Carte Blanche - Full Discretionary Power

HI RPM
I had a working document editable by many (but restricted) viewable by all in mind. I have been racking my brain to think of a way to do this but I concur, probably the only way to do this is to have anew topic with the first item the woking template and the thread following with contributions. The editor of the original post could then add the contributions to the document as they take shape... I will work on something over the next few days and post it as a new topic under Announcements and wee how it flies.
I am doing some serious research within Telkom to get the steering committee members names to you. BTW Nat Kekana new head of Gov & regulatory at Telkom is super efficient and very very approachable. he reports directly to DG of Comms. Perhaps we should try and see him?
P
 
Hi Peapod

Thanks for all the work.

I think it is a great idea for us to get more active again. For the past few weeks we stayed quite with the idea that Telkom will start improving the service, but I am not so certain it will materialize. I have a meeting scheduled in the beginning of next month and it seems that you guys are also making plans. Great stuff. We will use this forum to coordinate actions.

Regards,

RPM
[email protected]
 
Just a quick question to rpm.

How many people are registered on this site?

According to Telkom there are about 10 000 subscribed ADSL users in this country and that only a small fraction are not satisfied. I find this hard to believe. And if it is so, the other people probably just keep quiet cause they don't know who to talk to about it, since Telkom's after sales service is not the friendliest around.

Knowledge is Power.
 
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Cloud</i>
<br />
How many people are registered on this site?

According to Telkom there are about 10 000 subscribed ADSL users in this country and that only a small fraction are not satisfied. <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

I did a quick check on the Telkom site. (http://www.telkom.co.za/IR/corpgov/hcm_emp_profile.jsp)
As of 31 March 2003, they had 35,361 employees (excluding subsidiaries). They are broken down as follow:
8% = Management
19% = Supervisors
73% = Operational workers

Due to the extreme favourable rate to Telkom employees on ADSL +-R320PM (and lets me open minded here and assume Management DO pay for ADSL in this case) that the uptake under Telkom employees read as follow:
80% of Management = +- 2262
50% of Supervisors = +- 3359
20% of Operational = +- 5162
<font color="red">TOTAL = &gt; 10,000</font id="red">

Uhm, I guess we are in the minority when we complain? [:p]
Now I could be totally wrong, but heck, I have no other 'facts' to base my view on.
 
BRAIN DUMP.......
[:D]

I think the uptake for ADSL is a hell of a lot higher than Telkom are disclosing.

The cynic in me has to look at the abject lack of active advertising surrounding ADSL and the number of ISDN specials that have been on offer from most ISP's since the ADSL rollout began.

Why, if ADSL is the sliced bread in affordable internet connectivity, would Telkom not toot their horn as loudly as they could? It is after all, the buzz on the street globally, why not raise their profile as an international player, competently meeting and matching international standards?

I don't think they were ready, and more scarily, I don't think they accurately predicted or researched the volume of international bandwidth the SA public would demand. Terrifying when you have to consider that over normal copper they must have been able to make this assesment based on what us slow-pokes (52Kbps) are already using.

What I think has happened is that Telkom never expected the public to be as accurately informed as we are - once again a failing on their behalf to accurately gauge market demands. They have kept deliberately quiet, perhaps hoping that they would have an alternate product (WIFI/Sattelite DSL) ready in time to meet the tidal wave of demand. Again, they were too slow to deliver and demand badly researched.

I think the service failures and bandwidth capping are more to do with bad planning (both techology wise and revenue wise) than anything else.

Obviously it would be in Telkoms interest to keep supplying a higher revenue generating product like ISDN but I think this is minor in the grander scheme of things. Rationally, one has to consider the cost to Telkom of miscalculating market uptake - Training staff, upgrading technology, falloff in other high revenue products, buying international bandwidth, exchange upgrades - all of these are direct P&L and Capex costs - all hitting Telkom over 2 consecutive fiscal years. This puts forum posts of untrained engineers and botched installations into perspective and, a rollout plan that ends late 2008? Who were Telkom trying to kid?

Despite a requirement by law to be able to furnish the public with stats and research regarding uptake and demand, we will probably never know just how badly managed the ADSL implemetation is, how it was driven, and what factors dictated the butchered end product they now call ADSL <b>Broad</b>band.

Accountability and admission are things we will never see from telkom, not in our lifetimes anyway. Accurate Stats? Ha ha ha ha ha bonk (thats me laughing my head off.)

Brain Dump Over.
[V]
 
Mux

Really enjoyed your post. That sums it up pretty well. Maybe we should all apply for a job at Telkom [xx(].

Any news from the media attemps yet?
 
I "traded in" my dual channel ISDN service for ADSL - i am now unable to reach ANY INTERNATIONAL SITES[:(!] WHATSOEVER ... local / national access flies, but my internet connection is now totally worthless.
 
ASF

I went to a conference last year and had quite an interesting chat with a Licencing manager in ICASA. He gave me some interesting info.

All the licencing income of Icasa (VASP, Cell phone, Broadcasting, Telcos etc) is going straight to the Department of Communications, not to ICASA. The department subsidise ICASA in full. So much for INDEPENDANT communications authority.

The state is the major share holder of all the big players in the internet field including: Telkom, Eskom and transnet (Stake holders in the SNO)and Sentech.

Conclusion: The authority that regulates the Companies that give the state a huge income, is maintained (financialy) by the state.

A prime example of classic economics.


<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by ASF</i>
<br />Yup - I agree - I would also like to see Carte Blanche (or whoever has the guts) do an expose on the whole SNO issue :

1. Who is Next and why did ICASA, as the regulator who should have skills, appoint them to evaluate the SNO bids? What is the relationship (at individual level) between ICASA / Next / Telkom?
2. Why is the board of ICASA mostly made up of broadcasters? Where are the telco specialists?
3. Why has the govt not intervened PRO-ACTIVELY to sort this issue out. Mr Mbeki himself is quoted as saying that the countries future lies in the development of the ICT industry.
4. Expose Telkom for the greedy monopolisitic pigs that they are! This could be done purely by showing how they increased their pricing this year - see http://www.myadsl.co.za/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=535 let alone the ADSL issue...
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
 
Thanks for the info - I was not aware of this - now it all makes sense! What a bloody mess! What a pity that we live in such a beautiful country that is being ruined through ignorance, incompetance and greed! No wonder we have lost so many skilled individuals to foreign countries.....
 
We haven't been "lost" ASF, we have been gathering knowledge (and pounds and dollars)to bring back and contribute to a country we love and have a right to call home. i challenge any expat Saffer to tell me they aren't homesick? We moved back home lock stock and barrel in March after 10 years in the UK. Among our wide circle of SA friends (we worked in Tokyo, New York, London, Germany, Hong Kong and Singapore and Saffers are everywhere)we are the first of many returning home.
And I am a shy voice in comparison to some on their way back over here.
 
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