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Notes from NZNOG'05 History of Peering session.

This page started as result of presentation by Joe Abley at NZNOG 2005 and notes taken down from that.

1876

  • Trans-tasman telegraph cable (Beardon 1985 - full references at bottom).

1960

  • In November, the Treasury leases an IBM 650, New Zealand's first computer. Within a year, Canterbury University and the Griffins biscuit factory also have computers. By 1962, Treasury considers its IBM 650 outmoded. (Beardon 1985)

1970

  • First overseas on-line link, to American Express's hotel booking network. (Beardon 1985).

1973

  • Universities get Burroughs B6700 systems. Plans to connect the B6700 at Victoria University to the Aloha network in Hawaii. (Hine, J.H. 1987: Research Networks in New Zealand. Department of Computer Science, Victoria University of Wellington. Technical Report CSD-87-021. Chapter 6).

1975

  • Massey and Victoria experiment with a network connection - named Kiwinet (Hine, 1987). Link uses a pair of synchronous modems operating at 4800bps.

1976

  • Waikato's Department of Computer Science acquire a brand new PDP 11/70 at a cost of $548,000, with "absolutely no ability to pay the bill".
  • March. Tasman 1 cable (Auckland--Sydney) in service. International Cable Protection Committee
  • October. Kiwinet metamorphoses into a design for VICNET, "a general purpose network that would be able to link the machines on the Victoria campus and Massey's B6700" (Hine, 1987).

1977

  • DSIRnet established using modified CSIRONET (Australia) protocols.

1980

  • Universities' B6700 systems replaced with various different equipment (Hine, 1987).

  • David Couch of DSIR's CRS (Computing Research Section of the Physics and Engineering Laboratory) produces "VAX Notice No.1", dated 18 November 1980. It reads in part:

    "DSIR has signed a contract with Digital Equipment Corporation for the supply of a VAX-11/780 computer system to be installed at PEL, Gracefield. ... The contract calls for the system to be delivered by the end of March 1981. ... CRS are planning to make the VAX accessible to all Network users as soon as it is operating. ... The Gracefield VAX is the first of the proposed series of five similar machines to replace the existing local nodes."

  • The Post Office (ie, Telecom), supports about 800 leased lines and 1800 modems. (Beardon, 1985)

1981

  • Development of the Poly and Aamber Pegasus, New Zealand's only indigenous home computer systems. The Poly was marketed on the strength of its colour screen and obscure proprietary networking system. Ethernet had not reached the desktop at this time. The Pegasus was marketed on the strength of its support of multiple computer languages and low price. A network version of the Pegasus provided connectivity to a 6809-based server (SWTPC-6809). Both systems (particularly their networking versions) attempted to address the Government's computers in schools initiative, which never produced the hoped-for large orders for these machines.

1983

  • John Hine sends his first {international} email message. Reference: "Early NZ internet a different beast" by David Watson, Computerworld, 19 November 2001

1984

  • Victoria University establishes campus network based on IBM's RSCS protocol (Hine, 1987).
  • DSIR's Applied Maths Division access the CSIRO CYBER 205 supercomputer, for finite element modelling of the Maui gas field. Access is initially via the Post Office OASIS AUSTRALIA link, then via the P.O.'s PACNET Packet Switching Service.

1985

  • Leased line connects three Auckland University Computing Centre machines to Victoria's campus network (Hine, 1987). The link initially uses the 4800bps modems bought for the 1975 Kiwinet project.
  • April 1. New DSIR Division of Information Technology (DIT) officially comes into existence. The Director is Peter Ellis. "Most of CRS now belong to either the Network Group, with Frank March as the group leader, or the Software Development Group led by Peter Whimp."

1986

  • The 1986 SOE act makes Telecom a State Owned Enterprise (ref)
  • February. Victoria University connects with ACSnet (Australian Computer Science Net). Reference: "Early NZ internet a different beast" by David Watson, Computerworld, 19 November 2001
  • Victoria University has connection to North America (University of Calgary) and Melbourne University using UNIX (UUCP and ACSnet) protocols and connects to a few other Unix sites (DSIR Applied Maths, Fisheries Research and ICL Computers), used mainly for USENET and email.
  • 7 Oct Duncan McEwan announces vuwcomp on net.news.newsite October 1986 net.news.newsite post

1987

  • 19th Jan: .nz is registered Ref
  • DSIRnet links main DSIR sites.
  • SPEARNET (South Pacific Educational and Research Network) links all Universities.
  • SPEARNET implements JANET Coloured book protocols including Grey Book mail and Blue Book file transfer over the Yellow book transport layer, lower layers are provided by Telecoms PACNET X.25 Network.
  • Victoria University adds a UUCP connection to seismo (the site that evolves into UUNET).
  • Victoria operates mail gateway between the SPEARNET, ACSnet and UUCP networks. As the endianness of Coloured Book addresses (nz.ac.vuw.rs2) and rfc822 addresses (rs1.vuw.ac.nz) are different, this involves some interesting jiggery-pokery and ultimately influences the choice of 2lds in the .nz namespace.
  • Telecom launches the 025 mobile, and CDPD mobile data network.

1988-?? [Please move events according to time]

  • Telecom delivers international capacity to the University of Waikato
  • NZIX appears; ethernet switch across which are exchanged using IGPs
  • Clear delivers two 512k circuits to Hamilton, terminated in wondrous state-of-the-art Cisco 4500 routers
  • Routes are exchanged at the NZIX using a variety of protocols (RIP, RIPv2, OSPF, various cisco protocols that shall not be named)
  • Only real exception is BGP
  • Clear was back through to MCI
  • In effect peering at universities through Tuianet – This was pulled after DoS attack around 1995 at Cybernet conference against ICONZ.
  • Paid for charging for capacity at this time – world leading at the time
  • FreeNet in Wellington
  • Victoria University decides to use routers rather than bridges on the new Ethernet LAN that will link the new Computer Science building to the existing Computer Center. Furthermore, it decides to purchase them from an unknown company called cisco, rather than Wellfleet or Proteon. Rather than deal directly with the tiny cisco, VUW suggests that ECL (a division of the TV repair people Tisco), from whom they were purchasing TRW terminal servers, become the country agents for cisco (ECL became Case, then Dowty, etc., and then Logical, later brought by IBM). Five MGS routers were ordered, but cisco are unable to deliver them on time so substitute the larger AGS model for three of them. Thus do the first five cisco routers enter New Zealand. See http://www.knossos.net.nz/don/wn1.html

  • Universities and DSIR request Class B addresses -- in the days when all you needed was to show that you would probably have more than 256 hosts within three years.

    • Aug 1988: Massey University 130.123.0.0
    • Sep 1988: Victoria University 130.195.0.0
    • Oct 1988: Auckland University 130.216.0.0

    • Oct 1988: Waikato University 130.217.0.0

      • The story goes that Nevil Brownlee was getting a /16 for Auckland university, and contacted Waikato to ask if they wanted some address space too. Waikato said "Sure!", hence why the two addresses are contiguious.
    • Jan 1989: DSIR 131.203.0.0
    • Mar 1989: Canterbury University 132.181.0.0 (according to "reg-date" remark in whois)

1989

  • TUIA Net ( ? Tuia Net didn't really start until 1992; prior to that there were separate Kawaihiko (Universities) & DSIR networks, converging at Waikato. Perhaps Kawaihiko is meant?)
  • Satellite link between the University of Waikato and Hawaii
  • 17 January: Victoria installs first Cisco routers (see above)
  • KCBBS started
  • Internet link (PACCOM TCP/IP link to Hawaii) doubled at Waikato University from 2.4 to 4.8 Kb/sec
  • Original connection into Waikato was CSNET
  • Connected to DSIR through DSIR routers – 4.8 K links on PC after failing to get working on X25 – Massey was also piggy backed off this as well. Mark Davies MCS/VUW web page.
  • Little concept of "peering". ISPs and Universities "connect to Waikato" in order to access the Internet
  • Routers, switches and associated baggage are commonly operated by Waikato ITS staff, who generally know more about them than the telcos
  • Telecoms deregulation
  • (Refs)
  • April: Kawaihiko's IP network started as an analog 9k6 link to Hawaii (ref pics)
  • November: Link to WCC replacing UUCP link.
  • November: Actrix started, Actrix links via UUCP to Victoria University Computer Science for email/news. International traffic charged at $10/MB. (This doesn't sound right. I've got email from '92 that puts VUW Comp Sci email charges at $60/MB, and I'm sure they were higher in '89. Note that this is for email, not IP. -- don)

1990

  • Clear Communications Limited incorporated
  • Telecom is sold to wholly owned subsidiaries of Bell Atlantic Corporation and Ameritech Corporation for NZ$4,250 million. (ref)
  • 1 June: Kiwi Cable Company registered as a Telecommunications Network Operator. Kiwi Cable later becomes Saturn Communications.
  • June: KCBBS made Usenet and email available. There were a total of 386 newsgroups available, and a full newsfeed was between 9 and 12 megabytes of messages. A year later their equipment was like this.
  • June 14: Kawaihiko DDS links were added. (ref)
  • November: NZGate link is upgraded to 14k4 analog cable to Hawaii (ref)

1991

  • March: Actrix on analogue IP link to VUW, but access restricted to VUW network and Waikato NNTP servers.
  • July: VUW-Waikato link to 48k
  • 98% of shares of Telecom are sold to Bell Atlantic and Ameritech (ref)
  • CityNet in Wellington opened. Runs on a couple of Vaxes. Free local dial up (2400 baud) Internet access is available in Wellington, and later in Auckland and Christchurch. I don't have an exact date for this but a posting from Richard Naylor suggests CityNet had been around for 5 years. (ref)
  • OSI/CLNS configured on VUW campus routers for testing. IP vs OSI/GOSIP wars in full swing. IP camp says "we don't need this bureaucratically imposed stuff", OSI camp says "IP is just a testbed, wait till REAL STANDARDS are ready." Standards Association of New Zealand sets charges of $3,000+G.S.T. for a 'type 1' format registration, $750+gst for type 2 and $150+gst for type 3, registration being valid for three years. Of course ‘The other IDI formats described may be used within New Zealand but are covered by other registration authorities’. So we choose E.163, aka our phone number, at no additional cost.

1992

  • February: WCC link to 48k
  • January: Access restrictions removed from Actrix analogue IP link.
  • TuiaNet links go in. (ref)
  • ICONZ is founded.
  • March. Tasman 2 cable (Auckland--Sydney) in service. International Cable Protection Committee
  • July 1. The DSIR is dissolved into independent Crown Research Institutes. The DSIR Network becomes CRInet. The network is managed by a group in the new Industrial Research Ltd (IRL) CRI.
  • July: Richard Naylor puts the Wellington City Council bylaws online.
  • September: 64kbps satellite link to NASA Ames replaces 14k4 analog cable to Hawaii. (ref) Must be earlier than this. An nz.netstatus posting on 3 March 1992 (Message-ID: <1992Mar3.110908.6750@waikato.ac.nz>) says
        >We are expecting to have sun outages affect circuts from
        >NASA Ames to Australia (AARNet, 139.130 net) and New Zealand (Univ of
        >Waikato, net 130.217) for the next 4-5 days (March 1-5, 1992).
  • October: Some interesting exchanges in nz.general about PACCOM charges the NewZnet Support Group and charging for Usenet News and mail.
  • Late '92: VUW Internetworking Group formed to formalise VUW leased-line IP services, charging etc

1993

  • Pacrim East cable (Auckland--Hawaii) in service.International Cable Protection Committee
  • Bellsouth starts the first mobile phone network that competes with Telecom ref
  • February: 128k satellite link from Walkworth to NASA Ames (ref, says Feb 92, but suggests that Feb 93 is the correct date) {Rather, given the Usenet evidence above, the dates are probably Sep 91 and Feb 92} (Hrm, more evidence that Feb 92 was an upgrade is correct ref)
  • July: KCBBS became Internet connected via a 48 Kbit Metropolitan Digital Data Service to the Auckland University Computer Center.
  • MichaelNewbery creates the New Zealand Internet Catechism to hand out to organisations interested in this Internet thing.
  • October: Nevil Brownlee (U of Auckland) releases NeTraMet, Network Traffic Meter, used by many Universities & ISPs for IP traffic accounting.
  • Trevor Rogers MP introduces Technology and Crimes Reform Bill into Parliament which would have the effect of making ISPs responsible for "objectionable material" carried by their networks.

1994

  • March: 256k satellite link to NASA Ames.(ref)
  • March: Steering group meets at Victoria University to set up ISOCNZ (now InternetNZ) http://www.isocnz.org.nz/about-us/history/940310-steering-group-meeting.html
  • June: In a joint venture with Taranaki Polytechnic, Telecom launches a cut-down Internet access product for schools and other special interest groups, called NZ Online. (ref)
  • July: 512k satellite link to NASA Ames (ref)

  • July: "Rough consensus & running code" wins. Government ICIT Standards Working Group recommends that the Government Open Systems Interconnect Profile (GOSIP), multiple telephone-book sized volumes mandating the use of ISO/OSI protocols by Government agencies, be replaced by a single-page public sector guideline "embodying:

    • Pragmatism;
    • Responsiveness to user needs and to changing technology; and
    • Brevity."
  • August: First Usenet posting of the "Internet access in New Zealand FAQ" by Simon Lyall. ( Note: the first edition was actually posted in late June but appears to not have been archived).
  • September: Telecom’s Netway Communications announces that a retail ISP service for corporate customers will launch in six months’ time. It doesn’t. (http://www.unlimited.net.nz/unlimited.nsf/0/79B2526E25373F9DCC256942001D8961?OpenDocument)
  • October/November: Waikato starts labelling international access as NZGate rather than PACCOM.

1995

  • Cybernet ISP performs DoS attack on Iprolink's (another ISP) public demonstration of the InterNet. Cybernet's upstream (Auckland University) respond by disconnecting them in November. (described at http://www.kcbbs.gen.nz/width.html)
  • Original NZNOG List created? (ref)
  • January: Telecom in talks with Microsoft about a joint venture with Microsoft Network. (ref)
  • January 31. Pacrim West cable (Sydney--Guam) in service.International Cable Protection Committee
  • February: auckland.nz.undernet.org IRC node setup, hosted at ICONZ
  • April: VUW Internetworking Group becomes NetLink, offering leased-line, dialup & hosting services
  • May: NZGate's link was 1Mbit by now (ref)
  • August: NetLink takes over management of Internet connections via Auckland University
  • November: Wired magazine carries an article titled "Godzone: What would it be like if all government regulations just went away...", describing the effects of NZ's telecommunications deregulation. "For Maurice Williamson, cutting code in C++ ranks just below sex in terms of pure pleasure."!!!
  • November: Ihug offers flat rate dialup
  • November: Voyager starts up, offering $10/hr, and also provide 0800 access to the 'net.
  • November/December: CityNet stops accepting new users.

1996

  • Pronet formed as a cooperative between several ISPs (Actrix, Iprolink, Plain Communications)

    • Deployed as a wholesale network peering at the NZIX and buying transport from Telecom and Clear
    • ISPs connected to Pronet using Frame Relay
  • NetLink deploys into Christchurch & Dunedin
  • NZGate is scaled down to be replaced with NZIX (ref)
  • Telstra NZ opens for business
  • Telecom starts deploying its Hybrid Fibre Coax (HFC) cable to homes in Auckland and Wellington. Perhaps also elsewhere in NZ?
  • Saturn begins to build local access cable and telephony network in Wellington (ref)
  • Ascend Max 4000's are being used (ref)
  • January: Waikato University’s NZGate stops reselling international Internet bandwidth from Netway. (ref)
  • CityNet decomissioned.
  • May 1: Telecom launches its ISP arm, Xtra. (ref)
  • May: Voyager halves its hourly rate to $5. (ref)
  • August: Xtra halves its hourly rate to $2.50. Xtra has 10,000 customers. (ref)
  • August: ISPANZ (Internet Service Providers Association of New Zealand) formed in response to Xtra's price cut.
  • September: "The great Xtra security debacle"
  • October 12: Web coverage of 1996 General Election
  • October 29: Ihug merges with Efficient Software
  • November: Clear launches Clear Net. (ref)

1997

  • Clear pulls MCI circuits back to Auckland, to avoid tromboning international traffic to Waikato and back
  • NZIX's IGP routes are redistributed into BGP in Clear's network, tagged for identification, but not filtered

  • Clear, Telecom, Telstra NZ discuss peering in Auckland

    • "AMX" is used as a working title (e.g. See Arron Scott's NZNOG post)
    • A triangle of 2M circuits is provisioned between the three telcos as an interim measure
  • Saturn opens for business in Wellington
  • January: IPNet launched (ref)
  • January: Xtra has 45,000 customers.
  • July: Telecom New Zealand, Optus and MFS Globenet (subsequently taken over by WorldCom) agree to sponsor the Southern Cross project.
  • July: Ihug first ISP to launch residential broadband in NZ - using satellite bandwidth
  • 8 September: Saturn installs first trial cable modem customers, in Lower Hutt, in conjunction with Actrix
  • October: Ihug lands PanAmSat carrier in Newton Road, providing an additional path for inbound traffic

1998

  • Telecom's Hybrid Fibre Coax project canned. Last cable in the ground removed in 2001, although there may still be some around in Auckland. Poor uptake of the service cited as reason it was killed off.
  • Telecom has 500,000 mobile customers ref
  • Vodafone buys BellSouth.
  • February - Telecom's Jetstream ADSL trial launched in Wellington – the service was aimed primarily at video. Predicts roll out in late 1999
  • February - NZNOG List created in its modern form by Donald Neal

  • June

    • NZNOG Mailing list has 18 Subscribers.
    • Xtra has 119,400 subscribers.
    • Saturn launches commercial cable modem service with install of 1st customer on 26 June through NetLink.

  • July

    • Actrix cable modem customers installed on Saturn commercial service.
    • Rex Croft pulls 202.7.0.0/23 out of Dunedin City Council for use on the WIX. There are attempts to give parts of this out to customers through ISPs (ref)
    • NZIX upgraded from a single Cisco CAT 5000 to two fully redundant Cisco WS-2926 switches (ref)
  • CityLink have been providing connectivity between customers and ISPs for some time, but there has been little organised peering between ISPs before now. CityLink is unique as MAN and exchange building out to ISPs

  • National Library peering over WIX with Clear, ICONZ, Netlink, Paradise, CityLink

    • When National Library peered it was on a 386 notebook with two Ethernet cards running Linux
  • October - Simon Blake announces availability of route servers on the WIX

1999

  • Telstra merges with Saturn to form TelstraSaturn? ltd ref

  • March - the idea of a neutral peering point in Auckland is discussed(ref) on the NZNOG mailing list. Guided tours of the Sky Tower's comms floor by JDA. Richard Naylor of Citylink offers to install a cabinet and find a switch.

    • Joe had idea of using Sky Tower for peering after riding on a bus and seeing Sky Tower looming above him.
    • Level 48 at Sky Tower was logical because Clear had fibre and could host internal aerials there also due to type of glass. Correction to a slide – Roger found switch not Richard
  • April - MichaelNewbery of Saturn names(ref) the peering point APE for Auckland Peering Exchange. There was much rejoicing. Logos involving King Kong climbing the tower swatting at flying routers are suggested, over-excitedly, but never materialise
  • May - CLEAR Net, Xtra offer flat-rate dial-up in order to compete with IHUG
  • ICONZ, Iprolink, KCBBS hosted an abortive exchange through ISDN. Centrex suggested by Max Gustin for this as well.

  • June: APE announced as being "open" (but the first routes are actually exchanged over a year later in August 1999!)

    • Richard Naylor steals 192.203.154.0/24 from children (the original owner was Capital Discovery Place, a children's science & discovery centre operated by the Wellington City Council, but defunct by the time Richard pinched the IP address) and we use it to number peers on the APE
  • i4free was using Clear Network
  • June: Telecom ADSL (JetStream) launched - $89 per month for 600MB of traffic (ref: Ministry of Economic Development info sheet)
  • August: APE goes live for real
  • August - IHUG starts to sell calling cards which provide toll calls carried over IP
  • Cleaning up the NZIX is discussed, again: there is a general desire to run BGP between peers on the exchange - nobody wants to be the first person to throw away OSPF routes
  • 10 August - First peering session live on the APE (Plain Communications and CLEAR). CLEAR operates a fully open peering policy at the APE, WIX and NZIX
  • September: Southern Cross Cable landed at Takapuna, Auckland (ref: Ministry of Economic Development info sheet)
  • 1 October - Telstra NZ purchases NetLink from VUW
  • November - APE switch replaced by new hardware donated by Roger de Salis at Cisco
  • November - Telstra NZ live at the APE

Between 1995/1996 and 2001.

  • Waikato no longer main connectivity. Rex Croft not looking after .nz. Telecom/Netway got it because nobody else wanted it.

2000

  • 1 January - At around 12:05am the NZ Internet sends more outbound than inbound for the first time ever, as the world attempts to see if we survived Y2K
  • February - Compass launches FreeNet, a free dial-up service
  • 1 April: Saturn purchases Paradise Net.
  • April: Clear set up ZFree, a free dial-up ISP, to take advantage of interconnect fees from Telecom customers.
  • April - i4Free is launched
  • May: Clear and Telecom reach an "agreement" over 0867 (ref)
  • May: Domainz moves to their new registration system (DRS). (ref)
  • 28 May: Chello, a European based broadband only (no dial up) ISP launches a flat rate cable modem service in Wellington over Saturn's cable network. Had a GRE tunnel to Midwest America.
  • 7 September: Chello, like iHug before them and @Home subsequentially, discovers that flat-rate all you can eat is not economically viable and exits. Nearly all their customers elect to transfer to Paradise.
  • September: Telstra NZ disconnects from the NZIX
  • October(?): Telstra NZ and Saturn Communications merge to form TelstraSaturn?
  • November 15. Southern Cross cable goes live.
  • The Great Pacrim East Bandwidth Squeeze Begins. Both Clear and Telecom land IntelSat carriers in order to augment inbound capacity.
  • Telstra breaks out an Australia-US DS3 in Auckland and resells transit on it to Telecom and Clear (AS 9901)
  • Xtra celebrates its 300,000th customer
  • CLEAR caps ZFree subscribers at 250,000

2001

  • March: TelstraSaturn launches local service in parts of Christchurch. Ends acrimonously not long after as rollout cancelled and cable contractor going bust who sues Downer Engineering which used to be ConnecTel which used to be Telecom
  • March: big DDoS attacks on the Undernet IRC network force auckland.nz.undernet.org to shutdown (see undernet history and related nznog thread)
  • July 28: Tasman 1 and Southern Cross cables severed by dragging ship's anchor in a storm off Sydney. Tasman 1 not repaired.
  • August: The last router on NZIX is turned off and NZIX closes.(ref)
  • August: Long-time NZ nameservers, ns99.waikato.ac.nz and rata.vuw.ac.nz, cease to carry NZ zones. ns99 (under Domainz management for all of 2001) shut down.
  • December: TelstraSaturn acquires CLEAR. New company called TelstraClear

2002

  • ZFree shut down (April 30) after Telecom set up their IPNet and negotiation of better interconnect terms. (NZHerald article)
  • October: Wired Country launches network in Auckland - some time prior to this they wire up Franklin District with fibre
  • October: NZ Shared Registry System introduced for NZ domain name registrations
  • September: .maori.nz domain established
  • December: Proposal for .geek.nz 2TLD received by the DNC
  • December: NASA-operated name server MX.NSI.NASA.GOV ceases carrying NZ zones, replaced by commercial DNS service UltraDNS, after constant service since 1989.

2003

  • MCI, Sprint, Asia Netcom sell international transit in Auckland

    • Mayoral Drive/Sky Tower
    • $0 last mile
  • MCI were selling Voyager transport. Satellite connection to Ozemail – GRE tunnel also through terrestrial. Subsequent DS3 to Sydney – Late 2003/early 2003
  • Mid 2003 Xtra (having operated as a seperate entity owned by Telecom NZ Ltd up untill now) is merged back into the Telecom NZ fold. Xtra becomes more focussed on Residential and Small Business customers; Global Gateway (formerly NetGate?) and Telecom's Corporate Internet Direct product targetted at businesses. (CID = LAN Extension, Ethernet delivered high bandwidth circuits, etc etc.)
  • Before Southern Cross Clear and Telecom were sending large packets via satellite and small via cable to help get more traffic through
  • Woosh offer wireless "broadband" in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Invercargill
  • August: .geek.nz domain established.
  • November: TelstraClear drop peering with ICONZ, in retaliation for ICONZ changing to another international transit provider (see nznog post)

2004

  • Telecom withdrew route servers from WIX

  • May: TelstraClear announce intention to de-peer from APE

    • TelstraClear's intention to change peering policy from May 2003
    • Nov 6 2004 was given as the date that they would de-peer. They still peer until Feb 2005 (see below).
    • "Domestic Internet" product launched to provide equivalent functionality, but at non-zero cost
  • November: PNIX launched ref. PNIX so needs a logo
  • Commerce Commission investigating regulation decides not to recommend LocalLoop unbundling, instead recommends wholesaling of ADSL.

2005

2006

  • February 14: Prime Minister's speech in Parliament says that NZ broadband uptake is not good enough, and announces review of the regulatory environment.

    • Telecom's response to mounting political pressure is to announce new plans with 3.5Mbps down to be introduced in April, and make the new plans available to business customers as well TCNZ media release 1,release 2
  • April 21: Orcon Internet acquires WISE Net
  • May 3: Information about unbundling the local loop was announced early, after the information was leaked to Telecom.
  • 20 Jul iiNet announces sale of iHug
  • 24 Jul Woosh Wireless purchases Quicksilver Internet
  • 31 Aug: Advanced Networks (REANNZ/KAREN) officially lauched.
  • October: Xtra launch ADSL without download speed restriction at an affordable price but heavily managed
  • October: Vodafone buy Ihug

2007

  • 19 Jan: WizWireless takes over Orcon Wairarapa Wireless services
  • 02 Feb: Theresa Gattung announces her leaving Telecom as of 30 June 2007.
  • 28 Jun: Dr Paul Reynolds (former CEO of BT Wholesale) named as new CEO of Telecom
  • 2 July: Kordia (formerly BCL) announces purchase of ISP Orcon - nznog pdf
  • 31 July: Commerce Commission releases draft document on unbundling that would set the wholesale price of a line to $16.49 (urban) / $32.20 (rural). NZ Herald article
  • 9 Aug: Local Loop Unbundling physically starts NZ Herald article
  • 18- Aug: xtra's forced migration of customers to the new Yahoo/Xtra "Bubble" email service (hosted in Australia) goes horribly wrong, with many users unable to go through the required registration process, many users not having prior notice of the changes, long queues for xtra's help desk (which was unable to provide answers), and spam filters on the new service not working. (NZ Herald article, ComputerWorld articles one and two)
  • 13 Dec: Commerce Commission announces finalised pricing for Telecom wholesale DSL services to take effect from April 2008 - between $27.44 and $47.99 (depending on plan) per urban user with a land line, and between $47.28 and $67.83 per urban user for naked DSL. (NZ Herald article)

2008

2009

  • May: Vodafone launches legal action against Telecom, saying that their new 3G/WCDMA network (at 850MHz, scheduled to go live on 13 May) is causing interference with Vodafone's existing network (at 900MHz).

See Also

References

  • Beardon 1985: Colin Beardon, Computer Culture: the information revolution in New Zealand (published by Reed Methuen, isbn 0 474 00047 8).
  • Hine 1987: John H. Hine Research Networks in New Zealand.