I tell ya technology is leaping ahead exponentially and Australia, a country which didn’t get colour TV until the 70’s, is just not catching on. The rest of the civilized (and by civilized I mean we fight with machines, not machetes) world has fibre optics sprouting from its collective ass and in places that do favour the machete like Nigeria, they’ve gone completely wireless – skipping the copper landline stage all together.
Here in Aus we have a still-partially-government-owned-but-sort-of-privatised-too telecom system which is made up of a cobbled-together tangle of copper lines with mechanical switching, ADSL, cellular, satellite, and trained koalas which carry messages in little backpacks and works fine if you want to send a message up a gum tree. You take a koala out of his tree he’ll scratch the shit out of you then die from a heart attack brought on by stress. They have a right hissy fit.
And so it is we find the new compound, although only a scant 4.8km from our other house, is not able to receive broadband ADSL service. Our choices are to go back to dial up, go to satellite, or try the still-sort-of-government-run telco’s highly bragged about 3G Wireless network “coverage to 98% of Australia, only $39.95/mo”. Well, ok said we, let’s try the 3G, we can get two of those nifty USB modems – one for the main computer and one for the laptop. Well sir, turns out that 39.95 is the El-Useless plan which caps usage to 0.5 gigabytes/mo. Half a freaking gig! And if you want the USB modem it costs $250 otherwise you get the normal “wireless” modem which requires a wall socket to run.
Well, god help us we don’t want to go back to dial-up, that would be just wrong, so let’s get one modem on the medium plan $49.95 with a generous usage cap of one (1) GB. Goodbye u-Tube.
2-4 working days later the modem arrived in the mail with the set-up pack. Try as it might, set up was unsuccessful. No Fucking Signal. We live in the most populated region of Australia, the coastal strip between Sydney and Brisbane, 10 minutes from the major North-South freeway, Highway 1, but apparently we are in the 2% of Australia which does not get coverage. You want high-speed in Fuck-head Creek, Northern Territory, no problem. Want to check your email while traversing the baking Nullarbor Plain, it’s as good as done. But not here, buddy.
So, you ask, through what sorcery did I manage to post this post upon the wise and knowing internet, keeper of all knowledge and more porn than one would believe could have been created since the invention of video tape. Well, by pacing the property with my phone, which is also 3G but works here, I managed to find a useable signal out in the laboratory. If I place the modem on the windowsill with one antenna erect and one slightly askew I can get one bar of signal. A 1GB cap seems somehow optimistic now.
Here is a photo from my new back veranda. Look hard, there won’t be many photos for a while until I can see about satellite service.
Here in Aus we have a still-partially-government-owned-but-sort-of-privatised-too telecom system which is made up of a cobbled-together tangle of copper lines with mechanical switching, ADSL, cellular, satellite, and trained koalas which carry messages in little backpacks and works fine if you want to send a message up a gum tree. You take a koala out of his tree he’ll scratch the shit out of you then die from a heart attack brought on by stress. They have a right hissy fit.
And so it is we find the new compound, although only a scant 4.8km from our other house, is not able to receive broadband ADSL service. Our choices are to go back to dial up, go to satellite, or try the still-sort-of-government-run telco’s highly bragged about 3G Wireless network “coverage to 98% of Australia, only $39.95/mo”. Well, ok said we, let’s try the 3G, we can get two of those nifty USB modems – one for the main computer and one for the laptop. Well sir, turns out that 39.95 is the El-Useless plan which caps usage to 0.5 gigabytes/mo. Half a freaking gig! And if you want the USB modem it costs $250 otherwise you get the normal “wireless” modem which requires a wall socket to run.
Well, god help us we don’t want to go back to dial-up, that would be just wrong, so let’s get one modem on the medium plan $49.95 with a generous usage cap of one (1) GB. Goodbye u-Tube.
2-4 working days later the modem arrived in the mail with the set-up pack. Try as it might, set up was unsuccessful. No Fucking Signal. We live in the most populated region of Australia, the coastal strip between Sydney and Brisbane, 10 minutes from the major North-South freeway, Highway 1, but apparently we are in the 2% of Australia which does not get coverage. You want high-speed in Fuck-head Creek, Northern Territory, no problem. Want to check your email while traversing the baking Nullarbor Plain, it’s as good as done. But not here, buddy.
So, you ask, through what sorcery did I manage to post this post upon the wise and knowing internet, keeper of all knowledge and more porn than one would believe could have been created since the invention of video tape. Well, by pacing the property with my phone, which is also 3G but works here, I managed to find a useable signal out in the laboratory. If I place the modem on the windowsill with one antenna erect and one slightly askew I can get one bar of signal. A 1GB cap seems somehow optimistic now.
Here is a photo from my new back veranda. Look hard, there won’t be many photos for a while until I can see about satellite service.
.JPG)
3 comments:
Looks so serene and peaceful. Wonderful way to mask the sinister activities taking place.
Beautiful place! I hope you and Mrs. Joe are settling in well. Are those mutant cows in the background?
Don't feel too badly about the crappy Internet. All I can get at the moment (other than dialup) is satellite. This has better download limits than the 3G plans you describe, but latency is insane (ping times minimum of 700ms, you can forget about online gaming). And my job IS the Internet!
Best wishes in the new compound. It looks lovely, can't wait until we all move in.
Post a Comment