Why the NBN is like the iPhone
- 11 December, 2009 15:54
- Comments 8
The Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator Stephen Conroy, has likened the National Broadband Network (NBN) to the Apple iPhone, saying it’s impossible to know all the applications that will use the high-speed connectivity engine before it is built.
Speaking during day two of the Realising Our Broadband Future forum, Conroy told delegates the NBN would enable applications that had not yet been imagined.
“The iPhone is an enabling platform in the mobile market in the same way as the NBN will be an enabling platform for Australia in the years and decades ahead,” he said. Conroy said that the 85,000 downloads available from the App Store were applications that nobody would have imagined when the iPhone was first developed and innovation would no doubt continue. “Should Apple have waited for all these applications to be developed before it built the platform?” he asked the audience. “Or could it be the case that without the enabling platform, none of these applications would ever have been developed at all?”
Conroy outlined some discussions from day one of the forum, saying they provided a “refreshing insight” into Australia’s digital economy. He also argued that the NBN would have flow-on benefits in other areas such as health, education, water management energy efficiency and regional infrastructure. “The National Broadband Network will be Australia’s first national wholesale-only, open access, high-speed broadband platform,” he said. “The network will operate on an arms-length basis from Government and we remain confident it will operate on a commercial basis.”
The NBN could be considered utility infrastructure, he said, earning a utility-style rate of return, rather than those generally earned by and expected from a vertically-integrated operator. He was clearly talking about Telstra. “While we remain confident of the commercial operating basis for the NBN, the benefits of the investment will be significantly broader,” he said. “It will support a new competitive communications market that will unleash innovation and development.” A competitive wholesale broadband network would resolve the “economic blockage”.
“In fact, a number of retail service providers – iiNet, Internode, Primus and Macquarie Telecom – have already indicated that they aim to take advantage of these networks to enter underserved markets.”
Nominations for the 2012 ARN IT Industry Awards open on Tuesday, June 12.
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Comments
toddles
Honestly
That is possibly the worst analogy ever. Every app that exists for the iphone already existed on other platforms. The creation of the iphone did not open new doors for developers that didn't already exist on other platforms, it just provide a marketing strategy for them.
This once again shows how inept Conroy is and how embarrassing it is that he is in charge of anything, let alone the NBN.
Anonymous
no... i agree he is inept, however on this topic he is right, the NBN is a great great thing for Australia, it's backwards thinking people like yourself that are still stuck in the 1950's and are against it.
this is the same thing as when australia first built it's copper cable network, and you can imagine how useful that has been in australia's development.
conroy is wrong on filtering but at least he's on the right track with the NBN.
(and fwiw, there are many many innovative iphone apps that weren't developed beforehand, so you are wrong)
bruce tyler
Agreed
The government run infastructure idea is fantastic. How could you be against such a thing?
The filtering idea just has to go, but the NBN itself...essential.
Roddy
Huhhh? Toddles, not a developer I see...
Apps on existing platforms do not magically appear on iPhones toddles. Companies and developers that began porting apps to iPhone standards early have done very well, especially those who had the smarts to take bigger apps from other platforms and migrate the core functionality to the iPhone.
Then we had the developers that looked at popular existing apps that would benefit from mobility, and began coding new apps that provided the functionality on the very mobile iphone.
Then you have the developers that built agents and modeluesto connect the smaller app code on the iPhone to network based datrabases and larger applications, leveraging off the ***technical infrastructure** of the Cloud based computing systems and applications.
The analogy is good if you understand the world of development and business opportunities, it is a puzzle to those that do not have that comprehension...
Roddy
Article on cream cakes coming up, complain about filtering...
rofl...
The filter complainers just cannot help themselves. Every ever so perhaps related subject just has to have several posts from filter complainers spamming up the page.
They have no real interest in the subject, they just want to spam spam spam away...
Spammers.
Like mosquitos at times. There you are tying to enjoy a BBQ and they come buzzing around looking for just somewhere to stick in a cause some annoyance....
lol
Spammers.
Well guys, the Womans Weekly and New Idea awaits you! Zip over there, if you are not already doing that, and post your comlaints amongst the blogs and forums fornew cake recipes and dissertations on Britney Spears...
lol
Example template:
"I think <insert article subject> is fine, but Conroy's filter has to go."
Spammers...
Mosquitos...
Anonymous
Speaking of spam...
Roddy,
I think it's quite ironic that you're complaining about people spamming these forums when it is you that seems to share your opinion about EVERYTHING.
The only thing more annoying than a smartarse is an overly-prolific one.
Roddy
Buz buzz buzz...
If you have a comment about the subject at hand, that is not spamming....
If you are using one subject to complain about another subject, and this happens continually,that is spamming anonymous.
Sharing opinions on the subject of the articles is not spamming, even if that is on everything....
Popping up all over the place, irrespective of the subject, to moan about and call for the end of the filter is spamming anonymous.
It is a typical sign of people who are not convinced of the strength of their arguments or their effectiveness, and therefore go for slopping it all over the place.
That is spamming. That is what is happening. Like it or not, and you are defending this?
Did I hear another mosquito buzzing around...?
buzz buzz buzz.....
Walter Adamson @g2m
Conroy's right about the platform, although simplistic
I think the analogy with not the iPhone but the iPhone ecosystem is apt, as made by Senator Conroy. It is an enabler and it created new opportunities. But @toddles is also right, in part, that it allowed a lot of things that were already out there to be delivered. But it is also the platform for a whole lot of things that were not out there, and even if they were out there as "innovations" they made no money i.e. created no wealth. The iPhone platform has allowed wealth to be created by developers and innovators and to not have the blood sucked out of them by the telcos.
Why I say it is simplistic is that NBN is just cables plus a bit of supporting transport software. It's nowhere near as sophisticated or complicated as the iPhone ecosystem. It's that next level which is where the test of value to Australia will come.
I'm a big fan of the NBN at least giving Australia a chance to claw its way up from the digital scrapheap into which Howard placed us.
But I'm no fan of the unbelievable waste of funds and pure political pork-barreling in spending hundreds of millions of dollars to wire up 100% of the country. The last 80% is a complete waste of money - which is where all the money has gone so far. So while our water, rivers, roads, schools, police stations, health, venture capital, higher education falls to pieces the government invests billions in nonsensical cabling/connecting of the 20% of the country which will never return value. Would you like to be given $5 million to "educate" a few country folk about broadband, or are you too busy slaving at your job to make a living? Oddly enough, no-one complains about this at all??!!
Walter Adamson
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