In message <3FECEE8B.1020209(a)saarinen.org>, Juha Saarinen writes:

I don't want to sound defeatist, but I think I'll be withered and dead long before there's an affordable alternative to DSL outside the Auckland CBD.

I'm outside the Auckland CBD.[0] I've got a 2 Mbps down, 256 kbps up link to my house. That, plus my phone line, come to under $120/month total. To my mind that's affordable.[2] You might point out that this is also supplied by a telco, and that's true these days. But it wasn't originally set up by a telco. If you set your target as "DSL everywhere" then frankly I don't think all that much is going to be achieved. 1Mbps, 2Mbps, or even 10Mbps is so 1990s. I've been pleasantly surprised with just how successful DSL has been (internationally), given that it wasn't so many years ago we were told the POTS lines were good for 9600bps with a tail wind and not a bit more. But it's basically a dancing bear. Much as I think the Commerce Commission decision was probably the wrong decision for New Zealand[3], it's not really a major problem. All it means is that the Government isn't going to provide. Time for some Kiwi ingunity. Ewen [0] Approximately 800km outside the Auckland CBD, but that's outside the Auckland CBD.[1] [1] I'm not even sure why the Auckland CBD is the point of reference; there are other cities in New Zealand with better high speed connectivity. 100Mbps connections for less than what I know some organisations are paying for a single E1 across town in other cities. [2] For about $15 more per month I could get "pay TV" as well. Not that that'd be a whole lot of use, since I don't have a TV. [3] Cheap DSL everywhere would have been better than the current situation assuming it could be rolled out over a year or two -- as the Australia experience suggests.