Thursday 6 November 2008

Broadband For Grey Nomads? Not Guaranteed.

Did you know we have a Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy? Well, we do.  You can contact them here - I've done the link finding for you.

Why would you want to contact them?  Well, DBCDE agrees that broadband is these days a necessity of life, and they have a thing called the Broadband Guarantee.  Basically they say that if you're in an area that's disadvantaged, they will provide some way to get broadband to you, at an equivalent rate and speed as someone in an urban area.

Around the world, broadband is acknowledged as a necessity rather than a luxury, as evidenced by this article - and others like it.  People often buy property now based on availability of broadband rather than proximity to shops or transport.

And so I thought to myself  - what about us Grey Nomads and Winter Drifters in our buses and caravans, what broadband guarantee do we have?  And there's really none.  Despite the fact that mobile broadband is available all along the major routes and cheap enough to provide to us, we seem to be in a (pardon the ageist joke) a "grey" area...

Meanwhile, I've developed a few tips and tricks for getting wireless inside caravans and buses, I'll take a few pictures and put together a few articles over the next few weeks.

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