Dáil Committee to discuss National Broadband Plan

clohamon

Next Wednesday 26th at 9:30am in Committee Room 4

Live video will be here.

http://www.oireachtas.ie/ViewDoc.asp?fn=/documents/livewebcast/Web-Live.htm&CatID=83&m=o

(i) Officials from the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources; and
(ii) Mr Conal Henry, Chief Executive Officer, e|net

clohamon

Shameful display by committee members. Only 5 out of 21 members showed up on time. Another 4 showed up late. The questioning was embarrassing.

The Department rolled them with ease and the Secretary General didn't have to defer to his officials even once.

Conal Henry of enet was interesting and articulate. He could have been enlightening too if there had been one TD or Senator who had any clue or interest in their work.

watty

But there is no plan.

clohamon

watty wrote: »

But there is no plan.

Well, yes; but I was hoping one of the committee might have been able to point that out to the department.

Plan or no plan, it was pretty clear that they've settled on an LTE solution for the last 30%. Even Conal Henry was talking about €175 M being "enough" for that last group, which seemed to indicate that a 'solution' had been outlined at the Taskforce meetings.

In fairness to him he also told the committee that a national fibre solution would cost €2Bn which was "not that much" in his view.

He also thought that the middle 20% (provincial towns and environs) would not be dealt with by competitive forces as assumed by the 'plan'. Naturally enough that's where most of his MANS end-users are.

watty

Remember when we had only GSM and 3G was going to bring Video Calling?

Except it was too expensive and even today the Mast Sector can barely support 5 users, vs 100+ voice.

LTE is over hyped and will be expensive. Also in the Comreg 5MHz channels and Multiple Operator plan barely better than 3G.

So basically the "Plan" is to do nothing. As usual. Also as was the case with minimum home insulation recommended by Gov Committee. Waste Water treatment & Fresh Water directives. All 10 to 15 years or more a go and ignored. Now we have more Septic Tank users than Broadband users. We have Home Insulation and BER "cowboys" and Winter Energy consumption maybe 20% more than it would have been if the recommendations implemented. How much Fibre and Water infrastructure would the savings on Fuel imports have paid for?

Maybe 40% leakage on mains water (but no-one knows really) and loads of polluted "group water" schemes or individual wells, and Comreg "Strategy" is being set by the likes of Linda Doyle and her Cognitive Radio + Open Spectrum Fantasies.

bealtine

watty wrote: »

Comreg "Strategy" is being set by the likes of Linda Doyle and her Cognitive Radio + Open Spectrum Fantasies.

It's certainly not being set people who have any clues...

Bill Shock

If only they'd all listen to Ireland Off Line we'd have most of the country's problems sorted out in no time.....

clohamon

Bill Shock wrote: »

If only they'd all listen to Ireland Off Line we'd have most of the country's problems sorted out in no time.....

Maybe I'm wrong, but that reads like sarcasm. If so, would you say what you disagree with and why.

bealtine

Bill Shock wrote: »

If only they'd all listen to Ireland Off Line we'd have most of the country's problems sorted out in no time.....

Hardly as IoffL have never attempted to tackle the "country's(sic) problems", IoffL have nothing to say on the subject of the debt or how the hospitals should be run and any of the million other problems facing the country.

IoffL are only interested in telecommunications infrastructure and how it can be improved for the benefit of all and for the benefit of the country.

As clohamon says if you don't agree how about you tell us here why you don't agree?

chris2008x

Its funny how in this country we need task-forces with TD's and civil servants and crap to talk about broadband roll out yet they never achieve anything. Sooner or later Eircom will have to be nationalized again so we should be focusing on buying that infrastructure back at a knockdown price given they are in receivership.

jbkenn

chris2008x wrote: »

Its funny how in this country we need task-forces with TD's and civil servants and crap to talk about broadband roll out yet they never achieve anything. Sooner or later Eircom will have to be nationalized again so we should be focusing on buying that infrastructure back at a knockdown price given they are in receivership.

For those of you who are new around here,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IrelandOffline

For those of you too lazy to click on the link

IrelandOffline (IOFFL) is an Irish consumer pressure group which was set up on 13 May 2001 to lobby for universal, affordable internet access in Ireland.

In early May 2001, the internet service provider Esat discontinued provision to 2000 users of its "IOL Surf No Limits" internet access package - a flat rate package - for what it deemed "excessive usage" of the service. This prompted discussions by disgruntled users on the ie.comp newsgroup, where it was decided that a pressure group was required to lobby Eircom (the former state-owned monopoly), Esat, Comreg (formerly the ODTR), and the Irish Government to take effective action that would ultimately result in universal Broadband Internet access to every home in the country.

Since its founding, IrelandOffline has changed its strategy and objectives as the market in Ireland has evolved. IrelandOffline's current objective is Affordable Internet access for all;

Affordable -- comparable with other countries for comparable services.
Internet -- functional narrowband access (that is, not at rates as low as the 14 kbit/s currently available to a substantial number of households), and proper broadband access.
Access -- accessible to every household in the country.

Ireland Offline terminated its operation in August 2007 with Ireland still ranking low in the European broadband availability and usage statistics. IrelandOffline have reformed as of January 2009 due to the lack of activity, in regard to the provisioning of broadband, in the telecommunications sector since previously terminating.

Eleven years later...... same **** different year.

Eleven years time...... same **** different year.

We as a nation are incapable of solving a problem we are confronted with, we convince ourselve we have a plan, and, carry on regardless.

Ireland... the land of the eternal gob****e, great little country, what would we do if they ever closed it down.