[AusNOG] Comms Day on reviews of the Telecoms Act

[Mark Delany]

On 18Feb14, Narelle allegedly wrote:

> Thoughts?

Why do these articles so rarely include the end consumer?

History tells us that regulators uniformly do a poor job of coercing
an industry dominated by monopoly giants into a thriving commercial
marketplace.

The only thing that keeps suppliers truly honest are consumers with
sufficient market power to "regulate".

So the number one job of a successful regulator has to be: how can
they make themselves superfluous by transferring power to
consumers. As soon as they think otherwise, we're in for decades of
sub-optimal outcomes.

And to my mind that was the most important goal of the national
substrate that was being built. By moving competition above the
substrate it had the potential to create a sustainable balance of
power between consumers and suppliers. Ergo, very little regulation
would be needed.

While there are plenty of nits about the detail, the goal of enabling
consumers is a powerful one.


The other thing that intrigues me about such articles is why
competition at the lower layers is deemed to be so important? (I know,
heresy on ausnog, right?)

All the value from networks derives from the upper layers. When I
execute a $100 transaction online the profit at the substrate is
probably less than a cent. So why is policy and regulation so hep up
over the $0.01 rather than the $99.99?

If it turns out that the $0.01 needs to be a subsidized utility in
some parts of the country, so what? Enabling the $100 transaction is
what truly matters.


Mark.