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The troubled rollout of the National Broadband Network (NBN) is creating a digital divide in communities across Australia.
Key points:
- NBN boss says 25 megabits is "sufficient for the majority"
- Brisbane couple says it's often faster for them to transport data than upload it
- Real estate agent says NBN connections already a selling point
NBN chief Bill Morrow has told Four Corners that high-speed fibre connections are technologically superior to the copper and cable which links most Australians to the new broadband network.
He also conceded that the fast pace of the rollout is leading to compromises and said it turns his stomach that some customers are getting left behind.
The rollout is a lottery. About one-fifth of Australians are getting direct fibre connections, but the majority are being connected with older technology such as copper phone wire and pay television cables.
The end result is that some households and businesses are unable to access the high speeds they are paying for.
And Mr Morrow is blunt — if those people want faster connections, they will have to pay for it themselves.
Internet connections becoming a selling point
In Dubbo in western New South Wales, you can drive down streets where the people on one side get fibre to their homes — which is faster and more reliable — and the people on the other side are connected with copper that limits their internet speeds.David Hayward and his family moved into their house in East Dubbo believing that it was getting a full-fibre connection — but instead they ended up getting what is called fibre-to-the-node (FTTN).
It is the technology which is connecting the largest number of Australians to the NBN.
With a FTTN connection, the final link to the house is with copper wire stretching from a green box in the street. The longer the length of copper, the slower the available internet speeds.
Mr Hayward has been paying for the best available download speeds of up to 100 megabits per second.
But following a Four Corners enquiry, Telstra told him that the best download speed he could ever get with his connection was just 46 megabits per second.
He is worried Dubbo's digital divide may affect his property's value.
"It causes a bit of a two-class society in Dubbo when it comes to modern technology," he said."If I then go to sell this house and other parts have better, am I going to be disadvantaged financially because people are used to that, are they going to want to go backwards?
"I wouldn't want to go backwards."
Dubbo real estate agent Richard Tegart said NBN connections are already a selling point.
"A very common question now is, 'is NBN connected?" and the next question they ask [is], 'is it connected fibre to the premises or is it fibre to the node?'," he said.
"It's interesting that most consumers or buyers are certainly aware of what they want with internet connections."
'It can be quicker for somebody to drive'
Brisbane couple Cheryl Vance and Joel Styles have just won a prestigious international prize for a new video game they released this year.They made it in an office in their suburban home which is also connected to the NBN with FTTN.
They also rarely get the higher speeds they are paying for and will be forced to move to a part of Brisbane where houses have direct fibre connections, Ms Vance said.
"With us kind of peaking the maximum that we can, we can likely receive at this point, that's obviously going to pose a huge challenge to us," she said.
"Obviously, we're not going to be able to receive the resources that we need from the NBN."
Ms Vance said the company has had to adopt strategies to cope with the limitations of their NBN connection.
"It can be quicker for somebody to drive from the south end of Brisbane up to the north end of Brisbane and give them builds rather than try and upload them and download them," she said.
"Our basic coping strategy at times is, 'what's the quickest way to get the data into somebody's hands?' And unfortunately, sometimes that's a car and a USB stick to do that."Ms Vance and Mr Styles look to their competitors in New Zealand with envy.
By the time Australia's "multi-technology mix" NBN is complete, a large majority of New Zealanders will have access to direct fibre connections to their homes and businesses.
Network 'fit for purpose'
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield defends the "multi-technology" NBN as being "fit for purpose"."Well, I think it's important to recognise that the guts of the NBN is fibre," he said.
"The NBN is a fibre-based network.
"We are, for the last component in the street, in some cases using copper … in some cases using the existing HFC pay TV cable.
"The reason we're doing that is because that really speeds up the rollout of the NBN, it really reduces the costs of the rollout of the NBN, so the guts of this is fibre and Australians will get fast speeds."
But Mr Morrow accepts that fibre-to-the-premises does provide consumers with a better internet experience.
"Fibre medium is better than copper medium," he said. "You can't argue any other way, but do we need that fibre today?"We know it costs more. Is it worth it to us to spend that money when we don't really need it, and copper would suffice?
"I think this is the policy that we're operating under today that proves that — based on what consumers are expecting — copper is sufficient.
"There are some people that have fibre built up into their homes already.
"If those people feel that they've got something extra, great. I feel great for you.
"The reality is even when that exists today, and we have a million people that are using that, they don't purchase more than 25 megabits per second, for the most part."
So far in New Zealand, 35 per cent of people have taken up the full fibre connection when it becomes available and 90 per cent of them choose download speeds of 100 megabits per second or more.
25 megabits 'sufficient for the mass market'
Mr Morrow said 80 per cent of Australians connected to the NBN are choosing download speeds of 25 megabits per second or less."25 megabits would be sufficient for the mass market, for the majority," he said.
"There's always the exception, and in those cases, we have ways to deal with those customers."
If people do not live in an area lucky enough to have full-fibre connections, they can pay to get them installed — and that can cost tens of thousands of dollars, Mr Morrow said.
"If it's that important for the consumer, about them paying for that, rather than passing the load on to every other user, that's the concept behind it," he said.
"This is just the way it works. Some motorways [have] closer access to your home than others, and it's no different when it comes to the broadband network that's being built across Australia."
The NBN boss also concedes that the rush to get the network complete sometimes leads to contractors getting hired with inadequate training.
"We have to remember this is an industry-wide transformation, and it's unprecedented in terms of the magnitude of what this is," he said.
"It brings to it complexity. It brings to it challenges that no-one was able to ever predict, so we're seeing these issues emerge."
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