Dial-up Internet Wasn't Free

Whilst reviewing the paper published on the Australian Policy Online site by Robert and Charles Kenny I came across this:

dial-up ... wasn’t expensive – a 56Kbps modem cost $100 in 1997, in dial-up’s heyday. The per-line share of the ISP’s modem bank was a further $90. For this sub-$200 upgrade, society got email ... e-commerce ... User-Generated Content ... online news ... and social networking

(p. 16)

I would condense their further argument to "we didn't spend anything on the first Internet so why should we on the next one?"

FTTH chicken or egg?

In their paper published on the Australian Policy Online site, Robert and Charles Kenny make a strong case refuting some of the benefits that FTTH advocates claim and argue that subsidy isn't justified as the benefits aren't necessarily real.

I broadly agree with their arguments that fiber broadband isn't necessary for many of the applications often quoted as requiring extreme bandwidth, and that rushing to give taxpayers money to incumbent carriers to replace their copper with fiber access networks isn't warranted.

There are some oversights in their argument however.

To me - to you

A couple of years ago we were fortunate that the water company decided to install a sewerage main in our road.  Prior to this we had a cess pit, the scourge of rural life.

I recall at the time the letter came through the door asking if we were interested in a connection (were we!)  and the terms were straightforward.  They would tee off the new main to the curtilage of our property for a modest fee - and it really was modest as they took into account the fact the navvies were there anyway laying the main so it was little more than the cost of the materials they used.

Satellite vs Copper - which is least worst?

The recent news about BT choosing the new HYLAS satellite to complement its part-taxpayer-funded broadband roll-out in Cornwall brings back memories of "satellite broadband grants" back in 2002.  Government money was given to small businesses in rural areas to install these broadband connections due to lack of alternatives.  To a lot of people they seemed to offer the ideal solution but the user experience wasn't too great.

The new purpose-built HYLAS satellite might be better than the re-purposed TV and marine telephone systems used back in the day, but the physics of radio communications hasn't changed.

Active Line Access (the new Wholesale)

NICC are busy standardising the way that service providers can use third parties' local loop or last mile access circuits, or to put it the other way around, the way that an access circuit provider opens their network to allow others to sell to their subscribers.

BT Wholesale's lavish HQ (nr. Gatwick)

BT have been doing this for years via the IPstream/Central products in the ADSL world, WBC in 21CN, WLR, LLU and all manner of other wholesale acronyms and it's no bad thing that these interfaces should be standardised; it levels the playing field and clarifies the demarcation between access and service providers.

I'm not sure it helps a community-built FTTH (or hybrid) network though.

Asymmetric side effect

In comments posted on an article about the FTTP project at Ashby de la Launde it was pointed out that a PC infected with malicious botnet software on a traditional broadband connection is limited to adding at most a couple of hundred kilobits/second of bot traffic to the Internet.  A botnet PC on a FTTH connection could be pumping out 100Mbps of bot traffic.  A few tens of these could do the damage that takes thousands of botnet computers inflict currently, not to mention saturate the precious Internet uplink.

Not an Internet Protocol IDS

Perhaps we need to deploy Intrusion Detection Systems at the digital village pump to catch infected subscribers and maybe apply some kind of automatic quarantine to their connections.

This is a problem that commercial ISP's don't need to worry too much about. Apart from the asymmetric bandwidth limitation, they make money selling bandwidth so the more that's used the better whereas a community network needs to take care not to squander the expensive uplink.

The Community NGN Jigsaw

There is plenty of buzz around community networking - with lots of people contributing from many different angles.  Not suprisingly, the two main areas of interest are the "big picture" and the "local interest"

Local interest covers all the community activism that is needed to bring about a network project.  Any community that is motivated to improve their access to the Internet needs organsing - and motivating - and sometimes guiding so that the network can become a reality.  Engaging with landowners, parish councils and potential subscribers is critical and has to be done face-to-face at the local level.