Telecoms and Broadband in Ireland - What Should Be Done ? / National Broadband Scheme

tags: Eamon Ryan


I just came across this on Joe O'Toole's website. We too almost had to relocate our office last year, until at the 11th hour Digiweb gave us broadband access.

http://Motion on Broadband

12/12/07 - Where does one start with this? I will start by saying that the Government amendment is quite appalling. The fact that, with a straight face, the Government side is asking the Seanad to commend the Government on its work in this area and for its determination to deliver broadband to those areas of Ireland where it is currently uneconomic is appalling. I do not know how any serious punter on that side of the House could have allowed this amendment to go through.

This issue is not being taken seriously. We talk about competitiveness and productivity. Not having access to broadband is like asking workers to work with one hand manacled to the other.

I live maybe 16 or 17 miles from here, which is the centre of power. I cannot get broadband at home. broadband. … As the Minister of State is aware, I am a person who has used technology every day for about 16 or 17 years. I use it all the time. The Minister of State will be aware that I do a podcast in his local area every week. I have a house in a small town in rural France. It is easier for me to send a podcast to Counties Clare and Wexford or elsewhere from a holiday home in a rural area of France than it is from my main residence in County Dublin. There is something daft about that.
Most of the people here represent or live in rural parts of the country. This is killing regional Ireland. It is hitting education in regional Ireland. Every year for the past four years, the Government has talked about rolling out broadband to every primary and post-primary school in the country. Most people think it has been done. It is same problem, namely, connectivity. Schools are not connected so our children are being held back.

Do people in Government recognise that our productivity in the future will be in intellectual add-on? We will not be making bits and pieces in factories anymore. They can do that more cheaply in any part of the world. It is all about intellectual add-on and the knowledge economy. We are at the bottom of the league when it comes to the knowledge that is coming down those pipes on what we used to call the information superhighway but which we now call the World Wide Web or Internet. We used to be proud of our position on these matters but this is no longer the case.

When the Minister of State wore his previous hat, he had to deal with issues like the retraining of workforces and finding new employment for the people in Shannon or elsewhere. A major part of that involves people doing courses via broadband in order that they can retrain, build on their knowledge and get better qualifications. The involvement of outsourcing must be also considered. I visited a Gaeltacht area in Mayo where people wanted to set up an interpretation facility for Gaeilge in Brussels. They had to move the facility in order to get reception.

The day I heard about metropolitan area networks I knew it was the most stupid decision ever made. What were we doing? We do not want metropolitan area networks. Every home in the country needs broadband. The Government should lease satellite space and soak the country in broadband. It should be available to everyone for a reasonable price. That could be effected with one decision. The idea of shooting down lines, fibre optics, cutting up roads and setting up masts is not necessary anymore because technology has moved on. We should recognise this.

There will be a row about unbundling and the quality of lines. Eircom will not bring the quality of its lines up to DSL level because someone else will lease the line to sell the service at a cheaper rate. There is no incentive for Eircom to do this. The only way to improve the situation is by satellite provision immediately to every part of the country. The Government should lease the space, give us an option and a future and bring us into the new century.

(www.joeotoole.net/enterprise-page16135.html# brdb2)

Of the many deficiencies of governance in the last 10 years, failure to insure world class broadband connectivity is perhaps the most infuriating. It is also a clear example of the failure of the open market as a mechanism for development.

At last a technology that could overcome Ireland's locational disadvantage. Surely we were going to grab it and run.
But no, first we privatised the national network without any safeguards to protect public and national interest. Then, long after it became appararent that the private sector was not going to leap in and give national coverage and capacity to meet our needs, government veered between doing nothing and fiddling with little schemes that were nevertheless unsettling enough in some areas to delay the private sector.

In 2007 a group of Irish CEOs of multinationals wrote to the Irish Times warning that their companies would have to leave Ireland if this was not sorted out very quickly.

The services we have now remain incomplete and patchy and with insufficient capacity.

The Global Information Technology Report 2007-2008 places Ireland 23rd in the world. This would suggest that things have improved - have they improved enough?

What should be done?

link

External embarrassment is the only thing likely to work. Write to the American Irish Chamber of Commerce and such like complaining like mad - and all foreign investors in Ireland current and potential.

It is a scandal. Redolent of the atrocious phone system we had back in the late sixties and early seventies - the laughing stock of Europe. There's another idea - kick up a fantastic stink in Europe - small business groups and others should galvanise themselves.

I mean, Jesus, its like refusing to tarmac the roads between towns and cities.

I dont fully understand the politics of it but isnt it the case that Eircom are holding the situation up by refusing to coperate with the government's reforms of the communications sector?

BT in Ireland are getting on very well with implementing broadband, it's very successful. Look here, please.

That's British Telecom ?

cactus flower wrote:

That's British Telecom ?

Yes it is.

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:

BT in Ireland are getting on very well with implementing broadband, it's very successful. Look here, please.

I have my broadband at home with BT Ireland and although their pricing is reasonable, their customer service is atrocious.
I've had a lot of trouble with them, mostly with mistakes on their part and it hasn't been easy to get them to sort it out.

AfricanDave wrote:

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:

BT in Ireland are getting on very well with implementing broadband, it's very successful. Look here, please.

I have my broadband at home with BT Ireland and although their pricing is reasonable, their customer service is atrocious.
I've had a lot of trouble with them, mostly with mistakes on their part and it hasn't been easy to get them to sort it out.

Well, I use BT Broadband as well and I've had no problems with it since I got it over 3 years ago.

I have eircom here in Castle Monster and it's been fine.

I should probably clarify - the service offered by BT is fine, I've had no problems with my actual broadband or internet connection.
The problems I had were when I went to get a package they were offering.
I signed up for one package, they sent out all the relevant paperwork and I completed it etc.
Then I found out 2 months later that they had signed me up to the wrong package while charging me (the higher rate) for the package I originally wanted.
In the meantime, I was still paying line rental to Eircom even though the package I wanted would have taken over the line rental.
So I was paying BT for things they weren't providing while at the same time paying Eircom for what BT were supposed to be providing.
It was without a doubt the fault of BT but they kept telling me to get on to Eircom.

AfricanDave wrote:

I should probably clarify - the service offered by BT is fine, I've had no problems with my actual broadband or internet connection.
The problems I had were when I went to get a package they were offering.
I signed up for one package, they sent out all the relevant paperwork and I completed it etc.
Then I found out 2 months later that they had signed me up to the wrong package while charging me (the higher rate) for the package I originally wanted.
In the meantime, I was still paying line rental to Eircom even though the package I wanted would have taken over the line rental.
So I was paying BT for things they weren't providing while at the same time paying Eircom for what BT were supposed to be providing.
It was without a doubt the fault of BT but they kept telling me to get on to Eircom.

I see, that sounds quite a tricky position.

It was, and I discovered that ComReg is (in my opinion) just a toothless old dog that really serves no purpose

AfricanDave wrote:

It was, and I discovered that ComReg is (in my opinion) just a toothless old dog that really serves no purpose

Did you ditch both of them and get Irish Broadband?

No, I stayed with BT because I had signed up to a year's contract. Regardless of the fact that they completely screwed me around they made me honour the contract that they didn't live up to.

Literally?

AfricanDave wrote:

No, I stayed with BT because I had signed up to a year's contract. Regardless of the fact that they completely screwed me around they made me honour the contract that they didn't live up to.

So will you be parting company with them as soon as your contract is up?

I would like to part company with them on principle, but they have a good deal for 3mb broadband including line rental for around 50 per month.
Eircom want around 45 for just the broadband, so you end up paying around 70 when the line rental is included.
I suppose I'm just a whore who's willing to pimp out my principles to the highest bidder.

AfricanDave wrote:

I suppose I'm just a whore who's willing to pimp out my principles to the highest bidder.

Well, if you're looking for a clean break, Digiweb, Imagine, Ice or Irish Broadband might be your only man.

Yiz haven't had to deal with dodgy broadband until you've spent a weeks work sitting in a car on a mountaintop, with a laptop and 3 dongle because your broadband provider is having one of its occasional attacks of complete shiteness. (And no that wasn't my Fiesta in the photo on the other thread!)

But just think of the sad and voiceless people who cannot be with us tonight because they have no broadband at all!

cactus flower wrote:

But just think of the sad and voiceless people who cannot be with us tonight because they have no broadband at all!

Yeah, it's very bad for them. Some of them could be on dial-up and have to restrict themselves to reading it in text-only version. Very bad altogether.

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

But just think of the sad and voiceless people who cannot be with us tonight because they have no broadband at all!

Yeah, it's very bad for them. Some of them could be on dial-up and have to restrict themselves to reading it in text-only version. Very bad altogether.

Maybe we should gather the best bits together and publish once a week. The Machine Nation Gazette....

MikeW wrote:

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:

cactus flower wrote:

But just think of the sad and voiceless people who cannot be with us tonight because they have no broadband at all!

Yeah, it's very bad for them. Some of them could be on dial-up and have to restrict themselves to reading it in text-only version. Very bad altogether.

Maybe we should gather the best bits together and publish once a week. The Machine Nation Gazette....

Yep, and it could all be typed in really easy-to-download Arial on a compressed pdf. Something for those less fortunate than ourselves.

Ard-Taoiseach wrote:

AfricanDave wrote:

I suppose I'm just a whore who's willing to pimp out my principles to the highest bidder.

Well, if you're looking for a clean break, Digiweb, Imagine, Ice or Irish Broadband might be your only man.

I have 1mb at the moment. I want as fast as I can get. BT are offering 8mb (which is really good considering), but not in my area.
I've looked at http://www.getbroadband.ie/ and the cheapest I can find for 3mb (the fastest I think I can get) are either BT Ireland or Imagine.
The thing about Imagine is that they don't seem to offer line rental, while BT can do the line rental and broadband all in one for 56 euro. Meanwhile, Imagine want 30 euro for 3mb.

AfricanDave wrote:

I have 1mb at the moment. I want as fast as I can get. BT are offering 8mb (which is really good considering), but not in my area.
I've looked at http://www.getbroadband.ie/ and the cheapest I can find for 3mb (the fastest I think I can get) are either BT Ireland or Imagine.
The thing about Imagine is that they don't seem to offer line rental, while BT can do the line rental and broadband all in one for 56 euro. Meanwhile, Imagine want 30 euro for 3mb.

I think Magnet do 8 meg broadband. You should see if they can satisfy your need for speed. They do triple-play as well, if you want to have a package of services from one supplier.

I've just checked the Magnet website, and it doesn't look like I can avail of their service.

Quote :

. Magnet Entertainment offers Digital TV, high-speed broadband and telephone services to homes in selected Developments in Dublin, Laois and Meath that have been equipped with Magnet's Fibre-To-The-Home (FTTH) technology.

I live in a 30 year old house in Co Wicklow.