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by flukus 3331 days ago
> The budget was already blowing out beyond 2x the cost

According to partisan figures that were often repeated but never justified. I don't doubt it would have blown out, world class infrastructure would have been worth it at twice the cost. Instead we have the current NBN who's costs have blown out just as much to delivery 20th century infrastructure.
1 comments
shard972 3331 days ago
> According to partisan figures that were often repeated but never justified.

I mean if you pretend that the $30~ billion paid to telstra had absolutely nothing to do with the NBN then yea you can avoid the 2x figure but I still have no idea how you can say the two things are completely unrelated.

> Instead we have the current NBN who's costs have blown out just as much to delivery 20th century infrastructure.

How? It's fiber for over 95% the connection with plans already been tested to allow people to complete the line to their house with fiber if your willing to pay for it. That's a lot better than what was available in 20th century.

I don't see the big problem with having the government do the entire backbone and lines close to the houses and allow people to fund the final hop if they want to.

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flukus 3331 days ago
The 30 billion to Telstra was the liberals to buy the copper network, not part of the Labor plan. 30 billion for a network the CEO of the owning company said was minutes to midnight a decade earlier.

What do you think is more efficient, digging up the footpath once and giving everyone a fiber connection, or doing it 50+ times? Because if everyone completes the line to their house, that's what will happen.

More importantly, if you're trying to start a business or provide a government service, you can't rely on everyone having a 100Mb connection, you have to plan for the lowest common denominator.

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Khaine 3328 days ago
Except the $30 Billion did have to do with the NBN. NNBN Co wanted access to that nationwide system of cables, ducts, phone exchanges and other infrastructure to form the basis of its network as it would make the build faster, cheaper and avoid duplicating assets [1]. Also please note that the deal was made by Labor and not by the Liberals.

[1] http://www.smh.com.au/business/telstras-nbn-deal--what-it-me...

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silly-silly 3330 days ago
> with plans already been tested to allow people to complete the line to their house with fiber if your willing to pay for it.

As I would one be of these people, how / who do i talk to ?

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