will then have one that competes, and is no different to the other carriers. HOW IS THIS 2 MONOPOLIES.
Statistics? (Score:2)
Say what you will about the effectiveness and appropriateness of the Austrailian web filters... This "70 times more likely to win the national lottery" business was clearly pulled out of someone's ass, and in the process, they made a number of egregiously wrong statements.
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It's really not that difficult, but perhaps you could RTFA, since TFA actually has some justification for this figure. Perhaps your posting came from the same orifice that you claim the "70 times" number came from?
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I was recently told by a Queensland Education Department tech that the current, recently upgraded EdQ filter infrastructure (centralised in Brisbane covers every school in Qld Au) is only able to cope with a maximum 80mbps requests. Some of the apparently common slowdowns of the department's network were due to this.
I can only wonder what will happen when Australians are all filtered...
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These stats came from a government that would not set the criteria of pass or fail until they have the result. They also make stupid claims about how it won't slow the internet, last I checked a 404 is a pretty high percentage of slow down about 100%
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maybe they were black or aboriginal, making you automatically a racist for disagreeing with them.
I found it interesting being in the UK and having British Blacks come up to me and harassing me for the way Australians treated Aboriginals. To think that I was a native of a country (UK) being harassed by immigrants (Africans) about harassing immigrants (Aboriginals)! Made me laugh; I guess some races just strive to prove genetic deficiency when political correctness prevents people from theorising it.
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To think that I was a native of a country (UK) being harassed by immigrants (Africans) about harassing immigrants (Aboriginals)!
In what way are Aboriginal people immigrants?
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Off topic but the irony and the laugh would be on you if they "harassed" you the same the British did: by harassment do you mean they forced you out of your homes, to learn their imported language, killed your friends and kidnaped your kids ?
You don't want to push the efficiency angle... (Score:5, Insightful)
Obviously, the mere existence of the system sucks, and taking pot-shots at governmental inefficiency is always fun; but there is a serious point here(although this program is a poor example, since it shouldn't exist at all):
Inefficiency is bad; but do not make the mistake of assuming that procedural restraint is a form of inefficiency. After all, courtrooms could be much more efficient, in case/year terms, if jury trials and defense attorneys were abolished. Prisons would be much more efficient, in dollars/year/inmate terms, if they were kept as full and as crowded as possible. And just think of the negative impact of the internal affairs division on the number of officers actively patrolling the streets, a terrible waste.
If your justice system allows efficiency to replace justice as the primary criterion, you have issues.(Of course, if your justice system allows public hysteria and political convenience to replace justice as the primary criteria, you get web censorship schemes).
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Corruption and Australia (Score:4, Interesting)
As an Australian citizen I have to say I am ashamed of Australia's level of corruption at all levels of government (and the lower the level the higher the corruption) from local to state to federal. With a justice system for which truth is no defence against an allegation and unions that have no interest in actually doing their job.
Is Internet Filtering about protecting Australians or giving authorities more reason to prosecute and more agencies kickbacks for "essential services"?
Here in Australia you don't even need to break a present law to have committed a crime. The Australian Tax Office (or Federal Government) can, at any time, pass legislation that applies retrospectively. For anyone with a short memory consider the repealed alcopop tax in 2009, the luxury car tax that was levied prematurely, the petrol taxes levied by Keating without budget approval in the senate, etc etc.
People get excited about Australia but it is just the weather and landscapes that are worth raving about. The regulatory system has nothing fair or just about it.
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For anyone with a short memory consider the repealed alcopop tax in 2009,
Even though it had never passed, they are still collecting it, and since a small shift of power has occurred, they are reintroducing it and are pretty sure it will pass this time.
At least they acknowledge it will do nothing for binge drinking, just makes people buy bottles of spirits. To qoute them "we need the money".
The bigger concern is that they can introduce such things without any legislation passing and have it effectively stick over multiple years
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The bigger concern is that they can introduce such things without any legislation passing and have it effectively stick over multiple years
My concern is that they tax individuals, the young, the old, the rich, the poor, on each drink. Then when they decide the tax is illegal guess who they refund.. the person that paid the tax? NO! They refund the alcohol industry.
Makes me think the alcohol industry might be strong arming the government into making up the tax so they can sell these drinks at a higher price which everyone grumbles about and accepts and then profits from!
Which goes to prove Australia is anything but "just". The concept of a
Re:Corruption and Australia (Score:4, Funny)
As an Australian citizen I have to say I am ashamed of Australia's level of corruption
And so you should be. We brits have been doing corrupt fucked up government for ages, and you're very far behind, despite all the hard work that seems to be going into catching up. do you have people like mandelson, jacqui smith, gordon brown? shape up and get with it, we're all moving into a golden age of corruption, and you don't want to be left behind, do you?
Parent
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And vote for who exactly in this two horses of slightly different colour race ? Tory ? Lib Dem ? Green ? Pirate ? Honestly, you be
The truth... (Score:2, Informative)
Re:The truth (Score:4, Insightful)
At the age of 15 I could tell the Telstra Share Offers were vastly overpriced, this is why they only sent their prospectus to selected individuals in the first release. Telstra has held back the advance of internet and telecommunications services in this country and why should we help them hold it back even further for the sake of other peoples bad investment.
Parent
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Really? Vastly over priced? And yet they were selling for almost triple the initial offer price two years later.
Sure they are below that price now so those people who bought then and are still holding see the shares that cost them $3.30 are now selling for $3.24. I'm pretty sure it will have been very easy to have done worse in a stock pick.
Oh but inflation, you say? Yes $3.30 then is equivalent to $4.53 now. But I skipped the dividends, those $3.30 shares if held for all this time will have paid $3 in divi
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You have to be kidding me, every Telstra investor is now crying in their drink after losing 70% true net worth on their investment (net worth versus cash). They would have been better opening a cash account and getting 4.5%pa.
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When Telstra was privatised it was quite clearly stated in the prospectus that the government could implement changes in the way telstra was managed if those changes were in the public interest, this obviously has always had an impact on Telstra's share value and as an investor you should have kept informed.
On the subject of privatisation, prior to privatisation Telstra as a government institution had originally intended to have fibre optic to the majority of Australian homes by 2005, so the profits for
I disagree (Score:5, Informative)
The separation of Telstra's wholesale and retail divisions has been discussed [zdnet.com.au] heatedly [smh.com.au] for many years, long before the change of government. The previous administration was happy to let it stand, which made Telstra investors happy but pissed off Telstra customers as well as competitors, not to mention holding back innovation [arnnet.com.au]. You only have to look at the number of times Telstra has lost in fights with the ACCC [news.com.au], the courts [theage.com.au] and even the government [theage.com.au] to see why this was a mistake.
The only group of people who are opposed to Telstra being split are the (unlucky) shareholders. Pretty much everyone else who has had to deal with Telstra are unhappy with their service and pricing [whirlpool.net.au], their treatment of retail customers [news.com.au] and wholesale customers [whirlpool.net.au].
I'm not saying that the government's NBN plan is well-thought-out or anything, but Telstra's joke of a proposal [news.com.au] and their juvenile "change the law to suit us or we take our toys and leave" attitude [news.com.au] is even worse for the competitive landscape and the general Australian public. A split can't come soon enough.
Parent
Re:The truth... (Score:5, Insightful)
Telstra have not been "playing ball" since about 1996! I also don't see how you can blame the Prime Minister for the money grubbing scam of the previous government of the Telstra float. A company that spends millions buying a dodgy pirate ringtone company in China and a thousand other bits of stupidity should not be immune to government action when it is in the national interest and the government is the major shareholder. The government has to get more out of it than a place to put good mates on the board, which is nearly all the previous government did. It needs better management than letting a failed farmer pick a silver tongued mexican bandit as a CEO then get that seconded by a historian too radical to get a good job in academia and a corrupt businessman that bought his way onto Australias TV screens as a pathetic copy of Letterman.
Kevin Rudd's huge ego really has nothing to do with it. We are all paying life support for a disfunctional corporation that could not exist in a competitive environment. We effectively have a government Qango that the government can not control and expending far more money while delivering far lass than it would if it was run by the government or was run like a private corporation. Sol must have been laughing all the way to the bank as he came over, called his friends over to join the feeding frenzy and contracted out many failed projects at vast expense with nothing delivered to friends at Andersons/Accenture and others.
Parent
Brownie Points? (Score:2, Interesting)
The Minister who has pushed the ridiculous broadband filter plan has at least won a few brownie points with yesterday's press conference
I'll believe it when something actually happens. Senator Conroy has a history of extreme inconsistency, ranging from "The government just wants to block child porn" to "The government just wants to stop 'Unwanted Content'". Conroy, get your story straight, the Australian people, including the non technical part of the community are tired of your complete and utter lack of consistency.
From the Brisbane times
"Unless it structurally separates, divests its ... cable network and divests its interests in Foxtel,'' Senator Conroy said.
I wonder exactly how profitable are those parts of Telstra's business? Has anyone seen what Telstra
So you would prefer they blocked more sites? (Score:3, Insightful)
To decrease the stupid cost per blocked url metric?
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No, I take the view that's $40 million AUD that could have been spent on actually bringing the creators of genuine child pornography to justice, rather than a filter to stop people from viewing the end result of the real original sin. The hard reality is, people who want to view this material are always going to be able to access it if they really want to, filter or no filter, and this money does nothing to stop the problem at the source; just maybe a few people from seeing a video that shows the (in my opi
Maybe we could fix the regulations instead? (Score:2, Insightful)
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About time (Score:3, Insightful)
Good on govt. for doing what should have been done before telstra was sold. This actually ensures that there will be some competition, rather than a continual requirement for regulation. In its current form, telstra is a recipe for anti-competitive strategies. With a monopoly on copper, they have a retail arm and a wholesale arm, that sells to companies who compete with the retail arm.
Sol and his amigos didn't exactly help telstra either. In Australia the government is not afraid of regulating with the consumer in mind.
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From what I've heard, ever since Telstra went private in 2006, they've been nothing but a nightmare for Australians
Nothing changed in 2006. Telstra/Telecom has always regarded their customers as the enemy. Back when Optus was starting up I preselected them for long distance. I called Telstra customer support with a question about my Telstra account for local calls. Their answer was that they couldn't answer the question because I has preselected Optus. In other words: you deal with the competition so STFU.
Old telstra people I know regard their employer as part of the federal government. By that argument dealing with the
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My guess is the old-timer politicians could never properly understand the "new fangled technology", and as newer, younger, and more tech-savvy politicians make it into office they are able to see how the industry has abused its unregulated position for so many years.
Unfortunately the current politicians in power do not properly understand the "new fangled technology". Whenever Senator Conroy questioned, he completely avoids answering the question, simply just regurgitates the bullshit line he has chosen for that particular day.
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Only those in management positions and politics, not too unlike the US
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What the hell are you talking about. If you have never heard anyone in gov talk about splitting up telstra before, you have been living under a rock. This is the best thing that could have happened, and should have happened from the beginning.