Cheaper To Fly Data

[RVFmal]

Business Day From the Insider

Cheaper to fly data

A TRADER at an investment bank says his unit needs to transmit data between Cape Town and Johannesburg. It needs a connection of a certain size between the two offices via a Telkom line. The rental is nearly R20000 a month.

Only a small part of the data is mission-critical. The rest has a turnaround time of seven days.

Trading is carried on from Monday to Friday, so, at an average of 21,7 working days a month, the line costs R900 a day. South African Airways offers a return ticket for about R900, if you book in advance. It would be cheaper to fly to Cape Town every day, collect the data and fly back. And if your application is web-based, line rental jumps from R20k to R40k a month once bandwidth costs are considered from your service provider.

Can it be? Where in the world is it cheaper to fly 2000km to collect data than send it via internet or wide-area network?

 

[nocilah]

ha ha ha. that is insane.

 

[Slinky511nx7]

OMG. How rediculous.

It's just like in Zimbabwe where, instead of buying 1 roll of toilet paper it's cheaper to exchange $1000 for 1000 $1 bills and wipe your a$$ with that and still have $250 change.

 

[AntiThesis]

Bwaaaahahahahahahahaha

 

[krycor]

Good one!!

 

[prozak]

Well,

I transfer music over the net, and with the proposed per gig pricing itwill also be cheaper to courier the data with next day delivery...it will also be faster.

This is insane

 

[RVFmal]

I guess the airlines will be quite happy with the status of broadband in this country.

I have a 3 gig document to send to my office in CT. I think I'll use 1Time today. Cheaper and quicker.

 

[mccrack]

I hope someone at the DoC takes note of this.

It's more sad than it is funny.

 

[RVFmal]

I hope someone at the DoC takes note of this.

It's more sad than it is funny.

The fact that Telscum have been ripping consumers off blatantly has been known to all and sundry for years. Does anyone really think that this comparison is going to make any difference whatsoever? I doubt it.

 

[Sneeky]

This needs to be hand delivered to someone at ICASA.

Sigh, wheres VAPI now, its a pity we will never be able to hear him try and explain this one away.

 

[WiseCrack]

This can only be true in South Africa.

 

[mccrack]

Sigh, wheres VAPI now, its a pity we will never be able to hear him try and explain this one away.

Where is Vapi?

He QUIT!

lol .... seriaaaas.

 

[Debbie]

A guy on Hellkom's vent posted that a few days ago.

I think it's an extremely succinct story, and should be repeated whenever the opportunity arises.

 

[Sneeky]

Serrriiiiiaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaassssssssssssss!!!

Telkom has also lost its chief spin-doctor, senior media relations specialist Xolisa Vapi, who quit last week. Lulu Letlape, group executive for corporate communications, says Vapi's resignation was unexpected but declines to speculate on the reason for it. Vapi could not be reached for comment.

http://mybroadband.co.za/nephp/?m=show&id=658

I kid you not

 

[RVFmal]

A guy on Hellkom's vent posted that a few days ago.

I think it's an extremely succinct story, and should be repeated whenever the opportunity arises.

Absolutely agreed. What should be done is a proper report based on factual findings which should then be forwarded to ICASA and every newpaper in the country.

 

[bb_matt]

I recently had to transfer about 2gig of files from a UK server to South Africa - these were adverts for a publication. The connection to the server was impossible on an ADSL line, so I had to hook up via my Hetzner server and download directly to my web space and then from hetzner to the office.

It took about 3 days and I worked out the cost based on Telkom data rates (R249 per 3gig) and my Hetzner monthly hosting costs - fortunately I've got the 30gig WA account right now, but get this - I worked out the cost at :-

R166 to download the data via Telkom ADSL
R279 for my Hetzner hosting account - Advanced has a 3.5gig data transfer per month.

That's R445 to get 2gig of data from the UK.

Assuming the server was fast enough so that the Hetzner route wasn't required, it would've cost R166

I'm fairly sure a DVD of data could've been sent airmail from the UK to SA within 24 hours and would've cost about the same.

 

[scatlett]

My 'Networks IV' lecturer always used to say "Never underestimate the bandwidth of a truck full of CDs barrelling down the road at 120km/h."

 

[RVFmal]

Don't know about the cost of sending the DVD via airmail, but I am sure that it would have been in the same region if not cheaper.

To top it off you have now used just over 57% of your monthly bandwidth with Hetzner for one file.

Ludicrous to say the least.

 

[Farquaon]

This is really insane, i wonder if we will ever be able to understand telkom logic, cause it is in a class of its own.

 

[Slinky511nx7]

Telkom has no class