08 Internet NZ: Where now?
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Where is the New Zealand internet heading this year? Your hopes? Your fears? Will the blogosphere be a town square or a bearpit? Or will the media corporates take it over? Will you read Public Address more or less? Will your broadband get any better, really? And does "the New Zealand internet" matter anyway?
63 Responses
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Well so far it looks like the Kiwiblog Right are doing there very best to shut-down oppositional leftwing voices if their full-on troll attack on the Standard at the moment is anything to go by.
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Ooh, ohh, bearpit! I choose bearpit!
Is there a prize?
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My two picks are moving away from the landline.
I think naked DSL is going to become a reality, though only in a small way.
And mobile internet is going to happen more and more. I'm picking vodafone to make a big next step and try and grab the market by the scruff of the net with some big offer combining your cell phone, 'land' line, and internet all in one contract.
NZ is going to catch onto the youtube/election thing - this will be our first election where videos accessible online are going to make a reasonable sized play. And Facebook will be hit up reasonably solidly come election campaign as well.
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Is there a prize?
Good point. I'll see what I can do.
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Well so far it looks like the Kiwiblog Right are doing there very best to shut-down oppositional leftwing voices if their full-on troll attack on the Standard at the moment is anything to go by.
Sadly, I'm not sure what makes that different from any other week.
Although I supposed it's a relief to Jordan Carter to have his longtime trolls go somewhere else for their jollies. I honestly think those clowns have no idea how their behaviour appears to relatively normal people.
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This year I expect to become a High Court Judge.
"Now, you say the accused was on Bebo ... is that an illicit substance of some kind?"
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Given it's an election year I suppose bearpit is unfortunately more likely.
As to whether or not the "NZ internet" matters, I would suggest it is only in that type of sphere - i.e. local news and discussion. Although I predict an increase in local interweb shopping I suppose - as people become more comfortable with purchasing online their first steps would likely be with local brands and identities, though in the longer run they would become less important.
My broadband (having left Woosh and now "hardwired" on Xtra) is pretty bloody good as it is (averaging 4.2Mbps down on speedtests) - think this is partly to do with the fact that I must be close to the Ponsonby exchange (anyone know where that is?) and being the hotbed of testing activity that seems to be perhaps it will get even better? Mobile broadband will be an '09 thing for me - certainly the roadmaps I've seen allow for some pretty decent speeds at about that point.
What else... ummmm, more small businesses to have their own @zzz.com addresses with email to match - having found Google Apps for my wife's business I can't see why anybody wouldn't?!
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NZ is going to catch onto the youtube/election thing - this will be our first election where videos accessible online are going to make a reasonable sized play.
I wondered what had happened to all the post-BDO (or even pre-BDO) blogs this year. Then I realised there were dozens of user-generated BDO clips hitting YouTube.
When you look at the Nielsen consumer survey last year (the internet activity to show the biggest increase was watching video online) it does look like we're seeing a shift.
Here's the Listener column I wrote about the role the internet played in the Australian election last year. I think we'll see a lot of the same here, including greater use of online advertising.
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Interesting that Telecom provided this for free at BDO this year:
Mobile broadband and laptops will be available for free from the Telecom Recharge zone on the day for Facebook, Bebo and My Space updates.
Not sure how broadly used they were?Given that the BDO moved to vid-blogs rather than text-blogs (I'm sure there's geek speak I'm missing here) is that an indicator of how the local blog community may head?
Piece to camera "Leave Britney Alone!" styles perhaps? -
For me, probably more PAS. Poneke too.
I enjoy not feeling like I'm going to war when expressing an opinion.
I imagine that on other 'political' blogs I will do more 'lurking' than engaging. I have found that, generally, others aren't really that interested in discussing policy - they're just there to fling shite, abuse, intimidate, bully, insinuate. A lot are not interested in learning from others or have any interest in others opinions and ideas. They appear to be very narrow-minded.
I find PAS to be the opposite of this. People seem grown-up enough to participate in meaningful vigorous debate, be open to learning from others and genuinely interested in new (to them, anyway) ideas.
Well, they do say you can judge a person by the company they keep... -
I should add, I hope Russell, that you've turned your mind to a good blogger to step in and cover the election campaign. Obviously a few people, including yourself, will be looking at it in your current blogs, but a good, well-written blog which asks intelligent questions and filters out the crap for the rest of us... well I'd appreciate that.
Finding someone to write it? Dunno.
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Given that Australia is now run by a party that has spent the last few years promising to devote serious effort/resources to improving telecommunications/internet infrastructure and that any actual action towards this will start happening this year I believe that there is a strong possibility it might become a political issue here as well.
Any bets that a NZ party (small or large) promises during the upcoming election campaign to spend big to fix the internets?
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Can the bearpit please be filled with people in bear costumes, rather than actual bears? And can we please have a tiki bar perched on the edge to watch the show from?
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Sue,
more colin the kitten
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I think nz internet will stay the same old same old it has for the last 2 years. ie a joke well behind the mark and holding people who actually want to use the internet by the throat.
We've got TVNZ offering tv on demand, and moves towards watching movies via download etc yet no provider has offered a realistic package that doesn't cost you big time for the data amounts it would take to actually use these quite reasonable features of the modern day internet.
Xtra and woosh have offered all you can eat plans then quickly removed them and capped users still on those plans. All you can eat so long as you don't want to eat much, and then they cap you down to levels that won't even support voice over internet, which makes sense cos why would a telephone company willingly give up its grip over international phone calls.
Internet on mobile phone. what a joke. The system seems to be set up to trap people into accidentally using the system for anything other than a three word email and then charging like a wounded bull for the mistake, but then why should we expect the mobile phone providers to do anything less then hold the country to ransom in 2 player monopoly that even they proudly brag about as being the exact way they would like it in an ideal profit maximising world.
What I would like to see is Internet not being trapped to the landline. hey some of us don't need a land line any more, but if you do a google search on woosh and read some of the user comments, pretty ugly with some truly scary stories of trapped customers locked into a 12 -18 month plan of internet that for some simply doesn't work even though it did when they installed it.
The whole 12 - 18 month minimum sign up period with hefty disconnection fee and makes it impossible for people to try the best providers for them and if you do have a bad experience then you're going to have another bad and costly experience to change to another provider that might be just as bad and as costly to escape once you've found out.
/rant
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Last election year, I set up a blog specifically to mull things over in public, being an undecided voter for the first time in my life. In general it was quite civilised, but you really couldn't pay me* to do that again this year - I have a dark forboding feeling of oncoming nasties - from both sides. I think we'll get spill-over from the US elections. People will have all the primaries to get all spitty and entrenched.
More arts/lit/geek blogs for me, I guess.
*I wouldn't actually swear to that. We might need to experiment with it a bit.
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more colin the kitten
Okay!
From Saturday. The video didn't convert too well so the YouTube version is a bit dark and fuzzy, but you get the general idea of feline athleticism.
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Given that the BDO moved to vid-blogs rather than text-blogs is that an indicator of how the local blog community may head?
I was about to say that some people can express themselves better verbally than in written form (and vice versa) so that a video blog might be more comfortable expression for them.
But then I realised - just as there are people who will write stuff like "omg here are pics of my kitten hes realy cute!!!!!", there are people who talk like that too.
But it's a lot easier to upload a short clip of Rage Against The Machine being awesome at the Big Day Out than it is to describe that experience with words. Is it the lazy way?
Another thought for 2008 - if 2007 was the year that everyone got a Facebook account, then 2008 is going to be the year that people finetune their Facebook experience. I've already filtered out a few people who I don't mind having as friends, but I quickly got tired of having their frequent updates cluttering up my feed.
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Rage Against The Machine are not awesome; Colin is awesome. The kitten wins every time.
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Where is the New Zealand internet heading this year? Your hopes? Your fears?
I really want to see some Auckland based web startups along the ines of PlanHQ, Xero, HireThings, etc. I think with the Auckland Web Meetup we are getting a great community happening and it will be good to see some cool new businesses launching.
Will your broadband get any better, really?
Hmm - Triple Play please. Mobile, Internet and Landline (damn faxes). $100/month - All you can eat.
And does "the New Zealand internet" matter anyway?
Yes it does - I'm all for Amazon and other great international companies but more and more I find myself getting local. Hopefully local business can wake up and start using the internet to promote themselves. Those that do will have a headstart on those that sit back and do nothing. The Yellow Pages is not the only directory that matters now.
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Rage Against The Machine are not awesome
No, I disagree. Rage Against The Machine should inspire awe in all, even if it's just awe at how long grown men can project such an amazingly sustained blast of adolescent political angst. Plus they've got groove.
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But it's a lot easier to upload a short clip of Rage Against The Machine being awesome at the Big Day Out than it is to describe that experience with words. Is it the lazy way?
"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture - it's a really stupid thing to want to do."
Elvis Costello 1983
I appreciate he's having a go a journalists, but even a tiny film clip is closer to the visceral thrill of a live gig than trying to put that thrill into words can ever be. Unless you're really good...
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most people are better at putting their thoughts into words than dancing. elvis's catchy line is more clever than it is intelligent. That said there is an art in translating one sensory experience into another medium
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Your hopes?
satellite internet provided by international providers completely smash the data cap strangleholds of local providers.
no international data cable excuses. -
"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture - it's a really stupid thing to want to do."
Elvis Costello 1983
Not that Elvis Costello hasn't written any books about music.
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