Last time I stayed in Whanganui, the host at the motel I stayed at was interested as to why I was there – as he said, Whanganui is a destination.  Its not on the main highway north so you have to choose to stop there,  but usually because you’re heading to do something up country.  But Whanganui has been making a name for itself over the last few years through it embracing its digital future, and the build of the ultrafast networks in the city.

The District Council has got right behind the push to make use of these new networks, and they haven’t been sitting still.  They have for the third year in a row been announced as a SMART 21 Community by the Intelligent Community Forum (see here), the only city in New Zealand to apply and make the grade.

The Council also took the lead in developing a free WIFI network in the central city as well and in recent years InspireNet took over running that network – now part of the aptly named InspireFreeWifi service.  The most interesting recent news about this service is that until December last year there was a 100 Mbytes limit per device per month on the free service, but they have recently upped that to 1,000 Mbytes per device per month to cope with users general day to day needs for email and social media as they move about away from home or work.  InspireNet also offers paid plans which start at 5,000 Mbytes per device per month for $10 per month.

The Inspirenetfreewifi network isn’t only in Whanganui though – it covers a number of lower North Island towns with about 500 Wifi nodes in place.  Its just another example of a committed regional ISP looking at how they can work with their local communities.

But Whanganui and InspireNet haven’t finished yet – I’m told there’s more to come so we’ll keep on eye on them.

MEDIA RELEASE Tue 20th Jan 2015

Sparks offer a good sign of the future

TUANZ welcomes the announcement today by SPARK that they will offer to their over 600,000 broadband customers a free 12 months subscription to the video streaming service LIGHTBOX.

“As we see the continued development of our broadband infrastructure, this sort of innovation is a sign of our future. High speed internet has the potential to improve both our personal and commercial lives if we take advantage of the benefits it offers” Craig Young, CEO of TUANZ said.

TUANZ believes that New Zealanders are more than willing to participate in this digital future if these sort of approaches are made more mainstream, and today’s announcement does just that. At the end of last year TUANZ members made it clear in a members survey, the increased interest in the convergence of TV and the online world. “We encourage this increase in content delivery over broadband and will be taking a lead in educating users and our members on these opportunities” said Mr Young.

“We also understand that as LIGHTBOX is ISP independent, that other service providers could look to offer similar deals. We look forward to seeing this happen to enable continued competition in this space”

ENDS

This year at TUANZ we are going to talk a lot more about how the new broadband networks can be used to improve both our commercial and personal lives.  One of those ways is accessing information that might have previously been available but only to those in the know.  So, it was great to be able to meet Lillian Grace (@GracefulLillian) this morning – she is the FOUNDER and CHIEF (yes, thats on her business card) at WIKI NEW ZEALAND.(@WikiNewZealand)

Their mission at WIKI NZ is getting people to use New Zealand’s data, and to be the place to play with New Zealand’s data.  

According to their website, there is a vast amount of data freely available on New Zealand and its position within the global context. However, to extract this data into a useable form requires time and skill.  Wiki New Zealand brings data together in one place and in accessible formats. Topics are presented from multiple angles, wider contexts and over time. Presenting this data in similar forms invites users to compare, contrast and interpret it easily and without bias.

Their current website is a good place to start playing with but Lillian this morning gave me a demo of the new backend (called Grace), and I saw some of the new front end design that will be live in February so make sure you have a look back at their site later that month.

It’s great to see this sort of initiative taking place and we will look to work further with WIKI NZ as more public data and information becomes available. 

On the same day that the US Federal Communications Commission has reportedly raised the basic definition for ‘broadband’ to a minimum download speed of 10Mbps, and 1Mbps on the uplink, TrueNet have come out with the news that the average NZ broadband speed increased 34% over the previous 12 months.  They are now seeing an average download speed of 14 Mbps, up from just over the magic (according to the FCC) number of 10 Mbps a year ago.

TrueNet believe that with the recent publication of Chorus customer numbers for each technology; the published data from MBIE on total fibre connections; combined with total market share of each ISP, they now have a reliable NZ wide speed calculation.  TrueNet is now taking broadband speed recordings from over 450 panelists throughout New Zealand, testing the speed every hour.

They put the increase in speed down to the increasing demand in the last 12 months for VDSL (Very-fast DSL) and Fibre connections.  Prior to a year ago, their average measure had been stuck at 9 Mbps since they had sufficient panelists in March 2012.

According to TrueNet, in 2012, all connections were either ADSL or 15Mb/s Cable.  This has now changed with the options of:

• Fibre was first offered as 30 or 100Mb/s, and is now available at speeds up to 1000Mb/s. The increasing  number of users with higher speeds are increasing, enabling the average to reach 43Mb/s.
• Cable products included 25Mb/s, then later 100Mb/s, and now 130Mb/s.  They believe the distribution of products sold now average speeds of 37Mb/s.
• VDSL is able to achieve speeds much faster than ADSL, and is now averaging 24Mb/s.
• ADSL continues to average 10Mb/s.

They are still seeing a drop in performance at peak hours of 8-10pm but at that time the improvement in speed is still high at 31%.

To see more details go to their website HERE.

I was fortunate to be able to catch up with one of my predecessors last Monday evening in the form of Ernie Newman, now a resident of the lovely town of Whakatane in the Eastern Bay of Plenty.  He is currently involved in some very exciting projects with the two District Health Boards in the area – Bay of Plenty and Tairawhiti.  This project involves the use of video technology to assist remote rural areas to have access to better health care.

Part of the Rural Broadband Initiative (RBI) is focused on delivering fibre to schools and hospitals and its this connectivity that is one of the more exiting outcomes from the project.  However, as Ernie says, the primary health care locations such as GP practices and rural health centres, weren’t covered automatically by the project.  In his role out east, Ernie is working with the DHB’s to install video conference equipment in locations such as Waihau Bay (hint: its where a lot of the movie BOY was filmed).  To read more about some of what he’s up to have a read at these links:

Kawerau Medical Clinic

Presentation to Australasian Long Term Condition Conference