[will_hughes]

> With Australia, submarine transport costs to Singapore (nearest 'major' Internet hub)

There's very little direct bandwidth to Singapore - there's only one cable going west (SEA-ME-WE-3), it's old, and constantly has breaks.

Unless you live in Western Australia, your traffic (even to Singapore) doesn't go via that - it goes via the US over SXC or Endeavor to the east, or to the north to Guam (PIPE-1) or Japan (AJC)

> It's reasonable for them to zero-rate that traffic as they're effectively passing their cost savings on to their customers, as opposed to trying to double dip by charging content networks for access to their subscribers. This may violate more pure definitions of net neutrality, but should be desirable behaviour as it's pro consumer.

I agree, however I've had (heated) arguments with people on this aspect. Not everyone agrees, and thinks that all traffic should be zero-rated if any traffic is going to be.