Don't tell me what I want

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Read more! Just reminded of my response to Bill Murphy BT in response to his comment (3mins in) about BT being able to deliver "what Rory wants, what the county wants, and what you want". (Thanks to Philip Virgo's blog post in Computer Weekly)

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

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I don't want FTTC. I definitely don't want BET or ADSL2+. I don't want a dodgy mobile broadband connection to go with my already poor mobile coverage. And I don't want a repeat of Project Access (£23M) which originally had the chance to bring fat pipes to many Cumbrian villages, and was dumbed down to ADSL enable exchanges with YourComms (as I understood it, not BT), build a wireless network I don't know if *anyone* uses and which interfered with our CLEO schools network, and put in a few miles of fibre to a sink estate in Cockermouth or Workington or somewhere. (That ADSL enablement has left many Cumbrians without working broadband in 2010 because of the technicalities of ADSL over line length and "99% of Cumbria has broadband" is no more true than 99% of UK has broadband - time to be honest about the true situation, please).

I am deadly serious about requiring my gigabucket per second connection. And I know after all these years that that is what my count(r)y needs in order to play catch up on the global broadband stage. That is the bar, and I would really prefer it if BT or anyone else stop trying to lower it so consistently. Let's be ambitious and let's be real about what this country needs.

And stop telling me what I want. No-one has EVER in 15 years asked me what I, as a small rural business and mum want for and from my broadband, nor what I would be willing to pay. I'm not saying every piece of market research should target me, (please don't!) but there are enough people in BT etc who know me who could have asked.

I am highly representative of a UK rural SME and know that it would only need a few companies like me willing to put my money where my mouth is to stop BT's ADSL 2+, FTTC etc plans in their tracks because we will JFDI gigabucket broadband without BT in the first mile. Or else, as I posted about the other day, I'm off, with my business, to Chattanooga.




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FCC Headrush

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Read more! Just noticed the FCC are following me on Twitter, and looking at their tweet stream, I found this snappy video about the 4th utility.
This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com
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I briefly spoke about the broadband need for our education system in my presentation, and it's great to see the US way of promoting it with the Educate to Innovate in STEM etc.

In rural areas we are always going to be fishing in a small pond for resources. But with true broadband - symmetrical and 100Mbps+,our (primary) schools, rural ones in particular, can grab the opportunity to access resources from outside of our small pond. There is no reason for our primary schools not to link with schools across the world to learn other languages, discover new cultures, do video tours of our villages for people elsewhere in the world.

If there is no harp teacher in the area and your child wants to learn that instrument, you can access a harp teacher somewhere else in the world with a proper broadband link. Ditto for every single subject, whatever age you are. Want to learn needlepoint, mecheng, or how to make a proper Yorkshire Pudding?

We can make lifelong learning a reality without suffering the scarcity of resource that rurality causes WHEN we have true broadband.
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#rbc10 Broadband Conference videos

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Read more! Many thanks to John Popham for filming and for uploading them so quickly. (You can tell he doesn't live in a rural area!)
This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com
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The videos from the Penrith Connecting Cumbrian Communities conference hosted by Rory Stewart are being uploaded onto Youtube as I write, and many are already available.
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Megabuckets

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Yesterday, during my presentation, I endeavoured to introduce a new term to prevent the bloody irksome failure of even seemingly well-educated people to distinguish between bits and bytes.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

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However, it was obvious in the final session that some people weren't listening, and even in the colloquium we had to correct people. This has to stop as it drives some of us to complete despair. ;o)

It's dead simple - if you can't remember whether it should be Megabit or megabyte, use the term "megabucket".


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How do we develop NGA apps?

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Read more! Nick Turner of the News and Star live blogged the rural broadband conference and asked live questions on behalf of those who could not get tickets.
This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

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As I heard it, there was a question asked of Bill Murphy of BT: can developers have access to fibre? This is a massively important question. (However, looking at the live blog the question was actually: will BT or the national grid allow developers to piggyback on their infrastructure FOC?)

Let's go back to what I thought was asked. If you or I have never ever been on a symmetrical 1Gbps or even 100Mbps connection, then how can we comprehend and imagine the type of apps that will come into being when such connectivity and bandwidth is available? Where will tomorrow's apps come from in the UK if we can't play on such connectivity without either a) leaving the country to do so b) finding a business willing to let us play on their big fat pipe or c) spending thousands and thousands of pounds putting in a connection to do our R&D.

The UK has always been pretty good at innovation and we have of course led the world in many sectors because of our access to the right tools for the job. In this instance, very few people have access to the sorts of bandwidth that Korea etc have today in bedrooms across the country, so we are unable to innovate at all, let alone lead the world.
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Radio Lentil - Broadband Interviews & Video

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Read more! Radio Lentil offers broadband podcasts, and during the next week we shall be playing a series of interviews conducted at Rory Stewart's broadband conference in Penrith yesterday. Many thanks to Mark Holdstock, who many of you will know from the BBC programmes You & Yours and Farming Today.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com
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In the meantime, you cannot miss this must-see broadband video

which for many was the highlight of the conference - Chris Conder's story of laying the first rural fibre to the home.
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Highs and Lows

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There are days when I wonder why we do this sh*t (sorry Dad). Why do we fight people on £70k (min) salaries to explain why we need to connect a farm in the middle of nowhere when that guy with PAYE and pension sorted can't even begin to understand our problems here at ground level?

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

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Today is one of those days when I remember why. See that image there? We hit front page BBC News and we knew it had gone global as soon as we hit #5 most read stories. I say 'we' with the utmost confidence in the fact I was involved in this to some extent. All I wanted to do was shift a few mole ploughs around the country and redo the Google car park dig in Cumbria this weekend, in a field to show how rural fibre digs work (ta, Google, for t'idea) - nothing major, and it will still happen but....

Luckily, there are others around me who can think out of the box more than me and @cyberdoyle is entirely responsible for making an event happen for Rory Stewart's event that puts every sponsor, speaker, quango, minister, knowledge network, etc etc into the shade.

Yep, the pigeons won. IP over avian carrier, get on!!

So, you, oh incumbent with your big pots of shareholder cash and investment....you, oh regulator, who can't see what is coming nor regulate 3 or 4 years behind the real world....you, the gobby consultants creaming money off the half empty pot we have to invest in this country in a recession............where were ANY OF YOU TODAY???

Today, a small ISP with a big conscience and huge imagination (Timico Tref), a farmer's wife (@cyberdoyle Chris), and a company with a CIC conscience who has already(I think?) dug in more fibre to homes than BT (Spurn Point, Great Ashby, and more 'in the digging' right now - Fibrestream Guy) did something that our Government, ministers, quangos, incumbent etc can't - they broke the mould and proved what can be done and, most importantly, highlighted in PLAIN ENGLISH what is wrong in this country with broadband so every single person, worldwide, could GET IT.

As you brush your suit off for the autumn round of conferences, or for your next high powered meeting with investors, please think very hard about what YOU ARE DOING to bring the issue to Joe Public and connect the people who really matter.

I am bloody proud to know these people. I was especially proud to be sitting in a small rural hotel in Penrith, Cumbria, with Dave Isenberg as this story went mainstream. (Actually, having seen who he emailed, p'raps DaveI is partially responsible!)

And if you don't know these folks...then think very carefully before ringing them up tomorrow or the next day. What are you doing to progress this country if you take up all their time with demands for help for your overpaid consultancy proof of concept etc?

The reality is that we need fibre. It is nigh on 10 years since I first threatened to sing "Come on baby light my fibre" at the BSG conference in Birmingham and it is now time to actually JFDI to the people who keep this country going - the small ISPs, the social enterprises, the farmers, and the SMEs in rural areas.

Stop talking and get on with it guys and gals. If you need help, then the toolkit aka CAN in a Box (Community Access Network) is already here, online. On Twitter, on Youtube, in the forums, comments on blogs, and on community websites and in the #big society that has existed in this country for generations.

Stop quangos, regulators, incumbents, RDAs, councils wasting money on broadband. This "stunt" today would have cost several million if it was for the Olympics when the reality is it took some imagination, fuel, goodwill and a couple of journos who know a good story when they see one. We can connect this country in a similar way. We do not need over-paid folks ticking boxes, we need to Just F***ing Do It.

Well done to the pigeons, Tref, Guy and Chris.


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ITs Time for Big Society... and action

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Guest Post (by Chris) What the Big Society means to me:
This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com
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Big society is like the inside of a watch.

In the 'Old Days' our society revolved round communication. Over the garden wall on a Monday morning when the washing was pegged out, the 'gossip' would go down the roads, passing on wisdom, advice and help through the cogs and wheels. Meeting the kids after school in the playground all the mums would catch up on stuff, again sharing problems or worries as well as having fun. This is how a big society worked, just like a watch. The lads would meet up at the chapel, the auction, the pub etc and do the same. (Contrary to most belief the biggest gossips were the men)... but that is the way to get stuff off your chest, and in the process get or give help. Gossip is what makes the fingers on the watch and the world go round.

If you don't know the lad up the road just lost his sheepdog you don't get the chance to let him know the lad down the road on the farm just whelped a tidy litter.

If you don't know the man next door has just been diagnosed as a diabetic and is very worried, you can't put him in touch with the lady you met at church last week whose husband is coping brilliantly with diabetic treatments and living a totally normal life.

Due to the pressures of modern life and lack of TIME, caused by most young families needing two wages, and youngsters moving away to cities for work, away from extended family, this social interaction is now being done digitally. Facebook, twitter, blogs, texting and chatting.

In many rural areas this is not an option, due to limited connectivity to the pipeline known as the internet. Mobile phones don't work in many areas too.
For a big society to really work we need access for ALL to technology. This does not mean everyone needs to be able to do a spreadsheet or format documents in microsoftflamingword. It means access to whatever apps they want to use. In a similar way to how they communicated in the past, when all the women were at home in the daytime. Whether it was talking over the garden fence or in the village shop, or school or church. With a fat pipe, a digital village pump in every parish it means communities can get together and build a digital infrastructure to take the place of the washing line.

To get back to the watch idea and the cogs... the whole big society concept is about communication.

A mandarin in London will think he is a big cog, and a little old lady in the sticks may think she is a small cog. No matter what size we are, we all have an invaluable part to play in the endgame of Next Generation Internet access in our country. For Big Society to work, the watch has to keep the time. Every jewel and cog in the watch is a vital component.

Someone wearing a carer's watch, looking after a family member with Alzheimers is the biggest cog in the watch, and even the king/queen/prime minster are tiny cogs in comparison, the local doctor's cog is larger than royalty, and a best friend can be a larger cog still. The carer's need for an internet connection for remote assistance is just as great as a banker wanting to move stocks and shares.

The kids trying to access the school Moodle for homework are just as important as the businessman wanting to access the company database. The kids are our future, we need to build a next generation network for the next generation.

In our own circle of influence within our timepiece, we are all large cogs. If we are on someone else's wrist, ie a government's, we may be small, but no matter, we are all vital to success. None of us can keep the time on our own.


It is time for us all to collaborate, innovate and work together in a Big Society to build the infrastructure we need, fit for this century and bring us out of the dark ages of copper. A councillor can help with town planning issues. A farmer can help with access and advice on how to cross his land. A parish councillor can help engage his/her community. A neighbour can help the little old lady get a decent connection to do a bit of video conferencing with the doctor or family.

Getting connected isn't just about using a computer, it's about all the other benefits that internet access brings. Remote monitoring and Ehealth don't even need the user to own a PC.

Here up int'north we have always had a big society. We look after our own. We need to be able to do it digitally too. Internet access is now a distinct possibility at this moment in Time. We must not waste this opportunity. Time to act.

At the Rural Broadband Conference on Saturday 18 Sept at Rheged let us be ready to be wound up. IT's time to get this show on the road.

Follow the Rural broadband conference and discussions on Twitter on #rbc10

Chris Read more!

Why Penrith and Eden matter more than you think

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Read more! You are not coming to an ordinary place.......here in Eden. In fact, 2 doors down from me, wireless networks were being played with by a certain Lord, and Marconi top dog, nigh on 80 years ago.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

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The man who became Secretary of State, Postmaster General and Marconi management lived in my village. He was born, as far as I can discover, two doors away from where I sit right now as I type this. We had wireless before many cities had a clue what it was. Just as we had electricity and pure water earlier than urbanisations.

So, come to Eden this weekend, and enjoy being in a place known for innovation. Know that you are within a few miles of many, many other rural communities like my village, all of whom have stories to tell that put the majority of cities to shame.

Find me a city that put electricity in to homes before the village I grew up in or the village that I live in now. Look on Youtube for the places that have done fibre. Not faffed around with economically viable arguments, but places where it has been done because the PEOPLE need it.

Just like water. Just like our single light bulb in every house in the 1920s here on my road. (Courtesy of Ted Stone and his forefathers, many of whose descendants I know today). And sometimes, just because it can be done, like Ted's cutting edge wireless experiments as a kid that led him to head Marconi and become a Lord. A country boy from Eden in Cumbria, no less!

Innovation and solutions shouldn't start in cities........... they should, and will, start here in rural areas.

No names mentioned, but

Forget that at your peril.
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Speed kills

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Read more! Or rather lack of it, and it is killing the UK.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.comTweet

Along with the Chattanooga announcement, I now hear that the next round of RUS funding in the USA includes a project very close to my heart - the USA version of what we would propose here given half a chance. This is not some tiny network, but a joined up thinking, economies of scale proposal that allows multiple rural communities to build a network without telco involvement, owned by the communities it serves, and built with the future IN PLACE. i.e without substantial upgrade paths (and hence further investment) to achieve what it needs to today AND tomorrow.

For anyone who has managed to get a ticket for this weekend, the two panels you MUST NOT MISS are at 11.40am and 16.30. That is when you will hear about very similar proposals to those which are making some of us go "W00t" tonight - the Digital Parish Pump, Mr Forde etc. And then there's the two colloquia on either side of the conference which will allow substantial JFDI opportunities for those who want to hear something different from the same old same old talking.

I will add one final thing. (Like you would expect any less of me!) This conference has the choice of becoming a Do It conference or a Talk About It Again conference. For all of you who plan to come and attempt to pull the wool over people's eyes from the platform, you are in the land of sheep farmers. We can shear to clear people's vision, and we will. We also know how to deal with slurry - be warned. And we can use technology. Including pigeons.


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1Gbps to residents launched

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Read more! Chattanooga, Tennessee, launched their community service today to residents. This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

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Communities United for Broadband announced on their FB page an hour ago: EPB Telecom in Chattanooga, TN launched their 1gbps service to residents today! They are the first muni-operated system to do this. As a stand alone service it is $350 a month, but the price gets better if you bundle. If they can do this, what is stopping your community?

Good question - why can't we do this in the UK?

I suspect some major telcos are extremely concerned at the determination in this country to do just this and catch up with other community networks. Saturday could be a great deal of fun....;o)

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Penrith Cumbria, Broadband Conference

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Read more! Are you coming to the conference? The latest in a 10+ year round of broadband conferences is on my home territory..

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

It's going to be awesome. Watch out for the race, come to the colloquia, meet DaveI, and hear what is planned for my fabulous bit of England....Finally, the people who speak sense are on the programme (and I am going to take the credit for having a certain speaker as my first keynote before most of you knew the word "broadband")

As I understand it, there are VERY VERY few tickets left. Bring your wife, children, mistress or office staff to the Lake District for the weekend, and enjoy. It's a very beautiful part of the UK which will do your soul good.

And I, well, I intend to......hmm, you'll have to wait and see!



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Big opportunities in Penrith

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It would seem that God is coming to Penrith in a couple of weeks time to a certain broadband conference.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com



Sadly, I have been unable to explain to my MP why Dave Isenberg's thinking, both past and present, has been so instrumental in steering broadband and telecom developments and therefore it seems that there is no room on Rory's conference program for him. (Personally, I can name at least five people I would be glad not to have to listen to YET AGAIN who Dave could easily replace, but it's not my event! And as you know, Dave has been keynote speaker at my events previously.)

However, others who have been in the broadband game for a few years have seen the opportunity of making DaveI a guest of honour and active participant, and he will be at the NextGenUs colloquia in the North Lakes Hotel on Friday eve and post-event on Saturday. Tickets are limited but the hotel has a reasonably spacious bar for post-colloquium colloquing!

Dave recently organised FiberFete in Lafayette with Geoff Daily (which a certain unpronounceable volcano prevented James Enck, myself and other Europeans attending - grrrrrrr!)

Fiberfete was an astounding event, from the streaming I managed to access, which brought together many involved in the different approaches to NGA. What is important to remember (and as I clearly saw back in January on my US road trip) is that we are literally light years behind the U.S., particularly in rural areas, and whilst the Brits remain reluctant to travel to learn from others, having someone like Dave Isenberg on (my) home territory is too good a chance to miss to find out what we should be doing.

Rory's conference is called Connecting Cumbrian Communities, and it is to be hoped that the action plan at the end of the day will encourage many to work together to do so. Teamwork, folks, is what is required. There are multiple companies who do not have speaker slots who are already JFDI so please, let's make this less of a talking heads event and much more about PLANNING and ACTION. And let's learn from those in the know who will be there.....

If you plan to attend the conference, feel free to do some pre-event networking here on this blog.



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BT ad

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Read more! For those who thought my silent B in the headline of the last post was confusing and/or that it referred to the BT ad where consumers choose an ending, due to be aired on Wednesday 18th August 2010....

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

I think the news story you are looking for is this one.....BT ad viewers choose ending for TV advert

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BTad confused

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Read more! (with a silent B) No, I really am confused and more than a tad. What exactly are BT OpenRetch doing in rural areas like mine?

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

Left the farm this morning to take sprog to dentist - a mere 90 mile round trip for those of you who live in towns and struggle to understand our annual mileage (20k without doing anything beyond normal daily tasks). Parked in the single track road outside was a BT cherry picker, plus 2 vans, engines running and 3 BT bods, wandering around. Time: 10.30, they had been there since around 9am, with engines running.

Purpose (seemingly): to replace a perfectly good telegraph pole in the field across from an almost unused yard to the only house that wants/needs a telephone line. There's no broadband here over ADSL, hence the satellite dish, routers, external ethernet draped between houses etc. BT seemingly can't 'get' ADSL to this farm cluster so why replace wires? No wire replacement will ever reduce the distance to the exchange (around 9km) unless you put fibre in from exchange-->village-->farms.

Ask BT bod why the need to replace the pole. "This is marked as a courtyard on our plans so we have to put a 16ft pole in". "But the current pole is on a bank over 3ft above the road, the wire is already over 16ft above the road and courtyard, and any way, it's not a courtyard". "No matter, we're changing it." "Have you informed the occupants of the farmhouse?" "Someone came round a couple of weeks ago....." "The guy who came to look at the pole...? He didn't talk to any of us and the occupants of the farmhouse are in the USA right now. Do they know you are going to be attaching new wires to their house?" "We don't deal with customer issues like that......."

BT bod wanders off to breathe in the exhaust fumes from one of the trucks.

I return at 2pm. Must be lunchtime or a break as two of the cabs are occupied whilst all equipment requiring diesel is unmanned. BUT, engines are still running - ask farmer and audience if they have been running all morning? Yep.

The cherry picker sits, dormant, which makes me struggle to work out how much fuel has been burnt in close proximity to my vegetable garden in the last 5.5hrs, and why. But I have to admit there is a new pole in situ, which now towers over the landscape on the drive from the village and whilst I say it is technicolour red, I'm sure it's just some eco-friendly form of creosote. And we all know it takes around 3 hours to drop a replacement pole into an existing hole. And of course, this is Cumbria, and hell, it's only August, so I'm sure all three vehicles have needed to run their heaters all day.....

I'm doing my best to put a positive spin on the OpenRetch visit but I can't find one. I don't know what this truck and its van pals have put out in carbon monoxide in the last few hours but I can guarantee it has a) cost BT a fairly substantial amount in fuel even on tickover without the minimal PTO use the planting of the pole took and b) caused a totally unnecessary hit to the environment up here today.

The Swiss insist you turn off your engine whilst waiting at traffic lights and penalise a failure to do so - oh for a similar form of citizen's arrest for people who pollute my precious bit of the planet.

I watch, from a safe distance, behind bullet proof glass (for the BT chaps' sake, not mine), as the copper wire that has been taken down is not re-used, though it would definitely reach, and finally, the need to warm the engines up is made clear as the cherry picker is used by a now well-fed, centrally heated, and newly caffeined OpenRetch engineer as he attaches a new cable from pole to pole, and pole to house.

Gone 3pm and the main truck moves off the single track road and parks on the neighbour's drive (luckily, of course, they are away, or he would have blocked their access entirely) so they can now climb ladders and attach new copper cable to the house. Struggle to spot the old copper cable as suspect it might make a few quid on Ebay or from someone seeking to supplement their income. (Average wage round here is £14k, but most people think we choose to live this idyllic rural lifestyle but I still know the odd person who would appreciate a few extra bob to spend on petrol to go 10miles for a pint of milk, over-inflated rural food prices etc.)

Reconsider where the copper may have gone....after all, from what I have seen today with the casual attitude to the environment by the OpenRetchers, if it is going to be lobbed into the landfill rather than recycled etc, I'll have it to resell for the playgroup, air ambulance, or even Big Society projects.

As far as any of us know, no permission has been given nor sought for this BT work, so should there be a problem with the new fixing (entirely different to the old, of course), it's presumably a problem that a call to directory enquiries is unlikely to solve. Debate asking the BT bods for a phone to ring the USA and ask if they knew this would be going on whilst they were on holiday. Momentary concern as to whether this was planned according to a quick peek at their emails to check when they would be away. Attempt to dismiss such conspiracy theories, but it's not easy.

BT eventually drive away around 4pm (must get the vans back to the depot by 5pm presumably and clock off), having spent a full workday day putting in an entirely unneeded pole, cost approx £400-£600 in pole alone, let alone cable, peeps and vans (with no toilet - I have to admit that has worried me all day because my cornflowers etc next to the pole are quite sensitive to acidity and they never asked to use the loo, but we are not inhuman), the massive, pointless consumption of fuel on the doorstep and the fumes that has undoubtedly left, the wasted copper, and the fact.....

this is the biggie....

it would have cost less to run fibre and ducting through the field than it did to replace an obsolete technology to ONE HOUSE. Plus, had BT actually spoken to the 4 houses in the cluster, they'd have found untold offers of help to do something useful rather than sit here with engines running all day, purely because someone in an office has looked at a plan and said, "That's a courtyard."

Not, "That's a courtyard/pole/wire that allows us access to THREE houses plus a neighbour and 2 businesses we currently can't get the USC to EVER and who don't have a BT phone account even........oooh, they are farmers, shall we see if they can help us deal with the first round, the final third, of USC people?"

Oh no. Joined up thinking? No chance. Let's go pollute the hell out of a farm for a day, waste 3 employees' time, burn untold gallons of diesel, replace a pole and bin the old one, and the copper wire too, FOR NO GOOD REASON WHATSOEVER except some plonker in the office, who has never been anywhere near this farm, is ticking all of his boxes to prove he is worth employing.

BT, I suggest you come and visit this pole again very soon. Now it is so much higher than the old one, I can see an overhead power pole down the road from the top of it that was previously on an uphill run I wasn't sure about. Shortly, you will be wondering whose fibre is running down to the village, where your engineers have spent nigh on 30 months since the Carlisle flood trying to solve the problems of aged and decrepit and corroded copper. It will be our fibre and I hate to say it but these customers you have just spent untold hundreds/thousands of pounds on today - they will be NOT YOURS. I think you may find they are on a community network belonging to us.

Sorry but is it not time you listened, talked, communicated with those whose land you need for your network, and your customers, and those who are determined to change the network map in the UK......

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No review on fibre tax

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Read more! Having taken a couple of days to calm down at the sheer idiocy of the coalition, it is time to ponder the failure to review the fibre tax.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

There are multiple previous posts on the fibre tax on this blog, all bewailing the fact that the Government (previous ones) had failed to comprehend:

• the distortion caused by the current system towards the incumbent and against new entrants


• the cost to the UK economy of failing to address the problem by severely limiting fibre deployment


• the lunacy of not adopting a system which favours the brave with the UK well-being at heart rather than the "corporate canny" with their own shareholder interests

Aidan Paul, Vtesse Networks, at our colloquium in Newark showed in simple graphs what the current fibre rating system means for BT.

In came the coalition and, with it, hopes that the rhetoric preceding the election wasn't just hot air, and that some common sense would exhibit itself in the decisions made by the new bunch at Westminster. BUT, Ed Vaizey has decided, after constructive talks with VOA (constructive for WHOM, one has to ask?), to not review the rating lists.

There is plenty of evidence from other countries who have taken specific routes to deal with the fibre rating issue that once this barrier to deployment is removed, the revenue which is (would have been) forthcoming to the coffers from fibre tax is a DROP IN THE OCEAN compared to that generated directly and indirectly from the use of fibre, to the GDP, GNP and NNI. So, we see increased value in and from the commercial sector (eg businesses), considerable savings to the health service and within education delivery, benefits for citizens (both in personal savings and opportunities generated), plus a huge reduction in costs for delivering government services.

As if all those factors should not be sufficient to convince any government to deal with the problem so fibre deployment happens sooner rather than later, the environmental impact of FTTH alone is such that it becomes a no-brainer vs any type of copper or alt telecoms solution.

What seems to be becoming increasingly clear is that it is over 20 years since *any* government in this country really got the importance of fibre to this country's citizens and economy. This realisation (or lack of) is now causing the UK to lag behind many other nations, not just meaning that the technical deployment is hindered by factors such as outdated and unnecessary regulation, but our overall IT awareness is similarly hampered by the lack of access to a communications infrastructure which is capable of doing a 21st century job.

You cannot even begin to understand the impact, for example, telemedicine has on (let's start small and expand the ripples) a single patient --> a regional Health Department --> the NHS in general and hence this country's well-being if it cannot and does not reach any patients at all.

We have thousands of digitally reluctant in this country - "Oooh no, I wouldn't know where to start with a computer" and really, who can blame them when the day to day benefits to each of those people cannot even be demonstrated because we don't have a single FTTH demo project in this country showing how the applications can and do work.

The only relief in all of this sorry tale is that there are communities who are JFDI anyway, and who are going to begin to increase the awareness in this country of what FTTH really means, despite the government's failure to support such projects and insistence on taking a short rather than long-term view.

The reality is that during your term in office, Mr Ed Vaizey and friends, we COULD deploy FTTH to the vast majority of this nation if the barriers to doing so were removed today. If we solved the USC issue with fibre and started in the most difficult areas rather than permitting corporate cherry picking, the marketplace would pick up, the economy could be assisted towards recovery, our businesses would not be at the severe disadvantage (as they are today), our school kids would receive a cybereducation similar to that of their peers in other countries, we could help to decrease our carbon footprint, etc etc etc etc.

The savings brought across the board by FTTH could then be spent on the services the citizens of this country require, and which are currently under threat.

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No more discussions, we need decisions

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Read more! As FCC people wend their way towards our European shores next month for the conference season, let's not lose sight of what is happening elsewhere. It is a particular failing of this isle to filter out events elsewhere in the mistaken belief "we know best".

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

Michael Copps, FCC Commissioner, has put out a one paragraph statement that bears several readings. The issue, Net neutrality, is not one which we can avoid either. Nor is his statement so simplistic that we cannot also apply it to our own regulatory environment.

“Some will claim this announcement moves the discussion forward. That’s one of its many problems. It is time to move a decision forward—a decision to reassert FCC authority over broadband telecommunications, to guarantee an open Internet now and forever, and to put the interests of consumers in front of the interests of giant corporations.”

Replace "FCC" with "Ofcom" or "ASA". Focus particularly on "discussion" versus "decision". Consider "authority", "open", "interest", "consumers", and "corporations".

Re-word this statement from current UK or EU perspective, and it is of worthy of 2 minutes consideration by us all in Europe today.

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Honesty in Broadband?

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It's been a long time coming. And it's still not actually here because Ofcom, whose mandate is consumer protection and representation, are too busy being courted by the telcos, media companies and so on, to actually fulfill the mandate. (Or put me right, guys)

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

This time a complaint has been upheld by the ASA against BT, which is a novelty because they failed to uphold Virgin's 'creative' claims previously about their fibre optic network. But you have to ask how this sort of practice got past Ofcom and into ASA territory anyway......

ThinkBroadband actually put the reality of BT's claims really neatly in their write-up of the case and it's worth reading, as well as the previous link.

BT claimed that consumers would know that the word "instant" didn't actually mean instantly, particularly in the context of broadband and the Internet.

Ho hum. Let's ask ourselves why UK broadband consumers would now be quite so confused about speeds, instantaneous access, always on, download and upload speeds etc....one could lay no blame whatsoever on the mis-marketing of services by the incumbent and their pals for the last 7+ years, could one?

And as for the comment about custard....The truth of the matter is once we get into degrees of 'how long' etc, Bird's custard *is* instantaneous compared to making "real" custard which anyone who has tried to do it will know takes hours/days/weeks/years (depending on your culinary capabilities!)- a bit like down/uploading a film/file/podcast on a substandard "up to" (rural) broadband connection. The important point is that it tastes about as much like the real thing as BT's Infinity broadband looks like a big fat two way pipe with HD TV movies downloaded 'instantaneously' wherever you are, but at least you don't need to be a geek to know which is real custard/potato etc.

I think it's time for a bar based on, um, let's say the Korean experience. (Or Hong Kong, Japan, Sweden etc). NOT the paucity of provision which the UK is becoming famed for, courtesy of the incumbent and the corporate telco players.

If a film will download or upload on your network to anyone wishing to be your customer at the same speed as this Utopia (now FTTH Council EU) demonstrator then you can say you have that service available.

You can even say you have "or more". But pretending that *anyone* who phones up asking for this level of connectivity has a cat in hell's chance of getting it is ridiculous, especially without proof. There are ways to guestimate (or even be accurate) about what can be delivered over any length of copper in this country, based on the evidence from around 20million lines and a not insubstantial R&D crew in Ipswich who really seem to know their stuff.

Take your call centre people away from their scripts, and instead of forcing Ofcom to regulate your mis-selling and complaints about you, sell what you really have to offer to each household or business who rings you up. Then, and only then, we might see market forces at work. Not because of hype, but because of TRUTH.

I drove through a deeply rural area of Yorkshire tonight and stopped to do one of my ever-increasing wireless scans of what was available, knowing that the copper in that area is utterly useless for ADSL. A local company name cropped up on my scan who have delivered a working, more than satisfactory, wireless network for less than BT wanted to connect a SINGLE home in the area to ADSL. This is the competitive market place. Those people are now so content with their network (I stopped because several of them have been in touch to tell me so) that if and when BT get close to 'seeing the light', there will be a very seriously uphill struggle for BT to regain market share. We are now seeing this across the country, and not just with wireless networks.

We need honesty because there are services now being delivered eg by Rutland Telecom and friends which are going to shortly show hard, irrefutable evidence that they really can deliver what some claim to be able to (and can't). This hard evidence is already available to real users, who will invite visitors into their homes to try it for themselves, who will then go home and dig where they live. Leaving companies who make spurious claims to fend for themselves.

Playing on the ignorance of the nation, a methodology which has been carefully cultivated, nurtured and fertilised the entire time I have been in this game, by marketers and ad agencies whose clients are invariably telcos with shareholder interest, cannot continue because "the truth will out".








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Friday Thought - Big Society gets (k)IT

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As some may know, my region, Eden in Cumbria, was recently chosen as one of the four vanguard communities for the Big Society. Quite what this will mean is, as yet, unclear, particularly in a community where JFDI has been going on for centuries because of our remoteness from Westminster, both geographically and emotionally.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

However, one thing that has become clear is that in order to deliver many of this community's dreams and aspirations, we need decent comms infrastructure to overcome our remote location, distance from services, distance from each other etc. It also means that the meagre budgets that we have at a regional level may well be better spent by the communities themselves through use of technology to reduce costs, increase efficiency and so on.

So, here's my thought for the day. This country is about to lay off hundreds of thousands of people in the public sector. Having been into public sector offices far too many times, I think I can safely say that the vast proportion of these people sit at desks and use computers. Some, although a far smaller proportion, may well also have laptops and smart phones.

There are community projects throughout the UK who could benefit from these items. We can use flat screen monitors for digital noticeboards on our community wireless networks, we can use old computers to bring the digitally reluctant into the 21st century, we can use routers, servers and so on to connect the disconnected. We can use smartphones to create exciting new community apps and demonstrate them to communities, Parish Councils etc, and also (where the mobile network permits) demonstrate mobile apps for community use. Laptops are often beyond the pocket of many of the rurally deprived and these can be used in so many ways - I would only bore you if I began to create a list of their potential uses.

If this IT equipment goes anywhere, it should be into our deprived and rural communities first and foremost. I have this awful feeling that some well-meaning charity will blag a contract to clear public sector offices of unneeded IT kit and start shipping this essential equipment abroad. We must not allow that to happen. These are UK assets, paid for with UK public money, and we need them here. In particular because the Big Society is expecting everyone to solve major issues as volunteers but we cannot do it without the required equipment which can normally only be acquired with hard cash.

I'm sure completely honourable and trustworthy people can be found to reformat hard drives, smart phones, etc for nothing if it means that we then have access to equipment that will permit community projects to succeed without having to operate on broken shoestrings and without the right tools for the job.

We'll work on sorting out the infrastructure too - oh, we already are!



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Ofomc and samknows claim average broadband speed increase

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Read more! Really? Might that be because in the 3 years ish this "experiment" has been running, our requests for the special routers to be placed in rural areas rather than purely urban areas have managed to achieve the grand total of 5 being sent out. One I know blew up as it was plugged into my house when we were hit by lightning, the other 4 are on varying degrees of rural connections which on occasion fail entirely to actually connect to the outside world.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com

If you, Ofcom and Samknows, are going to claim the average speed of British connections is increasing, then please define by location (urban vs rural) exactly where these routers are. Because I hate to be a cynic but aren't the majority of your routers in places being cherry picked by the telcos for ADSL 2+ etc???

I could say the average speed on all British roads is 60+mph if all I measure are the parts of the motorways with least traffic and most lanes. Aren't you skewing the statistics in a similar way? After all, who is paying for the end reports???

Put an absolute minimum of 50% of your routers in rural areas, as defined by accepted statistics and/or definitions, and then re-present your data please. Otherwise, I hate to say it, but these claims mean nothing.

"Torture numbers and they will tell you anything"
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