You speak as if humans aren't part of nature. Just because we're powerful doesn't mean we're not allowed to act in our own interests.

Mosquitos are the biggest human killers in all of history. They've killed more humans than all of our wars combined. If the Five-Toed Wheezing Slug dies off because of the eradication of mosquitos, so be it.

Fail.

I'd never heard of the watchmen. Walking into the theatre, all I knew was that it was about superheroes. I ended up being treated to a very unexpected 2 1/2 hours of quality filmwatching with the right amount of story, action, grit and complexity. I had no problem keeping up with the characters or the plot. Thus far it's my favourite movie of 2009.

I thought "started building his weapons cache" was a euphemism, only to find out it's just rocks and stone discs. I am simultaneously disappointed and relieved.

I thought we were on the same page as to the quality of NZ net and only in disagreement as to its cause?

I'm not with Telecom and enjoy a (relatively) good service as a direct result. In the past, this would have been rather difficult. Telecom's a shadow of its former self, however... and is steadily decreasing in power. Its shares have been taking a hit almost daily -- expand the history of that link back to 2008 to see the extent.

Here's a good source of ISP plans in NZ. Telecom are somewhere in the middle. As for market penetration, I'm unable to find any hard data on it. It used to be 90%~ Xtra at the beginning of the naughties. In 2005-2006, it had gone down to 75% shared with TelstraClear. I have no idea what it is now.

Back to my original argument: Monopoly? Not so much anymore. Return on investment? Definitely. We have four million people. TelstraClear have been finding it difficult to justify expanding their cable network in NZ (they actually tried to let their existing cable network fall out of favour for a few years and have only recently begun to roll out new fiber). Telecom, monopoly or no, have very real financial concerns preventing them from ripping up our shitty national copper network for something better. Undersea cabling linking us to the rest of the 'net suffers from the same difficulty of recouping the investment; that's why international traffic is expensive and ISPs often lift their data caps for national traffic.

The one thing NZ internet has going for it is that we're a perfect test bed for new technology.

due to cryogenics and the strong possibility of future revival, it's pretty difficult to shoot somebody to true death -- only legal death :)

I pay the NZ equivalent for 10mbit up/down and 80gb cap, on a network owned 100% by one of Telecom's competitors.
But nice try.

Speaking as a kiwi...

Wut?

Three words.
Return on investment.

NZ has fantastic connection to the world, and an TelstraClear is in the process of laying a brand new high capacity cable. I have a 10mbit up/down cable connection and there's no bottlenecks anywhere, let alone on one of the most popular sites on the world -- YouTube. I don't know what this w0mprat fellow is on about in this regard.

What we DO suffer from is lack of return on investment. Those undersea cables cost quite a bit to lay and we live in a country that only recently passed the four-million population mark. Our telecommunications monopoly that is only now being addressed has resulted in a below-OCD-average uptake of broadband technology, exacerbating the return-on-investment problem. Due to the cost of international data transfer, almost all plans in NZ are capped at ridiculously low levels (20gb/month is "good" here).

It's not all doom and gloom though... the new undersea cable has an insane capacity and Telecom's monopolistic grip is being loosened. Unfortunately, thanks to this new law, that light at the end of the tunnel? It's an oncoming train.

Indirectly, perhaps. I believe the primary reason is to help towards getting a free trade agreement with the US, which is what the last two governments have been clamoring for (it's doesn't appear to be that lucrative, though).

Some of the major ISPs have stated that they will be very laxx about compliance to this new law. I don't anticipate any changes to the way I use the net.

On the flip side, some ISPs here have been doing this before the law was even concieved.

Mod this AC up -- this is the crux of the issue and is not to be skipped over.

The term "New Zealander" includes Maori, just as it includes all other racial backgrounds that make up the people of Aotearoa.

And yeah they'd kick some arse :). Well, maybe. I think Pa are getting a bit outdated.

Do you want to talk about it?