ISPs must be stopped from screwing dial up users IMMEDIATELY

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Read more! I went round to a house tonight to test the WiBe. The lady had been in Cyberbarn this afternoon and seen the WiBe on the desk. She's on dial up, but actually came round to get advice about her printer. I dropped in to see her this evening on the way home....and unearthed a horror story.

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



Her hours at work have recently been cut and the family need to tighten their belts, as I'm sure many in this country can relate to so she had been going through their bank statements to see what could go. She spotted the AOL direct debit at £30 a month, and mentioned it to me whilst I was trying to fix the printer. I pretty much fell off the computer chair. "£30??? You are paying £30 for dial up?" "Yes, I hadn't thought about it but we have been paying AOL that amount for years and years. We know we can't get broadband, no-one can round here, so I'd never really thought about it, until today after coming to Cyberbarn, and then seeing it on the bank statement."

"Cancel it right now," was my advice. "I'll find you a better solution in the next day or two." It's a promise I intend to keep. And I am now also going to leaflet every house in that notspot and tell them to check the amount they are paying for dial up.

But the ISPs should be deeply ashamed of themselves. I know AOL have a huge number of customers, but a company that size must know that they have long-term customers, to whom neither they nor BT are able to offer a 21st century product like ADSL broadband, and should be ensuring that every single customer on dial up is being treated fairly and not being completely ripped off in this manner.

Yes, there are many of us guilty of not checking our statements to make sure we are not paying monies we needn't, chasing up a better deal on our utilities etc, but some of the onus should fall on the companies too to NOT RIP PEOPLE OFF like this. There is absolutely no excuse for a company to maintain customers on age-old tariffs which are clearly over-priced and bear no relation whatsoever to the service being offered.

Let's keep this 'Give an Hour to Help People Online' going. If you know ANYONE still on dial up, go and ask them how much they are paying and help them contact Ofcom to report their service provider so the extent of this problem can be seen and dealt with, and help them to find a better deal for their connectivity.

And if you are an ISP and still have dial up customers, especially those who must have been with you for at least most of this millennium, then give them a free year to make up for the ludicrous and immoral over-charging which has been going on for far too long.

Dial up should be free anyway - it's no use to man nor beast in this day and age and it costs peanuts to provide. Shame on you AOL and the rest of you running the same scam, check your customer records and start sorting this disgraceful situation out immediately.








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Day 1: rural broadband experiment

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Read more! 6 people in total through Cyberbarn. No-one was allowed to use Youtube, Facebook or anything else as I am now disastrously protective of the data allowance. This doesn't exactly make for a fun online experience but as I seem to be paying, can you blame me? This is how any rural family will be forced to behave at £15/GB. Here's what we spotted today..........



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



Cleaning windows, talking to old friends, gossiping about the soap opera that is our village, even with anywhere between 3 and 5 IT savvy folks in Cyberbarn who don't actually appear to be touching a computer, uses anywhere from 3/4-10MB each 30 minutes. That was on the satellite which is currently operating at 64kbps whilst we negotiate the new contract. (Apparently, I should be ashamed to admit this speed, but I am very grateful to a supplier willing to talk to me whilst I also endeavour to track down someone from 3 with some authority to help this experiment proceed for at least one month using data as we wish to).

My maths isn't great at this hour, but hopefully @yarwell or someone will do the sums and work out the necessary info to show how 20.4MB at 64kbps in 30 mins works......

So, at 6pm, we were operating on this 'about to be 6Mbps but right now 64kbps' satellite and then Mr Popham walked in with the WiBe. His first speed test was 2.7Mbps. It was posted on Twitter. Bear in mind, Upper Eden is an area where the few sad folk amongst us who care report the tiny patches of 3G connectivity, mostly high on the fells (usually MOD land), in case 3G is ever required. Most ISPs will not sell a 3G dongle to anyone round here as the tests have clearly shown nowt is available. The WiBe proved otherwise and I have to admit to being instantly impressed.

Not having enough cat5 ends to crimp through to the load balancer and share this minor upgrade in connectivity, we all just decamped to the WiBe wifi!! This is where I spent too much time eating fishcakes whilst finding the usage stats, a car went off the road, the village soap opera erupted, and luckily, tomorrow is another day!

However, there is a post script to day 1: the speedtest I received from my own house via @johnpopham indicated a 3.7Mbps down and 1.49 up from his WiBe. I showed this to the people from the Haybergill Centre who have had a nightmare broadband scenario for far too long. Mick was sceptical for about 2 secs before reminding me there is 3G somewhere up on the MOD ranges behind them. I reminded him there wasn't in the village, but this bit of kit had found one. The WiBe is going up there ASAP to see if it may, once and for all, resolve the problems up there with the need to get online. So, big tick to @johnpophma for solving yet another Can't Get Online Challenge problem.

How do I feel: tired. Happy. And very, very sad. Why are we so pleased with a 3.7Mbps speedtest from a £200+ WiBe which has a £15/GB tariff? This could end up costing (on my home usage alone) 28 days x £15, £420/month in excess usage, to do the nothingness that I can do now. After three months of that level of usage (which obviously I would have put a stop to as soon as I discovered it as it is way beyond my personal and business resources) we could have put in FTTH.

I've always argued that the economic dynamics of FTTH must be looked at from a far wider view point than purely the telcos' profits. Right now, I am going to stand on top of the reality of Day 1 and shout out to you all: FTTH makes far more sense for everyone's pockets - telcos, councils, consumers, parishes, SMEs etc.

So, day 1: overall, sad. Bloody impressed with the WiBe and want it as an adjunct to my FTTH - can you build a femto cell into it too? Pleased to have better connectivity than CCC, CLEO and BT Global can provide from the fibre that lies less than 300m from my house, but so sad that rural folk are being so dreadfully curtailed for no good reason. And will be for many more years if this lunacy continues much longer.











Allow the geeks to touch a computer, their iPhone or a tablet, add a WiBe (thanks Richard!!!) and the stats go steadily and unceasingly upwards. Chuck a John Popham into the mix with Cant Get Online Week blog posts and photos to upload, and the TX/RX got into telephone numbers (it was measured in bytes, but even so!)

I'm still trying to resolve the WiBe stats (has anyone out there got a minute to help this very tired individual make sense of it all?) to actually clock what we did today but my calculations actually have us over 100MB for just over 2 hours (which is sort of terrifying if you only get 2 GB a month), but I am happy to log start/finish data from now on as today was a tad haphazard!

(Unpack WiBe whilst trying to eat my fishcake breakfast at 6.30pm, monitor stats asap, enjoy the company whilst dealing with developing Parish issues, and dragging a UK ONline learner out of a dark/hidden ditch!) Bit full on I thought but never a dull moment here ... ;)









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Making the Final 10% the First 10%

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Read more! As per previous post, we are now running an experiment to prove that FTTH is the only solution, for most rural remote areas by looking at the options, costs, usage etc. We are not saying there is not a place for satellite, mobile or even FiWi, but we will prove that FTTH makes more sense AS THE PRIMARY CONNECTION for the vast majority of homes and businesses in this country. We need a wireless/mobile cloud whatever, and there are always going to be places where a satellite makes sense now and for the foreseeable.

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



Thanks to AFL, Lucid, ITS and others who are coming at us too thick and fast for a quick blog post like this, our next phase is about to begin now Cyberbarn is open.

The mile of fibre has landed. The dig is being prepared. If you want to be involved, watch this space or drop into Cyberbarn.

And very soon, B4RN will be announcing how to do rural FTTH over a much wider area on an economically viable and logical scale.

I'll be digging for both of them and continuing to support communities who want solutions, and who need options. Come and try mobile and satellite at Cyberbarn before you make any decisions, and read all the open source information that is available that clearly shows now why the Final Third and Tenth should be the first, and why it makes more sense to invest the money into that sector for long term economic payback than in towns and cities.
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The Final 10% Rural Broadband Experiment

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We are going to set to and provide the hard evidence required on paper to prove that mobile and satellite are insufficient for AFFORDABLE, ACCESSIBLE, PRESENT DAY INTERNET ACCESS in rural areas for your average family, farm, business, OAP etc. What we intend to prove is that the payment pain for these and any next generation solutions is going to fall heavily on the users, whilst the telcos get off scot free from investing in long-term answers already obvious to all. This could no doubt offer excuses for yet further delaying tactics from incumbents, ministers et al through said evidence but hey ho............

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



Cyberbarn is now open (Mon, Weds, Fri, 1-7pm if you care to drop in). It is already connected to a satellite dish and in a few hours it will also enjoy a mobile broadband connection through a WiBe lent by Rural Broadband's Richard Dix as part of John Popham's Can't get Online Week - cheers all!

Each GB of data over and above 2 per month (under negotiation and a tad pathetic compared to that permissible on most ISPs FUPs for town dwellers - 30 in my house and then £1 per GB thereafter) will cost us £15. There is NO funding for data (not even, yet, a generous mobile or satellite provider to allow us to capture stats without constant reductions on speed during the month - hint, hint) so guess which mug is paying or who in this rural community will suffer when I can't pay for data before food?




Looking at the current usage on the satellite by a normal everyday family (who featured on one of Rory Cellan-Jones' broadband news items a couple of years back about dial up agony before I put the satellite in), and the mobile usage by myself and a couple of others round here, we are all going to be paying more in bandwidth than in electricity, water etc, simply by opening the doors of Cyberbarn and encouraging people to Get Online as MLF wants us to. But, hey, I bet the implications of that doesn't hit the news as hard as the next electricity or gas price hike.

We are all constantly told that satellite and mobile will solve the final 10% so having installed Cyberbarn deliberately in that space, let's see.

(For those who are not aware, there is no ADSL available to any of the premises around or beyond Cyberbarn as it is too far from the exchange. The nearby village, approx a mile down the road, is almost entirely sub 2Mbps, according to both anecdotal data, speedtests, and the BDUK and Ofcom stats for Cumbria which we mapped a while back). Oh, except the Primary School but that is a whole other story dying to be told.

If anyone wants to see what happens when you allow the peasants free access to (halfway fast) data - 6Mbps on the sat and we'll add the WiBe speedtests to @cyberdoyle's cyberwave as soon as we are wired in, feel free to send £15 for a 1GB top up on either the WiBe or the satellite to keep them operating at their 'full' speeds. Not that I am expecting anyone to give us 1GB of data, but if you feel you should for the purpose of a decent experiment, UECP (the Upper Eden Community Partnership) can provide a Paypal account for Cyberbarn. Just comment below if you want one or if you know/are David Dyson, CEO of 3.

I think we know what the reality will be, but hell, let's give it a spin and prove it to those who refuse to believe us that fibre to the home is the only real solution. After all, who will be £1250 out of pocket, per home, if the peasants are paying monthly data tariff fees of £15 per GB rather than telcos putting in a 25-50 year solution for that money?

I'm going to go into this in more detail shortly as I find it deeply offensive that govt can dish out £950M and expect at least £6 per £1 private investment back for industry, and not even begin to apply the same thinking to consumers with the BDUK money. How many £££s is the BDUK cash stimulating from private investment and how much will be dragged from our pockets without ever being accounted for? The pilot projects in Cumbria alone must have already put in tens of thousands of pounds of private money and we haven't seen a bean invested yet in connectivity.

Perhaps this is just yet another tax on those of us who "choose" to live in rural areas? £1 or less per GB in town on a bog standard ADSL or cable connection vs £15/GB in the campo doesn't quite add up in my mind. When our average earnings are already only 63% OR LESS of you city dwellers and our fuel is 10+p a litre more and the hospital/supermarket/courts/County Council offices etc are 40 miles away compared to your 2-5 miles. And our connections don't work and we are being hit with 15 times what you are paying per GB (a DVD is 660MB and our mobile libraries no longer stock DVDs as we can apparently download them.....).


I could go on with how our lives are costing us more and more to produce food whilst city folk and Westminsterites pay less and less for it.

(Don't believe me that we really are?

WE produce your food, that's your steak out of the Cyberbarn viewing window. Cyberdoyle produces your milk.)

Add it up. Rural folks are being taxed out of existence and the digital divide is widening rapidly.

But, enough moaning. To work. Let's see what we can prove in the comms arena for Neelie, Jeremy, Ian et al....

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Workington, working together?

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Read more! BT will shortly announce that they have just cherry picked Workington out of Cumbria's roll out. They may have made the announcement already....been busy here.....

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



This county that I and others choose to live in is being scammed. Big style. As are far too many others. (Or prove us wrong?). Not for the BDUK money per se but for the townships which would then make a rural rollout actually worth playing with. Using the BDUK procurement as a backdrop.

Apparently C&W, who didn't actually show at the suppliers' day in Carlisle recently, are backing out. Read: have left. So, we're down to two players (waiting for confirmation but that isn't due till about next spring) and word on the street is that someone high up in HMG is trying to keep BT's monopoly alive and well. Like that comes as a surprise.

There are questions that need asking at County level about the fitness of some of those making telecom decisions for our next generations. But ask yourself in far more depth and detail what the hell is going on in Westminster that yet another County is down to only (in reality) a single player with two initials?

Yes, a register is required of lobbyists but how about a list of every single ex-BT employee and shareholder who seems to be currently involved in some very poor decision making for the future communications infrastructure of this country?

Hey, we get the need for commercial cut throat games, but why not put in open access infrastructure and then let them chop chunks out of each other?




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Big Society Hurdle Busting

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Read more! I sat on the doorstep of Cyberbarn tonight, waiting for two of our seriously active community campaigners (have you voted for Libby yet?)

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



When these folk arrived, just after I had spoken to Rory on the train as he came home to his constituency, we took Cyberbarn to pieces and reconstructed it. I am very lucky to have people like this around me. So is Cyberbarn.

Every hurdle we currently face will be removed by our Big Society barrier busting team. And people like Julie and Libby.

Watch this space. Cyberbarn is knocking down hurdles that it seems County would prefer stayed in place for at least another year. No chance. You will be voted out at the next election and we will make sure that your actions about bringing broadband to the Final Third are made public.



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Expensive IP Transit - Zynga

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Read more! Not my forte but did a few quick experiments to try to solve what was becoming an expensive problem here, and likely to become worse if we didn't know the source as we move into the next phase of the CAN.

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



Over the last 2 years or so, we have fairly regularly gone over our monthly cap dans le village. It has been hard to prove who was at fault. Until now.

It is, without a shadow of a doubt, Facebook games which are the issue. Two of my neighbours (oh yeah, and me too) have been using FB games instead of chat, Skype etc, as well as to make life slightly more interesting. The WOW downloads were, I knew, pretty hefty, but actually Zynga has to be the biggest non-paying user of bandwidth that any ISP is facing right now.

I have just set up a quick experiment that involved not actually playing a game and I'm sure this can be confirmed by my fave techie: I pulled 425MB in just under 10 secs without actually playing anything. Considering that these games demand regular check-ins etc, and many do not work over the mobile network (I wonder why!), having 2,3 or more of the Zynga family running at any one time could mean you are pulling a gig regularly throughout a day. Play 4 games consecutively (if you know how they work, you will know this is perfectly feasible) for 3-4 hours and the consumption must be enormous.

On many packages, this would see you pushing the FUP in no time flat on an average month. So, one wonders how many of the so-called excessive users we hear the ISPs calling criminals are simply Facebook's average users?

Makes it quite obvious that a) we need to stop permitting bloated code (compression techniques etc, guys) b) work together so games such as these work as much for LAN and cached as anywhere else and c) open the bloody pipes up.

If 25% of traffic in the US right now is Netflix, you wonder how much of the rest is obese Zynga (or similar) code? And what's in it for them using so much bandwidth? Anyone know of a Zynga/ISP deal, including an affiliate usage that might explain why any single company would want to create something that uses such a phenomenal percentage of the scarce resource at any one moment?

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Lords Committee on broadband

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Read more! Spotted a reference a while back to an up and coming HOL Committee on broadband on Jimi Enck's blog.
This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com



With many thanks to one of the readers here (don't know if you want naming, but thanks for your great emails!), this has now been confirmed and begins in December.

The sort of topics that Lords may want input on are technical and economic information, legal input on State Aid constraints, investment, as well as specifically rural inputs regarding wireless, satellite and rural finance.

Joint work on submissions is always welcome to keep input succinct, understandable etc so if anyone is interested in a 5TTH submission, get in touch.
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Ready for the next item on the good news agenda?

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Read more! I wasn't. And nor were the projects here in Cumbria.

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



Turned out (Mondayish) that there is an ITT out for consultants to advise the Cumbrian pilots on business plans, instruments etc. Came as a bit of a shock to the projects listed, as you can imagine. But I forwarded it to them in case they didn't know. They didn't.

Staffed by some of the most inexhaustible volunteers who have forged relationships within their communities (literally on their doorsteps), the idea that a furriner would be allowed access.....

Actually, it's worse. A PAID furriner, who knows absolutely nothing about these communities, and has been chosen in a rushed 5 day process (Oct 21st to 26th) could be forced in to Cumbrian communities who have established relationships that telcos, governmental departments and civil servants can only dream of. And not a single one of these hard working people who have already, in some cases, got networks up and running, HAS RECEIVED A SINGLE PENNY YET FROM BDUK.

The mind boggles.

So, I'm applying. Because I'm at least local and know every single one of these communities personally. And I'm in good company who can ask far more important questions than me starting with "Why not us?".

I'm sure we won't get it, although the team we have put together in a few short hours could do this job perfectly, without stepping on any toes or peeing money up the wall. (For those who feel like throwing my outcome income statement at me, I will explain this soon, I promise).

Can these furriners create the so-called Community Broadband Toolkit for the next wastage (sorry, spend) of public money called the Rural Community Broadband Fund due to be rushed through (sorry, launched) by the end of November.... when we find out who has "won" the chance to run the gauntlet of some severely cross Cumbrian communities, I'll post again.


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Hey, it gets better....

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Read more! I lied. It really doesn't.

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




In the last two days, rumours have been circulating on't Cumbrian jungle drums that one supplier (of the 3, or is it now down to 2?) on the Lot 2 list has told some folks that they are doing nothing more for now on any pilot*.

*There aren't actually any pilots** in Cumbria yet because the State Aid issues have not been resolved. We could be the first county to have pilots that come post-procurement. Go, us! For achieving sweet FA since Rory's event, let alone the 7 years or so since the Project-Access-debacle, we should get yet another EU award (I was there in Brussels, PA really did get one and it should be removed/denounced/stripped, publicly, for out and out lying about the success of that nigh on £20M spend, read: #fail).

**Oh and none of the pilots are actually allowed to do that innovative lark we were all so looking forward to. It has to be one of the prospective bidders or get oot. It's beginning to look as though if you don't choose the right one, you will find you have wasted at least a year of your life come next spring (see a future post on the actual date) when/if procurement is actually announced.



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Cumbria...take a very deep breath

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Read more! Herefordshire, North Yorkshire, Scotland and every other county who thinks it has won the pools with BDUK, this includes you too. Shall I give you the good news first? Or are you up for the bad?

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



OK, neighbours, take this in.

Good news first.

The shouting about outside-in has, finally, hit a target. (That's it, the good news). Only taken, what? A decade? Now, let's see if there is some sort of consistency between documents, thinking, procurement..... CCC, BDUK, CALC et al are being particularly tight-arsed with sharing info at present, but hopefully when Jim, Liz and all the others return, who seem to be missing in action right now (holidays and visits on Tuesday by ministers etc), this blog might have some answers for you. I'd far prefer to be doing a different type of digging but needs must....

State Aid compliance has not yet been met. Heard this from 3 different sources last night. So, if you are one of the pilots, leave your hands tied to the chair for a while longer. There is no ERDF dosh coming your way, yet. Personally, I'd JFDI and forget the promises of free cash - it's looking increasingly vacuous.

Still no definition of SFBB in any county, and particularly not ours. Ask your MP about symmetry if all you are going to get is 2Mbps, which seems to be the ambition for this fair nation now - roll back to 2002 or worse, 1984. Question of the day is though: since when has SFBB meant choice of provider before speed of connection?

I'm breaking this into multiple posts as even I am struggling to take this all in now we're past the good news.
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Low Hanging Fruit...it's not urban

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One of the arguments/myths which has long done the rounds in telco circles is that the low hanging eg profitable fruit is to be found in urban areas. For years, particularly as a rural dweller, I have argued against this. And largely been unheard (Nowt new there!) But....no more...

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



Well, I am hesitant to say, "No more," but at the Telecom Paper Breedband 2011 event in Den Haag, the urban = low hanging fruit debate was comprehensively trashed in a coffee break by a group of senior telco execs who weren't (I suspect) expecting to arrive at the conclusion they did.

Why is URBAN no longer the place to be?

1) Competition in towns and cities - everyone assumed that urban was the place to be. Now you are all there, it isn't. Because a) customer acquisition and retention is costing you so much b) infrastructure is more expensive - once bitten, twice shy councils etc c) ARPU is insufficient in such a competitive environment to risk an investment. So, you end up as a reseller with little to differentiate you from all the others.

2) Rural isolation leads to desperation and frustration. And high uptake. So...urban with minimal uptake or rural with max uptake?

3) Necessity is the mother of invention. Rule breaking and JFDI means simple models can be adopted in rural areas and problems are different but often cheaper to resolve. They may be out of your comfort zone, but not out of the rural populace's experience to JFDI.

4) First to market. If you are the sole provider in an area with a realistic and (even urban) competitive pricing scenario for a great product, you own the market. All of it. Even with an open access solution - which you can do purely to convince yourself you are a risk taker!

5) Community is strong. Co-operation, collaboration, community and commerce work well together when allowed. Slice of pie for everyone.

6) The actual proven capex and opex figures vs revenue in rural areas have rapidly approached those in urban areas over the last few years. For reasons given above, it is now (arguably - goto comments) weighted towards rural.

7) Loyalty - Communities stick by their own and will support projects etc that are obviously doing good by the local economy and citizens. This is frequently abused by corporate social responsibility depts, even within so-called community-biased companies but rural communities are becoming wiser to these ploys in the tech sector now.

Value of Social Capital in a Rural Network

Social capital will not repay a bank loan directly. The representative from Rabobank and I discussed this in Den Haag at length - a single session with bankers and communities could solve this issue once and for all so the balance sheet works over a longer payback period (10-15 years) than would be required for a strictly commercial loan (3+ years) but it would still work.

However, where the community is benefiting and seeing the wealth generation internally, funds can be directed from blue pound etc to repayment of loans. What can go wrong is when a community-facing company leaves only a "skim" in the community coffers as a feel good factor after enjoying the revenue from all of the above without sufficient to repay the internal investment from within the community.

The big problem is greed. Too many companies seem to believe that FTTH or inferior versions thereof are a licence to print money, particularly in rural areas. Even those that are seemingly community-facing have ended up showing their true colours recently. For what? To gain a few percentage points and short term gains, whilst losing the chance (as many baby bells and rural telcos have proven is possible) to still be in business 30, 40 or more years down the line.

Long term , drip drip drip, solid revenue based on organic growth and an understanding of your customer base, with minimal competition and a technology that is established, proven and future-proofed.....well, we ended up with folks ready to invest in rural!


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CPE for FTTH

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A month or two ago, we at B4RN acquired some CPE kit to show at the Parish Parties so people could understand what might be in their homes or business premises once they chose to connect to the B4RN gigabit FTTH network. Typically, no-one showed an interest until it was returned to the kind loaner, LucidOS, after the #fibrewalk. But now....


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



As B4RN becomes more of a reality and people understand what is involved, questions about CPE are being asked. CPE (Customer Premises Equipment) is of course of interest to the consumer, but getting your CPE right on a project can make all the difference in cutting install costs too.

Since we first met earlier this year, it has been hard not to fall slightly in love with the Miniflex pre-terminated fibre that a consumer can literally plug in once it has come through the window frame.

Not only ease of use for consumers and installers, but the rugged ducting has also so far survived the cow test - lob it in the byre and see what damage your average cud-chomping moo can do in an enclosed environment. If it can survive that, it can survive deployment "in the field", literally.

Miniflex kit bears looking at and tell Graham or Paul that you heard about it from me when you buy. (Every 100m or so they care to donate to the cause as a thank you will more than likely connect another home in rural England so you can feel good about that contribution to the solving of the #digitalbritain problem!).

I'm getting far more interested in CPE, which is one of those areas where very little change has seemingly occurred in the 7 years I have been attending FTTH Council events. Yep, smaller. Yep, cheaper. Yep, more ports etc. But the real change now seems to have come from feedback by installers, which is ensuring that the length of time spent on a single install reduces dramatically.

And that affects bottom line and the fee you need to charge an end user to be connected.

So, on that note, I am adding a short video from meeting Genexis in Holland this last week. And some photos. The Genexis kit is of huge interest not only to projects where DIY is an integral element to the install, but also where having CPE kit that cannot be accidentally damaged and so add to the ongoing opex through maintenance, tech support etc is important. Plus, your installers want something that is simple to get to for upgrades etc, and where a tricky install in a tight corner is not an issue.

Customers are always right so if they want that CPE hidden under the stairs or beneath the desk, out of sight, then being able to oblige them without it causing a problem now or in the future has to be important. And having a cute bit of kit that people are happy with also counts.

And no, I am not reducing the resolution of the images. If you can't view them, lobby your MP, County and Parish Councils for a far better broadband solution than the telcos are currently willing to offer you. There's £530M just for starters in the pot......... make sure it is spent wisely connecting YOU!

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High level thinking in the Lowlands

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Many thanks to TelecomPaper (and particularly Tim Poulus) for inviting me to address around 150 senior telecoms executives at the Breedband 2011 event in Den Haag last week. Telecom Paper had assembled a high calibre of speakers and delegates and I was very definitely on a high by the end of the day with narry a coffee shop in sight!

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



I went to Holland prepared to return feeling dispirited at the comparable state of British broadband to the Dutch fibre endeavours, which of course many of us are jealous of, and to discover just where it is we are going wrong. Because we blatantly are. Many of those with the answers I was seeking were at the event and sought me out after my presentation, giving plenty of opportunity to quiz them about FTTH in Holland, Finland, Eastern Europe and Russia. (Separate post on all that!)

However, it appears that across Europe there still remains a tricky problem to solve - rural broadband - and B4RN may be one of the solutions which can actually overcome telecom apathy, investor reluctance, government failures, and this strangely mistaken but firm belief that rural broadband cannot pay back, whether public, private or community monies are invested (or a combination thereof).

I spoke after the inimitable Costas Troulos (who spoke in depth about the NBN in Australia) and Gary Mensch of City Fibre Holdings, who developed the plans that CFH have for urban areas in Britain, including Bournemouth, York and 53 other UK cities. It was bordering on completely terrifying speaking after these two, but I am passionate about B4RN, and the business case and technical solution are rock solid now after all this time in Barry Forde's capable hands. Many noted that it was the first time they had been able to access the figures for rural gigabit FTTH so kudos to B4RN for making these publicly available to everyone on B4RN.org.uk.

One of the major points to note in Costas' speech for me was the uniform backhaul rates being aimed for in Oz. This is, of course, one of the key stumbling blocks in the UK - charging for backhaul by distance - and I think we would do well to look closely at the aims in Australia (where distances are far larger than here by several factors). Additionally, there were the possible problems with getting NBN onto a sound economic footing after the initial "euphoria" (read: spend), as well as how to persuade non new build property developers to get on board - also lessons we would do well to consider if we are serious about stretching the little money we have as far as possible. Costas' research into NBN Australia is well worth taking into account and I recommend delving more deeply.

From Gary's talk came an interesting discussion post-event about urban-rural tie ups and partnerships which highlighted for me how much BDUK need to get out of the way. The possibilities for syndicates and partnerships in the UK are now enormous, but not if no-one dares invest or deploy in case some publicly funded project comes over the hill shortly after. (This subject has been done to death and I am not doing it again here).

Whilst other speakers at Breedband 2011 covered the cloud, FTTH business cases, govt funding, structural separation (and a few other topics which were in Dutch so I only got the briefest overview of these from a selection of translators picked at random from around the hall - Jos from Routit in particular, thank you very much!), there was only myself and a speaker from the co-operative Rabobank who went into rural broadband - funding, technology, engagement etc - in any depth. The wide range of topics made for a fascinating day.

I was also lucky enough to meet another Fibre To The Farmer, and conversations about rural FTTH were never-ending throughout the day from suppliers, mobile, fixed, consultants and so on. My head was spinning by the end and attempts from a lovely old boy outside who thought I needed educating in Dutch smoking culture were always going to fall on deaf ears thanks to Telecom Paper.

Judging by the number of in-depth questions which filled the lunch break and post event borrel, plus the surprising number of business cards thrust into my hands, it would appear that those of us involved in B4RN have been correct in our assumption that people who live and work a long way from Lancashire are extremely interested in supporting this project. (For those who have not seen the decision made on 07/10/11, the share offer will be launched next month and all are welcome to invest, from £100 to £20,000, although we also plan to launch a micro-support scheme for those wanting to show support without purchasing shares - a sponsor would be welcomed for this scheme if anyone is interested, cost £500, please get in touch).

I did of course throw into my speech that shareholders would be welcomed from the delegates present, and when this resulted in hands being raised to receive the share offer documents when produced, and firm offers to purchase shares when speaking to delegates after my speech, it was heart warming. However, people also came forward with offers of CPE, backbone equipment, sharing of information/knowledge, and even the odd bit of shovel wielding. From all the conversations, it would seem there will now be a few Europeans with a vested interest in a small area of rural England that they had barely heard of before last week!

I rabbit on and on about how broadband affects all aspects of our lives and this support will have an additional add-on effect for Lancashire that all councils would do well to take into account. Especially if they are only planning solutions around USC or SFBB rather than true next generation access of 1Gbps and above. TOURISM. And in particular, technical tourism. Our B&Bs plus local shops, bars and restaurants are likely to all benefit now from visitors from abroad because people want to see first hand how B4RN is implemented, the effects and the changes to local economies and services of true next generation access in a rural setting, as well as to use B4RN as an exemplar to take home and replicate. All being well obviously, but even in the worst case scenario, there will be valuable lessons learned.

Tourism contributes a phenomenal sum as a sector, and whilst we are pretty dreadful at hospitality compared to many other countries, we could begin to focus on showcasing our technical and innovative skills to guests from afar. That is, if we are actually going to play catch up/leap frog and not completely screw everything up by introducing ultra high levels of rushed bureaucracy into the equation through BDUK etc, and permitting uninformed communities to make snap decisions without understanding the big picture consequences. I was deeply embarrassed to explain the BDUK process in the networking sessions. From afar, you suddenly realise how little it is likely to achieve because it is as far from a Big Society, joined-up thinking, logical approach as it seems you could get when you stand on the other side of the North Sea and try to explain it.

Luckily, the ins and outs of our political shenanigans were of less interest than B4RN, and whilst I wish I spoke better Dutch, there were few discussions that could not be translated by one of the many English speakers around me. The RaboBank presentation in particular showed that a co-operative bank can provide invaluable assistance in getting community projects onto a sound economic footing, whilst also recouping their loans, although we did have a rather lengthy discussion over coffee about the bank's need to understand where social capital fits into the equation when setting terms for repayment of cash!

The presentation by Jyrki of Finland resulted in a 2+2 moment that I will try to blog about in the near future, although I am not completely sure I can do it full credit as it really was one of those "You had to be there" kerching moments.

The Genexis CPE kit (see video and photos in next blog post) will be of interest to anyone looking at FTTH, and end to end solutions plus out of the box thinking were available throughout the event. Many became obvious only when people networked and my lack of Dutch meant I missed conversations around me that would, I'm sure, have been fascinating.

That highlighted for me the need for people like Neelie to pick up on promises made by her predecessors to hold and attend an event that brings together regulators, consumers, communities, telcos, suppliers etc to make magical things happen by involving people from across the EU. It is simply no good now to have events in EU which are always poorly attended by those who most need to be heard or to listen. Which far too frequently, sadly, includes communities and consumers. And Brits. (We really do need to get out more).

Telecom Paper and others are now considering a proposal to hold such an event which drags a few Brits (kicking and screaming) across to mainland Europe to hear how things are being done in other countries and rural areas, and to share some of the best practice and innovative thinking which is coming out of the UK despite the best efforts of the telcos and government to undermine them. (Sorry, but it has to be said. And said again).

An EU wide understanding of how to deliver the very best in rural broadband (none of this half-assed USC malarkey) should, if the events I have attended in the EU recently give any indication, be a reasonably simple matter to resolve if the subject is given sufficient space on the agenda and made the priority it must become.

And the Big Society is allowed to play a part.

By this I mean that those who believe their salaries and exalted position give them a status, that at times is undeserved, acquire ears. As well as a level of humility that permits those at grassroots the chance to be heard and understood so that joint ventures become the order of the day.

The appetite to make rural broadband a reality is there, the contacts exist between nations, suppliers, communities, consumers, fixed and mobile etc, and the business case and economic and social value is slowly but surely becoming too apparent to miss. FiWi Pie could easily become dish of the day on the menu if a few people listen to those waiting on.












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Well, well, well, broadband gets awards!

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There are umpteen awards in this country - for everything from sausage rolls onwards. But it is rare (unless we hold the CanDo Awards again!) that broadband innovation gets a look in.

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



I've just received an email which has led me to discover that two of our number (for we count you as part of the family which will bring the solutions, particularly to solving rural broadband) have been shortlisted down to the Final 50 for the Red Bull Future 50 Awards.

So, I'd like to congratulate Paul Evans of Sharedband and James Collier of Neul for getting noticed in what appears to be a diverse and competitive award scenario.

Neul have also been included in the top ten judge's picks, and I love the comment: "Big? This could be galactic!", and we shall all be looking out for Weightless shortly.

Good luck to both companies, now and in the future, and readers: don't forget to vote!
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The Unbalanced Balance Sheet

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Read more! FTTH is TOO expensive....so say the telcos. Communities can debate this as much as we wish, but until here in the UK we prove the telcos wrong...we are wasting our time postulating about the FTTH lies/unrealistic thinking coming from industry. However....
This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com



The hard evidence concerning what happens across the entire fiscal picture once FTTH/P is deployed is no longer a finger in the air exercise.

Anyone who thinks FTTH is about what the telcos get back as ROI, (return from the investment) has missed the reality of what true broadband connectivity means.

Does your Council think that spending the BDUK money is about cutting costs for IT infrastructure? Is your Council looking at cutting a known cost for IT/backhaul through the BDUK process? Has your Council drawn up a balance sheet showing the cost/benefit of installing next generation broadband for EVERY SINGLE DEPARTMENT and CONSTITUENT?

Has any single body been put in charge of looking at the cost savings across the entire County (Council, SME, citizens, education and health, for starters) to judge the value of investment?

Is there a balance sheet that shows where savings over 5-10 years ACROSS THE BOARD are likely to occur by installing a forward and joined up thinking solution for next generation access?

Has that been compared to FTTC or BET or satellite?

NO? Oh, you surprise me.

Name me one company involved in NGA - incumbent, new entrant, public/private partnership, community org - who has actually thought this through to show why FTTH/P is the way forward and why it suits every single player....

THAT is FiWiPie. Joined up thinking, win/win for everyone, nothing at all to do with technology. As the person who in 2004 came up with FiWiPie with Adam Burns, long before 99% of the current people who claim to have anything to do with FiWi, FTTH, Community solutions etc had any involvement, I ask you all to do the maths, accounts, economics, community engagement etc.

New entrants can use the terms such as FiWi as much as they wish, but the reality is if you don't even grasp the basics of where this thinking came from, you are always going to be pretending to be au fait with the core thinking. And making up the solutions.

Does YOUR solution actually solve any problems by addressing the issues? Do you comprehend the issues? Do you have a full handle on the balance sheets for the council whose problems you are trying to solve? Do you have hard core evidence about the business problems faced in the area you are intending to cover? Do you have figures for the telecom costs paid for by every single business in that community? Have you spoken to over 50% of the citizens in the community you are attempting to cover to understand the issues faced?

Or are you just making it up as you go along and pretending YOU KNOW BEST?

Present evidence to my council, or any other. Stop inventing facts and figures. Stop pretending you have a solution, especially where unproven. Challenge the Councils with hard facts from dedicated research. Build demos by investing your own money not taxing rural people to fund unproven and dubious technologies.

STOP treating rural people as idiots. Not one of you has yet put in place a decent rural demo. Until you do, do not expect any of us to believe your claims. We don't believe the Councils etc, either, but at least we know they have no idea what they are trying to do.








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Purple pipe dreams or the road to nowhere...........?

Anyone travelling North on the M6 in Lancashire & Cumbria over the last few years could have noticed something being laid at the side of the hard shoulder - flexible plastic purple pipe which pops out of the ground occasionally where it needs to cross road bridges.

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

In Scotland, purple pipe can only be used for the street lighting network as ducting for the electricity cables - so what is it used for in England and the rest of the UK?

Well, purple pipe outside of Scotland is apparently only used by telecom companies as ducting!

That got me thinking - if it can be laid at the side of a motorway without any problem, why can't it be laid at the side of all roads? In Cumbria there are roughly 1100kms of primary and secondary roads, plus at least the same in what are category "C" roads - and these roads pass to and through every settlement in the county.

Cumbria County Council received £17.1m for broadband from BDUK, and are throwing in another £6.8m themselves - not including any matched funding from the EU or the "chosen one".

If the County Council used this money to lay wonderful purple pipe along every road they are responsible for, there would be no excuse for any telecom providers to claim that they were unable to reach the last "10%" - the means of getting to them would already be in place!

Building this network wouldn't make the county council a teleco and have screams of “State Aid" thrown at them every 5 minutes – they would be building an open access transport only provision which could be used by multiple telecos (and rented out to them at an amount far less than BT charge).

The roads and verges are owned and maintained by the County Council - and we pay for upgrading and maintenance of them through vehicle licensing and Council tax - there wouldn't be any negotiations needed on right of way and access on their own land to build it - and by banishing forever the placing of copper into the duct, more fibre could be pulled through.

BT wouldn't like it, as it would break up their monopoly on running copper and fibre through what was a publically financed network of ducts, cabinets and poles built back in the 50's, 60’s & 70's by the then GPO - but as they charge an absolute fortune to anyone else to access that infrastructure, maybe the time has come for some real joined up thinking to make them realise they can't get away with it any longer!

This isn’t radical thinking – it works in many other countries where it seems to be the norm, so why not here? It may well be a purple pipe dream, but it sure beats the road to nowhere we’ve already got.........

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Look to the stars....

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Not too long ago, I retweeted some info about the comparison of time it takes to send a data transmission off-planet or back to earth vs what us non-NASA humans have to put up with from telcos on planet earth. Then, coincidentally, there was a film on this evening that showed the moon landing during the opening credits and I remembered being dragged next door - we didn't have a TV till I was in my teens - and then the garden, to comprehend a) the TV and b) who was walking where that night. I was, as I recall, more impressed by the red and gold furry flock wallpaper than the box in the corner or the moon.....


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

It seems NASA have reached the limits of their data technology as it now takes 90 mins to send an HD photo from Mars to Earth. Obviously, my heart bleeds for them as it took me all weekend to send a few non HD photos to Flickr after Fibrewalk and as for being able to upload a video - Pah!

So, they are upping the ante.

However, maybe this is a lesson we can share with those who need to comprehend why higher capacity Internet is required. When my grandparents were born and started work at 14, there were few cars around, no tractors, and definitely no computers. For many, getting to market was an arduous task that did not involve Chelsea Tractors or the luxury of private travel. Working from home meant taking in menial sewing tasks and ironing. (Men could not work from home, as I recall from both my grandmothers, and had to be seen to be out there: earning, or fighting.)

NASA is going for 10Gbps between earth and a distant planet because that is what is required to do its job. Whilst you or I may not feel entitled to such speeds, the reality is that 10Gbps is feasible today on earth. To anyone. It's just that the telcos don't want to offer it or invest in it.

Far be it for me to once again suggest that our telcos are preventing each of us of achieving our dreams of becoming astronauts (or interior designers with aspirations for expensive wall paper, or...or....or.....), but whatever NASA (think bigger: science, R&D, research, academia etc) does, inevitably works its way back into our lives.

I'm sure Velcro was treated with the same "You'll never need it, no-one will ever use it" etc approach that gigabit broadband for the masses is now.......................Meanwhile, I don't feel that reaching for the stars for community and rural broadband is any less attainable than a furry, 3D wallpaper.

P.S. My next door neighbour was, and remains, one of the best lace designers in Europe. Nottingham has almost completely lost the distinction it previously held for the manufacture of lace, and the trade has been altered hugely from my childhood where colouring in her patterns was the highlight of every single day. Altair and every other colouring book had nothing on being part of Nottingham's lace industry 'waste' that I, as the only girl in the street, had full and unfettered access to with my crayons.

So, next time you buy lingerie or a lace tablecloth, look at the lace and see it as I do! An absolutely integral part of my childhood. What made you who you are? What are your childhood dreams? How will *you* reach the stars?




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FibreWalk Time Travellers

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Read more! Fibre Walk has received some fantastic press coverage courtesy of the Herald. Thank you again to ITS for sponsorship. Read the copy below....

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


From Section 2 of the Cumberland and Westmorland Herald 24th September:

Above: Freddy Markham, armed with laptop, and other enthusiasts prepare to board the 1946 Leyland bus.

IT was a case of old meets new on Friday as a group of internet enthusiasts gathered in Kirkby Stephen's Market Square in order to be transported to Warcop via a classic coach for the UK's first public "Fibre Walk".

The group, led by broadband campaigner and Warcop parish councillor Lindsey Annison, walked a route from Warcop School towards the proposed site of the UK's first cyberbarn. Along the route, a group of 23 people discussed the challenges presented by DIY fibre cable laying across the landscape.

Present on the walk were representatives of a number of remote villages in different parts of the country who have grown tired of waiting for their lack of Internet access to be solved by the big telecoms companies and government, and have decided that their only solution is to take up spades and ploughs to dig the trenches that will house the fibre cables that bring future-proofed internet to their communities and businesses.

Also present were parish and county councillors, broadband consultants and fibre optic experts from across the north of England.

Special guest Donny Smith, of Minnesota-based Jaguar Communications, which has rolled out an extensive fibre broadband network in an extremely remote part of the United States, shared his expertise.

"Donny's experience in all aspects of fibre optic broadband, from the pitfalls to solutions, was incredibly valuable," said Lindsey, who was joined by John Heron, chairman of Warcop Parish Council, and Richard and Liz Wynne, of Warcop village hall new build committee.

The event was sponsored by ITS Technology, which is experienced in fibre and advanced network technologies. John Bookless, its chief executive,, said, "This event has done fibre to the home in rural communities proud, and ITS is delighted to have had the opportunity to share our expertise and be involved in such a fantastic initiative to increase awareness of the challenges we all face with hyperfast broadband."



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Lies and more lies? OTU report p 95-6

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Now here's a fact that hasn't been reported widely yet, Britain came 10th for broadband in a fantastically interesting global report about ICT and broadband.....And then you spot the utter lie in the middle of the report and realise Britain's position is complete tosh propagated by god knows who, nor for what purpose, as it simply shows us as liars.

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



The ITU "Measuring the Information Society" report came out a week ago, and you'd think the Brits would be celebrating, but it seems to have fallen under the radar a little.

Hardly surprising when on p.95-6 comes an outright lie about broadband in Britain which can only have skewed all the results for the UK. Whoever is responsible for feeding such untruths to OECD (from whom the data appears to have been supplied to ITU) deserves never ending sleepless nights and karmic payback on a level approaching bankers' bonuses.

"While in 2010, Germany and UK had similar fixed-broadband penetration rates, 59 per cent of the United Kingdom's were above 10Mbit/s, compared with only 30% per cent in Germany. Indeed, in the United Kingdom, 99% of all subscriptions are above 2Mbps"

Really - says who??????? What good does it do this nation to hide the truth of our broadband situation?

So, of the 79.6% of households connected to the Internet in UK (Annex 4), only 20% are sub-10Mbps? Jeremy, it seems you may need to rethink where that £530M has gone, mate.

I hope ITU (and/or) OECD may be willing to share the information about just who provided the figures for UK. If it proves to be Ofcom, our regulator's integrity and interests will once more come into question. If A N Other Body, such as an incumbent, then there have to be questions asked about why such "falsehoods" are permitted on behalf of an entire country to a respected global reporting body such as ITU.

One to look into more deeply. There are plenty of journalists out there who can get to the bottom of stories such as the phone hacking scandal so this should be a doddle.....

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