NBN Facts?? Can anyone confirm or refute??

Yes these are REAL issues but have been resolved as they have sold up the property and moving to the regional centre to retire. BUT the new owners of the farm have these problems at the moment, its NOT a hypothetical.
All I'm saying is broadband to every home is just not practical, realistic or needed money spent on more BASIC infrastructure in Australia may be a wiser investment.

But even in the city aren't we a mobile society with all sorts of mobile gadgets needing Internet connections maybe a wireless / RF system and for that matter mixed delivery system would be better I doubt if we can solve these problems on a forum but just be aware that other people in Australia have needs and wants that may be different from yours.

Yep, can completely understand that.

I'm another one that can work from home without any hassle thanks to good broadband coverage. There's nothing I can do in the office that I couldn't do from home except maybe answer the phone on my desk (but I do know if it's ringing ... soon I should be able to intercept the call and redirect it to my home). The only reason for driving 50 minutes to the office is because my manager insists on seeing my smiling face. When I drive in I do it on perfectly good bitumen roads, highways and freeways. No potholes and certainly no dirt.

So *I* don't really need an NBN any more than I need better roads.

I guess in part I've been swayed by Bob Katter and the other independents who, even before the election, were all nominating the NBN as one of the highest priority needs for their region. Mostly though I'm swayed by my own experience which tells me that knowledge based industries is where the growth is. That where future new jobs will be. And if we want to be on the leading edge of that then we need world class infrastructure at least as good as our competitors have otherwise they'll get the business not us.

Now tell me Maxm just how and why it is that just about all of the computer software industry and call centres are located in India right now. It is because of the power of the WWW. Your job will be at increased risk as a result of this new connectivity. Some Indian IT expert will be prepared to do you in for a fraction of the dollars that you cost the boss. Same as us in the manufacturing industry, these transportable jobs will go to where the wage costs are lowest.

Looks like we are all coming to an agreement that it all hinges on a cost benefit analysis. Its just where we sit on that ledger that differs.
Interestingly though its odd how the independents all travelled to Canberra for face to face meetings with Gillard Abbott et al. Thats how we do things in the end.

Actually, that's becoming increasingly rare. Pollies do it because they don't pay the bill. In business, face to face meetings are becoming less common. I've had many meetings and long working relationships with many people I've never met. You, frant, spend countless hours debating issues such as the pluses and minuses of the NBN here in a forum with people whos names you don't even know, never mind never met. Can there be a better example of just how optional face-to-face is becoming?

As for offshoring work... yep, I'm a bit of an expert there, believe me. My company has been actively moving work to China and India for many years and continues to do so. Do you know what we're finding in India (for instance)? It's a short-term gain. They are having a LOT of trouble hiring properly qualified and experienced people. The ones they can hire are fresh out of school and have bugger all experience. When we do hire one of those, they stick around for a year or so and then leave to go to higher paying jobs in India. Wages for good, experienced people are rising rapidly over there - so how long will India have that price advantage?

In fact globally, Australia is one of the few growth centres for us largely because we can tap into our regional growth. We can support the region from Australia but only if there is good communications infrastructure in place. Sure, some of the work/jobs/dollars that comes out of that growth does flow on to China and India. But not all of it. Thing is that 30 years ago when I started, IT jobs were rare. A few thousand Australia wide. Now there'd be hundreds of thousands of people with those jobs even despite some work going overseas.

And finally, (sorry, didn't mean this to turn into a rant)...

You don't say how fixing up the road to Gizmo's in-laws farm benefits the country. I'm sure it benefits them personally but how does it increase their farm productivity? Are they going to be able to grow more wheat/raise more cattle/etc?? Will their children be able to get jobs on that one farm? What about their kids? I don't disagree with you that it's worth doing, especially a decent rail network. But I just can't see that it adds a huge amount to what we've got already whereas the NBN I think does have that potential.

I didn't say that because that is not what I was thinking.

I am what you might call mid to low tech so when I got the email I started thinking "Is this going to be another fiasco or white elephant like the home insulation/solar subsidy/ school halls programs seem to be?"

It was a genuine question about a topic upon which I and surely many other forumites have limited understanding.

There are many on the forum who are right up there with the IT and this is reflected in the constructive debate that has happened in this thread.

Muchos gracias compadres!!

If the NBN is good for the country overall, I am all for it. When I see the politicians talking about it I think "These jokers don't know anything more about this than I do." and that REALLY worries me.

Tony Abbott has to be given credit for saying to the journos "If this is going to be a technical question, I am not going to be able to answer it." or words to that effect.

All sides of politics agree that Australia needs higher speed and better coverage of the internet. I don't really see anybody here argeuing against that.

What is being argued is it's priority compared to other vital infrastructure, which kind of technology should be used to achieve it and ensuring it is not just the top end of the street that gets the benefit of it.

All good in this thread too!!

OK.

i still think all this money could have been better spent on something much more important....like a giant 5km2 dam on top of mt tamborine that works awesomely in any wind direction, has heated water, giant flood lights and a wave making machine

To get back to the original poster's question, apparently that bit of text was first posted on Andrew Bolt's blog. The guy is a 1st rate douchebag (think talkback radio Alan Jones type but in press) and I wouldn't trust anything on his blog.