🚀 go-pugleaf

Tom Worthington wrote:

> Australia�s corporate and government communities demonstrating
> their support at a very high level.
>
> Details:
>
> * Media Release:       http://www.acs.org.au/news/seaspot.htm
> * SEARCC'98 Home Page: http://www.acs.org.au/searcc/searcc98/searcc98.htm

Telstra's attendance certainly puts the spotlight on its credentials as
either a catalyst for a competitive networked  information sector or as a
classic example of what not to do. I'd be looking at their charges wrt world
parity prices for high speed data comms, the number of competitors thriving
in the marketplace, and the growth rate of the sector both in employment and
gdp. unfortunately the facts are:

1. Telstra charges 10-100 x higher than world parity prices for high speed
data
2. Telstra is currently being sued by the ACCC over its anti-competitive
practices
3. Unemployment in Australia's high tech centres such as Melbourne is about
10% while in similar centers overseas like Silicon Valley or Virginia its
close to  1 %. Additional workers are being hired from overseas, while
Australia is losing skilled workers at an alarming rate.

Let's hope the conference agenda translates into some TIMELY action on these
problems, regaining some momentum lost when big media started dictating IT
policy about 1996. Billions of dollars later there is very little progress to
show and data rates are higher than a year ago.

murray bent