Like vultures hovering over the soon-to-be-dead body of Australia’s Internet industry, filter vendors are lining up at doors of ISPs around the country ready to cash in.
According to Colin Jacobs at NoCleanFeed.com, Communications Day (subscription required) reports today that ISPs are already being lobbied by filtering companies and that small providers will be hit hardest.
Internode carrier relations manager John Lindsay says “many” vendors have contacted his company, and that based on their pricing the cost of filtering software alone would exceed the Government’s budget by 50%.
The article suggests that service providers with smaller market shares may be hit the hardest by the scheme. Since the filter vendors often use a sliding scale in pricing their licenses, smaller ISPs may be have to bear a disproportionate share of the burden.
4 comments
Don says:
Nov 3, 2008
T’is after all the age of capitalism, just like haliburton in Iraq, there is always an upside somewhere!
Stilgherrian says:
Nov 3, 2008
As I wrote back in January…
Few politicians know how to analyse a situation numerically, few are technically literate in even the most basic things. All they know is that if the voters in marginal electorates are placated, then the world is good. This is not a good way to run a nation.
Stilgherrian says:
Nov 3, 2008
Oh, that quote was from Angry geeks: “Don’t waste money on internet filters”.
Spikeles says:
Nov 3, 2008
“Exetel technology director Steve Waddington said, “If the cost turned out to be in the range of a dollar or more per customer, I don’t see any option but to pass the cost on. The net profit from an average ADSL customer is well less than $4 per month, and for some plans less than $2. I think we would have to treat such an imposed cost as another form of tax we collect for the government.””
So not only will it slow down our net, it will cost more(even though Aussies already have some of the most expensive internet plans in the world)
OH JOY!!