hashtag for the event #ng11

well that was a bit of a surprise

this morning i was asked to go and help cover the broadband nextGEN conference at the nottingham conference centre and i was really surprised about the level of information i was able to get about fibre, backhaul, bulk pricing and help to possibly map the fibre connection around the national forest space.

the best part of the morning however was meeting dave carter from the manchester mdda and hearing about how they have repurposed the old sharp building in manchester and are piping over internet for startups utilising shipping containers for a reasonable price per week with super fast internet connectivity.

this appeals to me and would be another great location for a third fibrecamp hosted space allowing us to tap into the pool of geek/hacker talent in the manchester area.

interesting news about 'service' centres in which antenna is one and i believe the dotted line is nearly signed for the ultraband service is nottingham - this should bring much needed additional connectivity.  i just need to align planets now to have our first product for sale as part of the fibrecamp brand within the next few months.

i made a great number of contacts valuable for help in providing a super internet connection (a combination probably of fibre/radio) into the ark location in the heart of the national forest.  people who can help with talking to companies next door for instance that already have fibre about using their duct to bring in fibre connectivity.  with just 10 meg up and down we could have a decent HD stream going out from a few cameras on site ;)

quicklink | go-connect.co.uk

disclaimer straight off the bat! - i'm working with mygocard who provide the go: connect service as an additional product. i have paid for the service myself and will be reviewing it in the normal way with no bias whatsoever to the company.

ok. glad that is done!

as some of you will be aware i have been disconnected from the internet at home for quite some time (over six months) and have been using 3g dongles to enable me to use the internet when at home. this has caused me to consume the internet in a different way and also highlighted to me the price of connectivity when using such a dongle/bandwidth system - with fixed broadband at home bandwidth is not one of those things that you spend too much time thinking about.

as i am very keen to rent/houseshare the property having internet in the property is paramount. having looked around for a way to get it back on i was told about go: connect the partner phone service from mygocard which has a much lower re-connection fee than if i went back and asked BT to do it.

It actually worked out better all round what with the £11 a month flat fee for the line rental and then only £5.99 for my internet - all of this being take from mygocard prepaid mastercard which is perfect because it allows me to pay directly from my card without having to worry about another direct debit from a bank account. i believe that BT require over £100+ for reconnection - my engineer arrived (funnily enough a BT openreach van) and was done and out the door within fifteen minutes of his arrival.

I was a little let down on the day that the router equipment had not come ahead of time but i'm to expect it after the installation date. the distributer/reseller policy is that the installation has to work and go ahead because they send out the ready configured router i presume - normally this is next day but it failed to arrive on this occasion. i'm guessing that it will arrive at some point today. a minor frustration that i hope with working though the customer feedback will enable mygocard to alter the way the installation is handled.

one of the good things about the way that the go: connect package works is no credit checks. my credit history is terrible what with the mortgage issues and the arrears on the house since i have been out of work in the last six months so trying to get back on the internet has been a pain. having to go and drink coffee every other day or scrape money together to purchase bandwidth with 3g dongles and the slow speed that they normally run out can make it impossible to get things sent up and done on the internet.

i see the go: connect isp service more than just an isp distributor. it is using the same ethos as the mygocard prepaid mastercard product to actually help digital inclusion for those unemployed or low income families by giving them a way to get reconnected and manage the money they do have. i'm sure there are many other services that are better, faster and have more features than the go: connect offering but for the low income family trying to keep their head above water in these difficult recession times the price and offering is one that will enable many to search actively for work again online.

i'll update you with reliability and upload/download speeds once i have done some more testing.

So i'm sitting in the fourth row up with what looks like the only power socket in this room that is dedicated normally to the cleaner. the room is quite busy with about 100 people turning up for the event this morning. i'm looking forward to the first workshop and finding out what is happening to make super fast internet speeds a reality in rural locations.

This really does tie in massively with the fibre project that we are undertaking at conkers at the heart of the national forest and it will give me a clearer overview of what is happening and what sort of timescales we can expect these things to come to fruition.

I'll be updating this blog entry this morning and trying to 'liveblog' various elements that really stand out.