Oireachtas Report: Provision of a national high speed broadband infrastructure

damien

http://broadband.oireachtas.ie/contents.htm

( I did a quick search and didn't find anything on this, if this was posted before please link me to the thread and we can re-start discussion in it. )

I urge everyone to take time out to read this and then comment on it here. The recommendations that were made were:

Summary of Recommendations

1. Defines broadband as a service that provides at least 512kb connectivity and sets as a target 5Mps connectivity by 2006 with widely available 10Mps connectivity in 2008 being the further target .
2. Develop a National Broadband Infrastructure Plan in 2004 .
3. Appoint a single Minister of State with cross department responsibility for the rollout of a national broadband infrastructure and the development of e-Government services .
4. Encourage closer co-operation between the Government, the telecoms industry and the end-users of broadband services .
5. Mandate that all national, regional, county and city development plans incorporate the provision of broadband infrastructure with such plans .
6. Ensure that all new developments are ‘future-proofed' for broadband.
7. Focus on “bridging of the first mile” as the first key policy issue.
8. Establish the proposed Management Service Enterprise (MSE) to ensure all existing broadband assets are put to full use.
9. Introduce measures to widen the ‘reach' of broadband technologies .
10. Improve skills to allow greater broadband access .
11. Encourage business to increase their usage of broadband technologies .
12. Fully examine the potential of Government to use broadband.

ednwireland

my problem with this is that after a year of tryng to get broadband my line still fails admittedly i'm on the limit of the (now pathetic compared to bt uk now 6km from the exchange) distance limit from the exchange, the real problem in broadband takeup (outside of cities) is the quality of eircoms network and its ability to deliver more than it has upto now. none of this seems to be addressed in this report probably from people who have no idea as usual. the real problem is that eircom will not invest in improving / extending the delivery mechanism so that all those people that want broadband but can't get it CAN get it. these sorts of consultations are worthless cos no-one ever acts on them

damien

Did you actually read the report ?

ednwireland

yep

fabien

I found this interesting website: http://www.tippinst.ie/broadband, from a broadband seminar which took place in Thurles in June '04, where you will find a presentation by Eircon with details of ADSL rollout to date and plans for the country in general and Tipp in particular.
Also a good presentation by a Comreg Business Analyst who was a speaker, with coverage maps for all broadband products in Tipp.
May be of interest to someone, somewhere...I hope.

Urban Weigl

ednwireland wrote:

my line still fails admittedly i'm on the limit of the (now pathetic compared to bt uk now 6km from the exchange) distance limit

BT are in the process of completely phasing out all distance limits. When you order, ADSL will be connected to your line and you will receive your DSL modem.

If it does not work, a technician will come out and attempt to repair your line. Right now 3% of lines fail the line test on enabled exchanges. With this new procedure, 95% of people who previously were not able to get DSL will be able to. as far as I know, this will be introduced before the end of the year in all parts of the UK.

eircomtribunal

fabien wrote:

Also a good presentation by a Comreg Business Analyst who was a speaker, with coverage maps for all broadband products in Tipp.
May be of interest to someone, somewhere...I hope.

Thanks for posting this. Have read trough the presentations with interest and sad amazement:

ComReg's Eoghan Callan (Business Analyst, Commission for Communications Regulation)
insults all of us consumers with his conclusion:
"To date limited competition and a lack of consumer interest have held back Ireland’s broadband market."


He even has no shame promoting Eircom's Trigger scheme scam.
"[Eircom]Also announced trigger scheme once 200-500 registrations achieved."

Very interesting quote from the, wait for it, Eircom presentation: "There are 56,700 telephone lines in total in County Tipperary and 35% of these will be broadband enabled by March 05.
And McRedmond is making the press rounds and telling us that 70% of the market can have ADSL now.

P.

seamus

eircomtribunal wrote:

"To date limited competition and a lack of consumer interest have held back Ireland’s broadband market."

I can never, ever understand where they get this from. Eircom make an excuse that it's not selling because people don't want it, and Comreg take it hook, line & sinker.

Are NTL not backlogged a month on their broadband installs?
Are certain satellite providers not backlogged a month on their broadband installs?
Are the telcos not selling almost as many (or more) DSL lines per month now as they did in the last 6 months of 2002?

As soon as the prices came down, interest suddenely shot up. Does that not indicate a pent up demand, i.e. a pent up interest in the technology?

No interest? Bull. Someone smack that kid for making a stupid comment like that.

damien

eircomtribunal wrote:

ComReg's Eoghan Callan (Business Analyst, Commission for Communications Regulation)
insults all of us consumers with his conclusion:
"To date limited competition and a lack of consumer interest have held back Ireland’s broadband market."

He is not going to get away with that. Seriously. It's not going to happen on our watch.

damien

So I emailed Eoghan in Comreg about this asking for clarification. It's boiled my blood. I hope Eoghan doesn't mind me publishing this but the email is under FOi if anyone wants to look at it that way.

Hi Damien,

The reference point for that statement is contained within the presentation itself. Slide 9 shows a graph titled: "How much would you expect your household to pay for a ADSL service?"

65% of respondents replied 'don't know' or were unable to put a value on
how much they were willing to pay for broadband.

My interpretation of this was that a very significant proportion of
consumers were uninformed/disengaged/uninterested in broadband to the
extent that they weren't even able to put a value on it.

It was in this context of almost two thirds of respondents not having
even considered what price they would pay to subscribe to broadband that
I was referring to when I used the phrase "a lack of consumer interest"
was holding back broadband adoption.

I hope this clarifies things somewhat.

Best regards
Eoghan Callan

---

Original Message

---

From: Damien Mulley [mailto:xxx@yyy.net]
Sent: 12 August 2004 10:31
To: Eoghan Callan
Subject: Thurles Conference - June 2nd 2004



Hi Eoghan,
I read your presentation you gave on June 2nd about Broadband.
http://www.tippinst.ie/broadband/docs/Speakers/Broadband%20in%20Ireland.
ppt

One of the final statements in your presentation was:

"To date limited competition and a lack of consumer interest have held back Ireland's broadband market. "

Can you reference your sources on this ? I'd be very interested in seeing this especially any surveys showing lack of consumer interest.

Thank you,
Damien Mulley.

jwt

damien.m wrote:

So I emailed a Eoghan in Comreg about this asking for clarification. It's boiled my blood. I hope Eoghan doesn't mind me publishing this but the email is under FOi if anyone wants to look at it that way.

Well if you made it clear that you were on the IOFFL committee and were reporting back to the IOFFL membership then yes...otherwise ......its better to paraphrase. Legally. :cool:

John

Ripwave

Eoghan_in_Comreg wrote:

It was in this context of almost two thirds of respondents not having even considered what price they would pay to subscribe to broadband that I was referring to when I used the phrase "a lack of consumer interest" was holding back broadband adoption.

Right, so the one third of respondents who had thought about the issue aren't enough to make the effort wortwhile.

Apparently, Comreg doesn't think there's any point in pushing broadband until half a million households have expressed an interest. The mind boggles!

damien

Ripwave wrote:

Apparently, Comreg doesn't think there's any point in pushing broadband until half a million households have expressed an interest.

But it's their definition of "interest", apparently if they ask you how much you'd pay for a new type of fast car and you answered "Don't know" it means you don't want to get that car. That's manipulation of facts, it's pure spin and it's bad gamesmanship.

By the way, the survey they got the results from is the "Amarach Consulting, Consumer TrendWatch Q2 2004" which can be downloaded here:

http://www.comreg.ie/_fileupload/publications/ComReg0478a.pdf

I like this bit:

Internet usage appears to have levelled off in Ireland, with the measured level of usage remaining below 45% for the past nine months.

It'll get fine toothcombed by me tomorrow. I have a feeling I can use the figures from that survey to show them up and I won't have to resort to spin to do it.

damien

I've made a summary of facts from the "Amarach Consulting, Consumer TrendWatch Q2 2004" report that Comreg has commissioned

Facts:

• An estimated 1.2 million Irish Adults use the Internet
  
  
• 36% of all respondents have home internet access
  
• Around 45% of Adults used the Internet in Quarter 4 of 2003
• Around 40% of Irish Adults are using the Internet in Quarter 2 2004
  
  That's a fall of 5% in 6 Months of Adults uusing the Internet in Ireland.
  
  
• 31% of Adults used the net from home in Q1 2004 Equiv Popl: 905,000
• 26% of Adults used the net from home in Q2 2004 Equiv Popl: 746,000
  
  Over the past 3 months there has been a drop of 5% of people using the net at home. A drop of around 160,000 people.
  
  
• 16% of Adults used net from Work Q1 2004
• 14% of Adults used net from work Q2 2004
  
  Adults using the net at work has dropped by 2% over the past 3 months.
  
  
• 6% of used net from School/College Q1 2004
• 8% used net from School/College Q2 2004
  
  Adults using the net in Schools/Colleges increased by 2% over the past 3 months. Because it's free/cheaper there ?
  
  
• 2% used net from Friends House Q1 2004
• 4% Used net from friends house Q2 2004
  
  Adults using the net at a friends house has doubled. An increase of 2%. I wonder why this is ? Not got the net at home themselves anymore perhaps ? (Remember the drop of 5% of adults using the net at home )
  
  
• 81% of households connect to then net via dialup Q2 2004
  
  Dialup is still the main way to get online.
  
  
• 3% of Households connect to the net via ADSL Q2 2004
  
  Factors Encouraging Home Net Users to Switch to broadband
• 82% state price and value for money.
• 59% state quality of service
  
  
• 82% of home net users have not considered moving to broadband
• Of those 23% said it was too expensive , 11% said it was not available
  

damien

Now, Dermot our Comms Minister set out the following policy directive to Comreg:
You can download it here: http://www.dcmnr.gov.ie/files/Comms_Reg_Policy_Directions_1_2004.doc

i. Broadband
a) Reason for direction: The development of broadband is a key enabler to enhance and maintain Ireland’s economic and social development. It is important that the regulatory environment underpins the development of available, affordable and competitive broadband services.

b) Policy direction
ComReg shall use regulatory and enforcement tools, where necessary and subject to relevant requirements under European and National law, to support initiatives to develop broadband and remove regulatory barriers, if any exist, to such initiatives.

In encouraging the further rollout of broadband ComReg shall have a particular focus on:
· the residential and SME sectors;
· balanced regional development and;
· potential for broadband provision on alternative platforms.

The Goal is to be at or better than the EU average (excluding accession countries) for end-user access to, and usage of, broadband by mid 2005.

I like this bit too:

ComReg shall report on its implementation on these directions at the end of June 2004, at the end of September 2004, at the end of December 2004 and at the end of March 2005

Was that Trends report it ?

Ripwave

damien.m wrote:

[*]Around 45% of Adults used the Internet in Quarter 4 of 2003
[*]Around 40% of Irish Adults are using the Internet in Quarter 2 2004

That's a fall of 5% in 6 Months of Adults uusing the Internet in Ireland.

They're not quite the numbers that I see in the report you linked to above, but it is noticeable that the Q2 results last year were lower than the Q1 results. It's not too surprising that people spend less time on the internet during May and June than they do during January and February, especially from home.

The Margin of Error for the survey is +/-3%, so some of the numbers (such as the 2% to 4% of people accessing the net from a friends house don't really signify too much (and the rise of broadband probably accounts for any difference, rather than actual cost sensitivity and sponging off someone elses dialup). Indeed, the survey says that Cable broadband access dropped from 3% to 1% between Q303 and Q403, which probably tells you all you need to know about error rates and small results.

This quote is also worth highlighting - The growth in mobile ownership may have been to the detriment of fixed line ownership, which in turn could negatively influence the growth in home internet access

damien

Ripwave wrote:

They're not quite the numbers that I see in the report you linked to above[/b]

Page 8 of the PDF.

Ripwave

Ripwave wrote:

Right, so the one third of respondents who had thought about the issue aren't enough to make the effort wortwhile.

Apparently, Comreg doesn't think there's any point in pushing broadband until half a million households have expressed an interest. The mind boggles!

Looking at the actual survey, I see that only 18% of internet users have considered switching to broadband (170,000 people in total). The main reasons that people who have gone for broadband have selected it are "Value for Money" (82%) and "Quality of Service" (59% - multiple responses allowed). This was based on the responses of 58 people, which appears to be 6% of all respondents, or 15% of the 374 "Home Internet Users". But later in the survey it says that only 21 respondents have Broadband at home.

Perhaps most surprising, of those who didn't switch to Broadband, only 11% said it was because it wasn't available, and less than 1% said their line didn't qualify. I guess, though, that these are people who actually did "consider" switching to broadband, and weren't put off by the "Sufficient Already", "Too Expensive" or "Infrequent use" options that represented 68% of responses. (Apparently, "considered getting broadband" and "didn't consider" means "has broadband" and "hasn't got broadband" in Amarach-speak).

damien

Ripwave wrote:

(Apparently, "considered getting broadband" and "didn't consider" means "has broadband" and "hasn't got broadband" in Amarach-speak).

Yeah it's rather odd.

And that 18% figure is terribly disappointing. I still believe though that Comreg stating broadband isn't available because people aren't interested is bull. As far as I know the ISPs are quite busy connecting people up.

Ripwave

damien.m wrote:

Page 8 of the PDF.

Ah, so you mean "roughly" as in estimated from looking at a graph. Page 10 says that 41% of all adults used the Internet in Q2, down from 43% in Q1. The trend is flat from Q403, so 45% is probably a fair estimate.

I really wouldn't attach too much significance to that drop. Page 15 suggests that the people who are connecting are using the internet more than they were over the last couple of quarters.

damien

Ripwave wrote:

I really wouldn't attach too much significance to that drop. Page 15 suggests that the people who are connecting are using the internet more than they were over the last couple of quarters.

Ok then. I'll go with your interpretation.