This is a bit of retro picked up from Instapundit but which has a lot more resonance here. It is the latest idea in telecommunications, at least it was in 1969, to wire every house and connect them through cable. This is the text that goes with the video:
“Supposing that every house were linked to the communication network via a wideband coaxial cable,” asks a forward-thinking member of the Post Office Research Station in Dollis Hill, London at the beginning of this 1969 short film titled, “Telecommunication Services for the 1990s.”
Made in 1969 at the Post Office Research Station, Dollis Hill, this eight minute film attempts to predict what the future of communications may be like.
We are governed by idiots who think they are forward looking geniuses but are repeating the same vision that might have been fresh in 1969 but is today beyond stale. And they are expensive to keep as well, but whose fault is it but our own for putting these people into office?
Think about how impressions are formed in the mind of the not-that-engaged voter. What information mechanisms dominate this process? How will you alter that in the future?
blogstrop
26 Oct 12 at 2:53 pm
Something these idiots would do well to recognise.
Rabz
26 Oct 12 at 2:54 pm
But under Gillard plan for 40 years luv.
Spatacrobat
26 Oct 12 at 3:00 pm
Interesting they had projected a mixture of both cable to the node and wireless.
Malcolm should send this video to NBN Co to use on their next marketing campaign.
Spatacrobat
26 Oct 12 at 3:06 pm
Just think… if this mob had been in in the eighties we’d now have the National Faxing Network.
Gibbo
26 Oct 12 at 3:57 pm
Astute observation, Gibbo.
Gab
26 Oct 12 at 4:00 pm
I think the most amazing thing about this is that Mr Harbuttle’s combeover goes to his left in the first vision and to the right in the second
GeorgeL
26 Oct 12 at 4:01 pm
Oh dear.
That will just set Senator Conroy off blubbing about his poisoned milk again. They took it away …waaaaaah …..waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.
H B Bear
26 Oct 12 at 4:04 pm
What else could you make predictions about?
Ellen of Tasmania
26 Oct 12 at 4:13 pm
If voting wasn’t compulsory would policy debate improve?
No need for tricks and spin – the uncommitted and disinterested can stay away so there is less need to appeal to base prejudices among the swinging voter population.
Why do we HAVE to vote? To whose advantage was it considered it was going to act after 1924?
murph the surf.
26 Oct 12 at 4:26 pm
Here’s a hard prediction for you.
Cable will always be faster than wireless.
Before you disagree, I suggest you take some lessons in electrical theory – specifically transmission theory.
I’m a libertarian at heart, but even I have to agree that one of the signs of a civilization is the provision of infrastructure. Communications infrastructure is too expensive to duplicate (except in CBD’s), so it should be provided the same way as roads, electricity, water, sewerage etc.
Stop dissing the NBN. It’s a good thing, it’s just that it’s implementation has been flawed by the political expediency of the current government.
Joe
26 Oct 12 at 4:33 pm
Ellen it’s a quote from Danish physicist Neils Bohr.
Apparently it came from a Q&A session during a seminar in Copenhagen where Niels Bohr laid out the fundamental nature of quantum physics. Bohr was asked what influence quantum physics might have on the world in the future to which he replied tongue in cheek that “it is exceedingly difficult to make predictions, particularly about the future”. Bohr himself attributed the saying to a Danish cartoonist Storm Petersen.
Ubique of Perth
26 Oct 12 at 4:42 pm
Ellen,
That’s a famous quote – variations of which have been attributed to numerous sources.
The one above has been attributed to Yogi Berra.
Rabz
26 Oct 12 at 4:46 pm
Thanks, Ubique.
Rabz
26 Oct 12 at 4:47 pm
Hi Alanism strikes again.
Yes, it ought to be privatised. The NBN is a joke.
http://www.nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbnco-annual-report-2012.pdf
Only 3864 premises have been connected to the FTTH service.
.
26 Oct 12 at 4:57 pm
“Stop dissing the NBN. It’s a good thing”
This is the argument I keep having with the refugess from Delimiter. I’m happy to accept that ubiquitous fibre-optic connections are a good thing, and that interesting and unexpected things will happen once it’s in place. What I don’t accept is that it’s necessary infrastructure, that it’s the best use of our scarce resources, that the telecommunications market would just stop evolving in response to demand and so we need the government to step in, and all the other assumptions people make.
It’s a good thing, but is it better than other good things that don’t get done? This is the central question.
Jarrah
26 Oct 12 at 5:02 pm
Hi Alan, I’m a conservative voter but I just don’t understand why everyone doesn’t get behind the monumental white elephant of the NBN.
Just like airlines. They’re expensive as well. We should have just one.
News for you Alan, I already pay a private firm for my electricity, and I can use alternate technologies for water and sewerage if I like.
The current meme going around is that ‘NBN is superior because you can’t go faster than the speed of light, which is what optic fibre goes at’.
Well, apart from the fact that radio transmissions also travel at the speed of light this is as silly as an argument gets.
These silly arguments leave out several important ponts:
- nobody is dissing fibre optic, just the need to connect expensive fibre optic to every existing home, and spending energy and capital pulling up working infrastructure to do it
- wireless technology is the future – wireless internet use will probably surpass fixed line internet this year or next. Same goes for telephony.
- wireless technology lends itself to competition
- re-nationalisation of the telecommunications industry is a completely backwards step
Finally, people the world over manage to get high speed internet without the taxpayer reaching into their pocket and wasting money. The NBN currently has 15 customers for every employee. It is a gold plated white elephant created to re-nationalise communications, a vanity project for Kevin Rudd and a giant make-work scheme for unionised workers.
And gifts the government centralised control for internet censorship.
What’s not to love, eh?
Moron.
brc
26 Oct 12 at 5:09 pm
O.K. Rabz and Ubique – obviously just displaying my own ignorance. Sorry.
Ellen of Tasmania
26 Oct 12 at 5:11 pm
Tony Blair: “I never make predictions; I never have and I never will”
Kenny
26 Oct 12 at 5:13 pm
So what guys, lefties don’t understand opportunity costs or economics?
Tell me something I don’t know.
You guys can keep on trying to teach a basset hound how to play a harp.
I’ll just point out the explicit and embarrassing business failure of the NBN, which should be blunt, strong yet circumstantial evidence to convince them that some good things are too expensive for everyone to have.
It’s what Fran Barlow and myself call a “teaching moment”.
.
26 Oct 12 at 5:17 pm
Libertarian-at-heart Joe, how do you know the NBN is a good thing? I am unaware of any evidence that could support this assertion. They refused to do a cost benefit analysis, which is a bit of a worry for the “Investors”.
Jannie
26 Oct 12 at 5:19 pm
Begs the mega question; how to isolate my wealth from the State that will soonish wish to thieve Superannuation to prop up its infrastructure goals at minimal yield to the punters.
Alfonso
26 Oct 12 at 5:52 pm
Well “.”, if that’s the way you feel. I’ll be happy for the NBN to be privately owned by me. Then the first person I can ban from using it will be you.
Do you have any understanding of the meaning of the word private.
Roads are not publicly owned just because they cost so much to build. They are publicly owned so that no OWNER can deny ACCESS to the road – moron!
–
“brc” who is this “alan” to which you are blathering on about?
You might pay the electricity company to product electricity, but without the transmission lines – paid for by tax payers – you would not be getting any. Did I say that I supported public ownership of electricity producers – did I? I DID NOT! I said I supported public ownership of the infrastructure – the transmission lines, water and sewerage pipes etc.
Joe
26 Oct 12 at 5:57 pm
Just for the record, my working definition of public infrastructure is:
anything that physically needs to cross property boundaries for it’s function is public infrastructure.
i.e. wireless is not public infrastructure and should be left in private hands.
Joe
26 Oct 12 at 6:03 pm
Joe, you’re on a hiding to nowhere here mate. I would love to have a government subsidised fibre cable to my little mountain hut, but my wife would only watch old reruns of home and away all night and I wouldn’t get to watch the road cycling. As someone else alluded, the wealthy porn trawlers can be relied upon to fund most of a private network then it will only take 39 years for youn couples to save for a new home and the industry won’t be nationalised, avoiding annual Internet strikes over Christmas. You know it makes sense.
Forester
26 Oct 12 at 6:05 pm
In some quarters the koolaid is still fizzy but for anyone else wanting train suppressing their gag reflex:
Obama and the Road Ahead: The Rolling Stone Interview (and cover story)
In an Oval Office conversation with a leading historian, the president discusses what he would do with a second term – and his opponent’s embrace of ‘the most extreme positions in the Republican Party’
JamesK
26 Oct 12 at 6:11 pm
wrong fred
JamesK
26 Oct 12 at 6:12 pm
Joe – you’re too blithely unaware that you’re being made fun of. Try and catch up.
No doubt you’ve got an xbox full of pirated movies and a deep seated desire to frag teenagers from Iceland. Well, more power to you, but whenever you’re ready to subsidise my hobbies to the tune of $40 billion, then lets talk.
brc
26 Oct 12 at 7:07 pm
And what would you advise, Steve, to improve the quality of the Australian network, seeing how you’re obviously an expert on the subject, and all…..
1735099
26 Oct 12 at 7:15 pm
When I saw the title of this thread I thought you were referring to the song ‘Miss Free Love’, by the Hoodoo Gurus.
I am the Walrus koo koo k'choo
26 Oct 12 at 7:25 pm
Thanks numbers, you’ve just proved AGAIN, that you really have no idea what is going on. For your benefit I’ll spell it out for you, in simple terms of course.
The first key point of this post is that ‘visionary’ government planners can’t predict the future better than anyone else. The next key point is that we need entrepreneurs, responding to profit and loss signals to discover what is the most efficient way of providing what consumers want. Governments don’t discover that information because they are not responding to the feedback that prices and profits give. Plus they pursue political objectives, which is almost never satisfying consumers and getting value for money.
Steve’s post was not so much about the stupidity of the predictions, but that the institution of government is prone to making these kind of mistakes. Of course the private sector produces mistakes, but they tend tostop before too much capital gets wasted. Governments tend to waste extraordinary amounts of capital.
Reall
Skuter
26 Oct 12 at 7:33 pm
…whoops…prematurely posted
Really I’m not surprised numbers is too dim to understand the underlying message of the post.
Skuter
26 Oct 12 at 7:35 pm
Classic!
Infidel Tiger
26 Oct 12 at 7:39 pm
You can say that again. The CFC cost me $80000.
1735099
26 Oct 12 at 7:56 pm
Did you have shares in the ozone layer?
Infidel Tiger
26 Oct 12 at 7:57 pm
Hah! – wood grain AND cassette tape. Kind of puts our marvellous NBN future to shame. Cry about THAT, Conroy.
derFRED
26 Oct 12 at 8:00 pm
I’m sure you’re gonna own it. Or if that ever happened, competition would never arise?
I’m about as sure of those assertions as I am sure you’re a “libertarian at heart”.
Ever been denied entry to the M7 or M2?
What a turkey.
No numbers. You invested poorly. Suck it up. The market fails when its participants fail.
.
26 Oct 12 at 8:21 pm
Taxis, banking, call out escorts?
.
26 Oct 12 at 8:24 pm
Regardless of your definition, there’s no need for “public infrastructure” to be owned or run by the state.
dd
26 Oct 12 at 8:31 pm
I too invested in CFCs, but my assets are frozen, they tell me, somewhere above Antarctica in some sort of black hole, or no-go-ozone, whatever.
blogstrop
26 Oct 12 at 9:22 pm
The remainder have been taken by the big bad Banksia men.
blogstrop
26 Oct 12 at 9:23 pm
Dot, to folks that understand markets, this is really just a tautology. It speaks volumes that this has to be pointed out to foolish leftists (is that another tautology?)…
Skuter
26 Oct 12 at 10:00 pm
I should also point out that markets routinely fail when the government is an active participant.
Skuter
26 Oct 12 at 10:01 pm
What jarrah said.
Optic fibre is nice, and the market was in the process of delivering it.
No. Sorry. You are stupid, and so far from correct you don’t even count as being wrong. Privately owned infrastructure does that every day of the bloody week.
wreckage
26 Oct 12 at 11:17 pm
Oh, Catallaxy. Bless.
Pity the nation’s non-partisan tech experts still recommend the NBN.
Jeremy
27 Oct 12 at 1:47 am
It may be the best solution, given unlimited resources.
Dangph
27 Oct 12 at 1:54 am
Experts? Have you seen their board or management?
Half of them are failures or union suits.
Non partsian? Remind us how the appointment of Mike Quigley was nonpartisan, or how NOT doing a CBA was “non-partisan”.
Bless you, fuckwit. The NBN has connected to under 4000 homes in three years and cost billions of dollars.
The private sector was ALREADY providing 100 Mbs connections in 2007 through firms like Internode and PIPE Networks, for less than the retail cost of the NBN. Yes it was in Greenfield lots but I’m sure they were doing more than 1200 or so connections per year. They’d only need to do 50 per month to keep up with the NBN.
Remind me never to have you represent me in court.
.
27 Oct 12 at 7:53 am
Hahahahaha!
Winston wipes tears of laughter from eyes.
Funniest thing I’ve heard in the last 24 hours…
Winston Smith
27 Oct 12 at 7:54 am
ahahahahahahaha Champagne Comedy………oh wait….you’re serious.
Carpe Jugulum
27 Oct 12 at 7:58 am
The nation’s “not partisan sports experts” also recommend the Institute of Sport and all the taxpayer funds it gets.
It’s generally good to take the advice of those with an interest in the money with a grain of salt.
Quentin George
27 Oct 12 at 8:05 am
should be non, not not.
Quentin George
27 Oct 12 at 8:05 am
You can’t really blame the government for its sheeple.
Go to whirlpool dot net dot au forums or example. 99.9% of people are gushing over the NBN. There is basically 0.1% of the tech industry against it. This is of course because the main benefactors are a minority – they will win out big time if the public of australia pay for high speed internet that they never use, as they will end up with subsidized super speed broadband. That’s what it really comes down to.
Everything about the NBN’s plans are ridiculous. While take up of ‘mobile only’ households is exploding, their long term buisness plan has it leveling out at 14%, no reason would given (other than their numbers wouldn’t work out if it wasn’t true). They believe they will have higher pentration than telstra currently do on copper take up! They literally believe every single person in australia will be picking up 12mbps minimum fibre.
mundi
27 Oct 12 at 12:04 pm
New NBN ad.
Gab
27 Oct 12 at 2:16 pm