Don?t hold your breath say users

Jim Weston is taking a cautious "believe it, when we see it" attitude to the news that Telecom's competitors can have access to the nationwide network resulting in a much cheaper and faster internet service for rural dwellers.
The government announced earlier this week that Telecom's monopoly of the national network of telephone lines would end, with the aim being more choice and cheaper, faster internet connections.
"It's been mooted for a long time and many are a bit ambivalent as to whether it will help," the Wairarapa Federated Farmers president said.
"The reality is that internet profits are in the large numbers in the cities and it's unrealistic to expect that a handful of people up a valley are get high priority."
Where he lives on Dyers Rock Road north of Masterton, he is lucky to get good radio reception. "We've known for a long time that satellite is the best way to get decent internet services, but it's hard to rationalise that into a farm budget."
"There's no doubt that farmers can operate much more efficiently with computers these days and those with slow access are certainly disadvantaged.
Mr Weston said emails are reasonably fast to receive, but the minute there's a graphic or photograph, it's frustratingly slow. He cited the case recently where his son helped him locate a bulldozer to buy for their farm from the United States.
"It was all so easy using the internet and we probably saved around $100,000 accessing it direct."
But when it comes to trying to find out information say on the latest meat industry prices or sheep and cattle breeding, the "poor old searching can take forever," he said.
Mr Weston said he got his first computer in 1986 when GST was introduced, "which made life a lot easier."
He now finds it invaluable for Federated Farmers business but would really like to see more affordable access to the internet for all farming people.
It's not only farming types that are holding their breath waiting to see just what this week's unbundling of Telecom will mean.
Wairarapa internet service provider, Orcon Wisenet is also adopting a "wait and see" policy. Manager, Jeremy Bradley said there were plenty of parties going on in ISP offices around New Zealand, but admits his Masterton office is taking a more conservative approach before popping the corks.
"The devil is really in the detail, and while this all looks very exciting for rural people, we're waiting to see what happens."
One who didn't wait to see what happens is Castlepoint station owners Anders and Emily Crofoot, living 64 kms from Masterton.
They have just recently completed a major internet installation, costing upwards of $20,000, purchasing their own equipment via Canning and Associates in Masterton, a specialist rural and remote wireless broadband ISP.
"We had been frustrated by the weak internet service at the coast for several years," said Mr Crofoot. He especially wanted to get a strong connection between the station homestead at Castlepoint and his stock manager's house at Otahome, 10 kms away. It got to the point sometimes when it would take an hour to download one file.
"We could see the advantage of owing our own gear so that if something goes wrong with one ISP, we can simply move to another. It makes us quite independent."
However, for most spending that sort of money is not viable when you are simply working away on your PC in a remote valley.
Mr Bradley said OrconWisenet is working hard to now see how quickly it can offer Broadband.
"The unbundling of Telecom can only be all good news for everyone."