The issue of "commercially non-viable customers" is a huge one because the entire telco industry pays $60m (more or less) each year so Telecom can provide you with 14.4kbit/s or 9.6kbit/s (yes, kilobits).
Rather than subsidise that, we say a: there are cheaper ways of providing service than copper, b: there are better ways of providing service than copper (satellite and mobile being two examples), c: that's a lot of money for dial-up access especially when you tally up the amount paid since 2001 and d: if you're getting service from Telecom copper, Vodafone mobile, Telecom XT, Telecom CDMA (in some cases) and satellite, how the $#@% can you be described as "commercially non-viable" in the first place?
Cheers
Paul
Paul Brislen Head of Corporate Communications Vodafone
The satellite being used here is low on the NZ horizon and is not viewable in some areas. So you may still be on dial up depending on your location! There are other VSAT suppliers that can provide broadband services without this issue.
I'm not sure which satellite you're talking about magnet but the IPStar bird looks directly at New Zealand and provides coverage of damn near 100% (the odd giant tree not withstanding).
Farmside doesn't do dial-up speeds at all.
cheers
Paul
Paul Brislen Head of Corporate Communications Vodafone
30km NE of Wanganui, in a tree lined valley with water-logged phonelines and zero cellphone reception... I have heard that the IPStar sattelite may be too low on the horizon for us but will wait and see what happens.
simon14: Doesn't satellite internet have really high latency? Like 1000 to 2000 ms?
anything has to be better than dial up
the only thing i have come accross with the ipstar/farmside is some secure sites eg internet banking does not work stright off the bat you may have to get the farmside tech to tinker with it. just make sure he/she tests internet banking sites while they are there setting it up
cool.
not sure what goes wrong i think its just some ports in there router that need fixing. they may have got around this bug by now but they never use to test them and you would have to get the tech back out again to fix it. worth asking about
Hu? did i do that? 16Mb (EDO RAM), K6-II processor, 2Mb of onboard graphics. 32k dial up modem. 12 speed CD ROM. 5¼-inch floppy drive. 500Mb HDD.
More than a week has passed with no further news. Guess I am going to have to go elsewhere: http://www.inzonecorp.com/Ruralinzone.htm Vodafone's loss - their gain.
Please let us know how you find the inzone service - I've seen their pamphlets (via their reseller Bigfrog) but haven't heard anything about them, good or bad!
Hi there Bart - good things take time I am afraid - will have someone contact you today. PS I am sure that the price points that you get from Farmside (and the speeds - both upload and download) will be better that you will recieve at inzone
01/09/09 has rolled over... no word yet, still waiting with bated breath... I wonder however if I am about to become a pawn in a political chess match... if it provides me with broadband Internet so I can get my home business off the ground then so be it!
Under the Telecommunications Service Obligation (the old Kiwishare), Telecom is required to provide a home line, and access to a dial-up internet connection, for around 60,000 rural customers deemed “commercially non-viable”. Each year, the Commerce Commission calculates how much it costs to serve these commercially non-viable customers (CNVCs).
The painful part for other telcos is that they have to chip in to help Telecom cover the cost of the commercially non-viable customers.
With annual High Court challenges thrown in, payments work on a two or three year lag, put last year the TSO cost was calculated by the commission at $70.7 million for the 2007/2008 year.
Vodafone was allocated easily the largest share, at $16 million (which is set by the commission, but has to be paid directly to Telecom). Most of the balance only exists on paper. The bizarre and complex formula behind the TSO requires Telecom to conduct a “thought experiment” on internal charges to allocate its own TSO cost; the amount remains a purely notional sum.
Tuanz, TelstraClear, Vodafone and others have long maintained that the TSO should be scrapped altogether, and even Telecom conceeds it should be refashioned to allow for cellular and satellite technologies.
Now, Vodafone is looking to actively prove its point that many of the “commercially non-viable” rural customers covered by the TSO are in fact commercially valid customer.
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