A good friend of mine who, incidentally, was one of the pioneers in software development in this country, put me on the spot last week when he asked: “Mate, what exactly will this very fast broadband really deliver for everyday Australians?”
“Well, it will improve the whole economy’s productivity generally,” I started, also adding that nearly all the experts agree on this point.
“And, it will deliver numerous new applications which either exist now but need the extra bandwidth to function correctly - video based apps in particular - or, (warming to the task), applications we have not even thought about: for example, a neat new tool which could perhaps locate products and services in your local area, or anywhere in the world, check all the competing prices and find reviews or recommendations from people you trust.”
Obviously not totally reassured by my technical explanation my knowledgeable (but sometimes exasperating) colleague pressed me for more concrete examples, explaining his position by adding the largest infrastructure project in our history should be able to easily justify the massive capital injection required to ordinary citizens – no doubt implying not just techos and geeks like me.
“Fast broadband will enable wide scale tele-conferencing which should lead to less travel, particularly air travel, by business people which will also lower the carbon pollution effects,” I ventured.
My friend chalked this one up as a real winner and asked for more.
“More people will be able to live outside the overcrowded and expensive metropolitan areas and work online in less costly rural and regional areas,” I added.
“Farmers will also be able to quickly access weather information and enjoy the whole internet experience in areas that used to be black spots.”
Unable to suppress a ‘Donald Rumsfeld’ moment I suggested a construction engineer’s view from another era. “You know you can’t really estimate the actual amount of traffic that will use a completed bridge by counting the number of swimmers between the two points.”
Given the number of Sydney toll roads that haven’t lived up to their early expectations, this point was perhaps not as convincing as I would have liked. But I wouldn’t mind betting the traffic on our Harbour Bridge these days is exponentially higher than when it was originally planned.
Feeling my inquisitive friend was finally warming to my arguments I pressed on with the opinion that truly transformative infrastructure projects transcend the usual nuts and bolts of accountants trying to establish some ROI, Internal Rate of Return, or Payback period.
“You need to be visionary. What’s more, innovation of this type is inherently risky. Let’s face it, if there was an obvious short term economic justification the last government would have done it already!”
“Are you saying the NBN is risky?” my friend retorted, perhaps sensing a fatal weakness in my case.
“Well it isn’t from a technical point of view: Fibre to the Home (FTH) technology is already in place in South Korea, Japan and Singapore, but our population is much more dispersed than theirs and there’s also a lot less of us.”
“So it’s not really a hardware question, more of a software one”, he persisted.
“Think of it this way, it’s more about the content we create and the applications and tools we develop which will ultimately dictate what and how we derive the best value from the NBN,” I said.
“So it really is a ‘build it and they will come’ sort of argument,” my friend concluded triumphantly.
“I don’t know about that”, I reluctantly conceded, thinking (uncharitably) about the fate of another great questioner.
Like my friend, I look forward to much debate on this topic in the months ahead. | 
