Garner and Keall on Dotcom and his party

blogs:

There's one major and terminal problem with Kim Dotcom's Internet Party: he can't be the leader.

He can only be the shadowy, backroom figure that pulls the strings. He will do that. And that will turn off some voters.

The other thing that should, and will, turn people off is that he collects Nazi memorabilia. He should be treated the same as any other political leader found draped in the Nazi flag: they would be crucified.

If it was David or Peter Dunne or, in the past, or Rodney Hide et al, they would be forced to resign. They would be shamed and sent packing. Dotcom should not be seen as any different. Why treat him as special?

Could you imagine the outcry if it turned out that (for example) the Leader of ACT purchased a signed copy of Mein Kampf, had a photo of him wearing an SS helmet and displayed a Nazi flag at his house? They'd be gone within hours.

I agree New Zealand needs better internet, but does it take an “internet party” to get us there? This party is a sham and a side-show feeding Kim Dotcom's vast wealth and ego – not to mention his desperate ambitions to stay in New Zealand, rather than rot in some American jail.

This is the truth. He has a host of convictions:

He owes money to creditors; good hard-working Kiwis who are now out of pocket.

And he could have paid them months ago. He has chosen not to.

Chris Keall writes at NBR:

The first “action agenda” item listed on the website is 50% cheaper internet – and unlimited and universal, to boot.

I'd also like the price of books to be 50% cheaper, and the price of food.

I agree with the Internet Party's stance that broadband at half the price would be “awesome.”

However, it's not clear how we get to this state of awesomeness. 

The party doesn't price any of its policies, say how they would be achieved or offer any other details. 

Details would be nice.

The 50% internet policy is actually the most fleshed out – if three sentences can be called fleshed out – with the line that  “We will take direct action to expand New Zealand's infrastructure by building a second submarine cable.”

I'd like to see a second cable, too. I find it curious National has been quite willing to out- Labour by sending $1.5 billion on the UFB and related projects, but offer only a paltry $15 million to assist a submarine cable startup (Pacific Fibre and others have estimated it will cost around $400 million to challenge the 50% Telecom-owned Southern Cross Cable's monopoly on our broadband connection to the outside world).

I would also like to see a second cable. But Hawaiki is planning such a cable, and until we see if they succeed or not, I don't think you can say the Government needs to step in. Far better to let the private sector compete.

I don't think a second cable would make broadband 50% cheaper. In fact, I'd be surprised if it yielded savings of 10% or 5% or anything, based on what ISPs tell me (Orcon boss Greg McAlister recently said a $75 monthly connection includes about $7 in bandwidth charges). 

This is correct. The price of international data is not a huge proportion of what we pay. The prices drop around 20% every year as capacity expands on the current cable. Also more of our international data is coming from Australia, not the US. 10 years ago it was over 90% US and 1% Australia and today it is 50% US and 37% Australia.

This is not to mean that a second US cable would not be a good thing. It would be. But it is not a silver bullet and will not reduce costs of broadband by 50% or probably even 5%.

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