Where’s the NBN Debt Provision in the Budget?

admin —  May 13, 2009 — 3 Comments

As I noted last night, besides some small related investments, there was no additional funding allocated to the NBN in the 09/10 budget, leaving a $38.3b short fall.

The Government has previously said that the NBN would raise money via infrastructure bonds, but wouldn’t these bonds count as debt?

The on the books catch is that they may not need to appear in the budget, because the bonds will be raised by the NBN corporation; not dissimilar to Telstra debt when it was still majority Government owned (NBN will be min 51% Government owned.)

But here’s the part that’s got me stumped: the form of the bonds.

From a previous Government statement:
?¢‚Ǩ?ìThe network will be funded from Aussie Infrastructure Bonds while private sector investment in the new company will be capped at 49%”

The implication here is that those bonds are Government backed. If they are issued by the company, with the Australian Government backing them, the Government in effect acts as a guarantor for the bonds. The last time I looked a guarantee of debt is counted as a liability until such time the debt is cleared.

If they’re not guaranteed by the Government, the use of the Aussie Infrastructure Bonds name is erroneous, but more importantly the cost of raising the money will increase relative to the security offered being less, which will further drive up the cost of the NBN.

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Budget 09-10: NBN and Censorship

admin —  May 12, 2009 — 6 Comments

Repeat after me….repeat after me….polly want a cracker….. least that’s what we got with tonights budget when it came to the NBN.

Mentioned by Wayne Swan, and naturally trumpeted by Stephen Conroy (in a press release) new funding for the NBN itself in this years budget was….wait for it….$0.

You don’t have to believe me though: here’s the direct link. The $4.7b was allocated and announced LAST YEAR. We’re still missing the other $38.3 billion….

There was one new NBN related item though, and up front its actually a good thing: $250m for the regional backbone blackspots program.

Also in non-capital items was an allocation of $53.2 billion for pre NBN rollout functions, including the feasibility study for the NBN, with delivery of the report due “early 2010.” What is odd is that this is new funding: why wasn’t the feasibility study costed in the original $4.7b? what else hasn’t been budgeted?

Funding of $53.2 million in 2009?¢‚Ǩ‚Äò10 will be provided to the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy to conduct an implementation study into the NBN that will examine detailed engineering, commercial and structural issues and report by early 2010. The funding will also support the department in the early implementation of a network in Tasmania, implementation of the regional backbone blackspots program, and development of legislation and a regulatory framework.

Censorship

There was absolutely no mention of the Great Firewall of Australia in this years budget from what I could see. The program had a 4 year allocation last year, so needs no mention if there are no changes.

However, there were a couple of things to note. ACMA is closing its Perth and Adelaide offices in a move that will save over $2m. The budget line item only says that the roles these offices currently undertake will be absorbed by other offices. Employment numbers aren’t broken out, so we don’t know if this means less people, but you’d guess possibly less. Likewise, no idea what the Perth and Adelaide offices do, for example face to face contact, admin..no idea.

In the AG portfolio there’s no mention of additional funding for the classification board. This is surprising, because the implementation of internet censorship will increase the board’s workload.

The funding stripped from the AFP to fight child porn, and given to the filter instead has not been reinstated. There was no child porn fighting related budget items in AG or BCDE.

In Web 2.0
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Grasping at Governments past

admin —  May 11, 2009 — 5 Comments

It’s one thing to turn around and say “shit, things got really bad, we have to act” but it’s another to blame the previous Government when your own Government not only delivered the last budget, but has had its hands in the till (well, really on the national Mastercard) dishing out money ever since.

Treasurer Wayne Swan blames revenue collapse on spending by John Howard: news.com.au

Two days before delivering his second Budget at a time of unprecedented global economic upheaval, Mr Swan yesterday told The Australian his efforts to deal with the recession-driven, $200 billion collapse in revenue had been complicated by a legacy of reckless spending by the previous government.

In an apparent move to make Mr Howard a fall guy for a tough Budget, Mr Swan said the former prime minister had behaved “as if the mining boom was never going to end” in handing out payments across the community.

“As a consequence of those unsustainable habits which developed at the top of the boom and, given the nature of the global recession and the unwinding of the mining boom, everybody will have to do their bit to put the budget on a more sustainable footing,” Mr Swan said

But hang on: those “unsustainable” habits weren’t addressed in last years budget, Swan’s first. It’s lovely having hindsight, but you can’t blame the last guy when you didn’t see the problem either.

There’s one thing I do agree on: the Howard Government spent far too much (particularly in middle class welfare) and didn’t put enough money aside for a rainy day. The Howard Government should have set the country up better.

However, the Rudd Government could have addressed that problem LAST YEAR. Instead, they increased spending in that budget, and then did two rounds of $900 stimulus payments to 90% of the adult population, on top of massive amounts of infrastructure and related spending.

They’ve raided the Future Fund to cover their spending…the very fund set up by Howard to save for a rainy day TO START WITH.

I don’t think the blame Howard line is going to wash with most Australians. The fact they’re using it reeks of desperation, and may be indicative of even worse news to be delivered tonight.

18 months to go until the next election. People aren’t stupid. Cutting taxes to meet an election promise, then upping the cost of living for everything else (possibly by a greater amount) is something voters will see through.

So much for a change to transparent and open Government. They should just dump the tax cuts and explain the reason why (without blaming Howard,) most people would accept the downturn as the reasoning.

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Censorship related funding to watch for in the Budget

admin —  May 11, 2009 — 4 Comments

Budget night Tuesday night. Although the Government’s “cyber safety” policy was costed in last years budget, the massive change to Government finances could see a revision to what was announced last year. Here’s what to look for.

Last years costings here as the start point. $125.8m total.

ISP funding

The original commitment included “a one?¢‚Ǩ‚Äòoff subsidy towards the costs of installing Internet Service Providers filters” from 2009-2010. It wasn’t clear who would pay this, but the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy had $32.5m allocated to it under the plan for 08-09 (a huge spike), followed by only $6.6m in 09-10.

AFP Funding

The Government has already stripped $2.8m from the AFP for its Online Child Sexual Exploitation Team. Given the likely cost cutting measures across all Departments, further money could be stripped here.

ACMA Funding

For the implementation of the plan, ACMA was allocated $2.8m for each of 09/10 and 10/11. It’s difficult to break this out, because ACMA receives separate funding for its existing censorship activities.

What we do know though is that the censorship plan must include an increased workload for ACMA, after all, how can you implement a censorship plan without a review and enforcement process.

Now We’re Talking noted on the ACMA direct expenditure after the 2008 budget

ACMA funding is projected to fall from $99m in 2007-08 to $94m in 2008-09 and to $90m thereafter. Consistent with this average staffing levels are projected to fall from 555 in 2007-08 to 530 in 2008-09.

Talking points

If ISP funding is cut for filters, the extra cost to the consumer of internet access if the censorship scheme goes ahead.

If AFP cyber safety funding is cut, why are we doing less to track down child porn etc.

If ACMA funding is cut (further), how is the scheme going to be enforced?

Additional points

If anyone knows of any additional budget items we should be looking at in tonights budget, please leave a comment.

Update: thx to @aussexparty on Twitter, keep an eye on funding through the Attorney Generals Department for funding for the classification board.

A quick Google search and I couldn’t find a break out figure for the board in the AG’s budget allocations, but this isn’t to say that it isn’t there somewhere. Will do some more digging. The implications should be that the implementation of Internet censorship would in theory require more resources for the classification board, given that ACMA must refer take down notices (and presumably entries to the blacklist) to the censorship board for final classification.

In Web 2.0
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One time I wish I wasn’t right

admin —  May 11, 2009 — 12 Comments

The Register: Aussie censors implement six degrees of separation policy

This article received massive attention overseas since it was published late last week, including top of Reddit and Digg. It notes that EFA received a link deletion notice for “linking to a link to allegedly harmful content.”

The crux confirms a concept I mentioned in Crikey March 20, although in that case I referred to Google links (however noted the 6 degrees of separation theory, saying

Here?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s the catch: if the Google search results are declared prohibited content (which they should be if ACMA is to apply the law evenly to all sites), linking to those search results would also be illegal. Any site linking to the search results becomes illegal, and any sites linking to the sites linking to the search results become illegal ?¢‚Ǩ¬¶ and sometime next year, every site on the internet is illegal in Australia because of the Government?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢s crusade to save us all from the things they don?¢‚Ǩ‚Ñ¢t like.

In a later column, I noted that Google was bizarrely exempt, but noted the idea was still the same: linking to a site that links to something that is RC, is in breach of the Act.

The story also runs counter to the claims by Kim Holburn that the proposition that linking to a page that links to RC isn’t illegal.

It’s worst nightmare stuff, and in this case I wish I wasn’t right, and Kim Holburn was.

The unanswered question though is how far is ACMA going to take the link to a link policy? For example, if the EFA was hosted in the United States, would linking to the EFA who linked to the link to the RC then become subject to a takedown notice and/ or fine? (yes, that’s a tongue twister, but that’s part of the point on how stupid this is.)

That’s the perilous question. We’ve gone past direct linking, but how far will it now go down the chain? Could half the internet, or more one day be RC according to ACMA?

In Web 2.0
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Inquisitr’s 1st birthday + April stats

admin —  May 6, 2009 — 7 Comments

First birthday post on The Inquisitr here.

I won’t do a huge stats post this month. Short version: 2.34m page views, just over February’s previous record of 2.31m I also managed to screw up the GAnalytics code this month, so there’s a day and a half missing in the total count. I’m guessing the total was around 2.45m.

Technorati out to 235. Weird month. We got in as close as 120 at one stage, then out to over 300. The six months prior was a growth time, so we’re not getting as many links as we’re losing, but not by much.

Finances were down CPM off March, which isn’t surprising given March was a strong month. The counter was more traffic in April which means while we made less this month, it wasn’t as big a drop as it might have been. We’re also ahead of Jan/ Feb on a CPM basis, so although it’s disappointing to see a drop, it’s not as bad as it once was. Overheads are up in April with the addition of two CPM based writers, which will be bigger again in May with Paul Short being made permanent.

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Why I shouldn’t be allowed to view Infomercials

admin —  April 29, 2009 — 16 Comments

The above video is on the front page of Reddit this evening. It’s a remix of an infomercial to music.

I would be lucky to watch TV once a week, and when I do it’s usually the ABC, so no infomercials. Oddly when I visit the US, I often watch informercials in my hotel room, only because they’re so foreign to me, I find them fascinating.

So I watched the above video, and while the music mix was good, I found the product even better. I did some quick research, and found some real world testing examples that backed up the claim.

I then hit Google to see 1: how much it cost 2: if you can get it in Australia. You can’t, but there are eBay sellers who offer shipping here.

For around $47 shipped (the shipping was more than the product), in about 10 days I’ll proudly own a Slap Chop 🙂

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Down 2

admin —  April 24, 2009 — 3 Comments

The Inquisitr dropped 2 places to 8th on the April Australian Startups list from TechNation.

This may have been available in previous months, but I’ve paid more attention this month: a Hitwise rating. According to Hitwise, The Inquisitr comes in at 7028 of the most popular web sites. Compared to some of the others in the top 10, that isn’t great, but it’s a figure I didn’t have.

They recorded Alexa at 12543, where we’re 11,678 today, maybe a delay. Compete 3907 and Quantcast 2206 I’ll happily own 🙂

One good thing about the list is the ability to sort by stat service. We come in at 4th on Compete and Quantcast.

In Web 2.0
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Nine’s double edged sword

admin —  April 24, 2009 — 4 Comments

One of the few Australian television programs we watch is Underbelly. However when I say watch I think we’ve watched it once when its broadcast on a Monday night, mostly we catch up with it during the week.

Nine was half reasonable in offering a DRM infested download of the show, as part of their “catchup TV” offering.

First couple of weeks was fine, but for at least the last 3-4 episodes, downloading it has been a pain. The download connection constantly drops out, so you need to restart it a dozen times to get it to finish. I’ve done a trace on the problems, it’s not on our end, it’s their server constantly cutting us off.

But the problems have gotten worse, because now the download speeds have become spotty. Where it might start at 120kbps down, it slows to 10kbps, before cutting out. This week that meant that when I wanted to watch it on Tuesday, I finally finished downloading it on Wednesday (note, because of the constant cut offs, you can’t just leave the computer to download it over night.)

But this week was the icing on the cake, because despite taking two days, and probably 5-6 hours to download on my 24mpbs ADSL2, Nine then inserted pre-roll ads. Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t object to seeing ads on a legal download, but I object to being forced to view ads (the DRM meant we couldn’t fast forward, despite the download playing in Quicktime) when it was such a bloody hassle in getting the download to start with.

It’s enough to turn a person to piracy, after all, it would have taken maybe 2-3 hours max (possibly quicker) to download Underbelly from BitTorrent. If it was available on a streaming site (I didn’t check) I could have watched it on demand, without waiting for the download.

The big fail is why Nine is doing the downloads to begin with, and not offering Underbelly on demand, be it through a Flash, or Silverlight embed. Seven and Ten are offering shows this way, so why is Nine being different?

The point of offering an alternative to piracy is to offer an alternative that is similar, or more appealing to the pirated version. On this front, Nine fails.

In Web 2.0
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Waterboarding

admin —  April 24, 2009 — 5 Comments

Lets take away the arguments for and against the use of torture by the US Government as a legitimate tool in the fight against terrorists, and lets consider the effectiveness of the favored method of “waterboarding.”

The argument for waterboarding is that it’s an effective way of breaking prisoners, and gaining vital intelligence information.

And yet

“CIA interrogators used waterboarding at least 266 times on Zubaydah and Mohammed.”

If it’s so effective, why do you need to use in 266 times? Surely if it is effective, a couple of times, maybe a dozen max, but 266 times?

Where’s the real case that waterboarding works?

I can’t remember where I read it, but it was a fair point: the Allies sent Japanese to the gallows for using the same techniques during World War 2. What does it say about the United States that what was once condemned, is now passed off as acceptable.

In General
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