My experience of telcos is that they won't move fast, unless kicked very hard. The monopoly has been in force in my city now since 1997 so I've been waiting 8 years. No ISP will come to the city because my telco keeps prices high to use their copper. I should also point out that a huge chunk of my telco is owned by my city council. Therefore anyone wishing to dig up the roads to lay their own copper or fibre would have to apply to the council to dig up roads, that would be the same council that own part of a telco that makes them a large profit. See any conflict in that?

Now the wireless has come to the city, it changes things, but it has been 8 years and has had to come from a town 3 miles across the river. I'm waiting for the ISP to contact me. I do know one of the partners in the company, since I've ben active in attempting to remove the monopoly for so long.

From what I've learnt of NZ you more or less only have Telecom who own the cables, be they copper or fibre. Telecom used to be state owned, like the major telco in the UK, who incidently is not allowed, or interested in supplying my city. I should also point out that my city isn't small, it's the 10th largest in England with a catchment of around a million.

After looking round the forum I do have to applaud the work that's happening with the setting up of wireless around NZ. Sadly I doubt the UK will get round to this in the near future, which is a shame.

The thing that has *always* bothered me about privatised telcos is that they are in it for the profit. Totally driven by profit and nothing else matters. This means my friend will never be able to have anything above 56k dialup because the telephone lines that Telecom used aren't up to standard (not sure what they mean, but they won't explain) even though the exchange is. My view on this is that if the cables aren't up to standard then they shoudl replace them, but they won't because it won't be cost effective.

A much simpler solution would have been to split the telco from the network. Privatised the network and telco as different companies and let telco's who want to provide services tender for use of the lines from the network provider, that way they wouldn't control everything like they have. That should have been the case in the UK as well, sadly an opportunity missed. Then it would have been a free for all with the user gaining choice. It's choice that is lacking in he privatisations. The network provider would then have been able to upgrade and replace the network with the money gained from the voice and data operators who paid to use the network.

Oh well. That's life. Sadly my friend, until wireless becomes viable, will be unable to have anything more than 56k. Hence my original question with regards wireles sin New Plymouth. At this time it doesn't matter who can proovide aDSL because they cables won't be replaced by anyone unless of course some careless farmer runs a plough through them.... (that'd be one way to force Telecom to replace).

Anyhow cheers. I'll try look back in a couple of days. I work away so I stay off the net. My rant over

Pete