IrelandOffline

Will 5G come to the rescue of rural Ireland ?

Will 5G come to the rescue of rural Ireland ? We thought that 5G could be the best hope rural areas have when it comes to getting high-speed internet access.  But we fear that nothing will change enough to make a difference and the have-nots will still go without. Here we are in April 2019 and I fear that will be the case — we’re certain now it will never be the panacea that was promised. Network Some time ago carriers were saying that spectrum licensing would be the greatest hurdle to being able to provide rural broadband using 5G...

mobile blackspots in Ireland

Today we are happy to share with you the work of the Department of Rural and Community Development, they’ve allegedly  been mapping “mobile blackspots” across the country. So without further ado or commentary about the quality of the data, here is the data as presented: 1. 2018_06_05 Blackspot FINAL – Cork 2. 2018_06_05 Blackspot FINAL – Donegal 3. 2018_06_05 Blackspot FINAL – Galway 4. 2018_06_05 Blackspot Westmeath 5. 2018_06_20 Blackspot Meath FINAL 6. Dept S Mobile Blackspots Mayo 7. Blackspot_Extent_Point_Locatio28_05_18   Enjoy!

The mysterious MSE “Liaison Committee”

The mysterious MSE “Liaison Committee” So we in IrelandOffline have asked some questions about this mysterious Liaison Committee that was first mentioned in the Smyth report and these are the answers we received: Who is on the Committee? The Liaison Committee was set up in accordance with the terms of the Concession Agreements to facilitate ongoing communications between the MSE and the Contracting Authority in order to achieve efficient delivery of the services as required under the Concession Agreement. The committee consists of representatives of the Department, a representative of the Local Authorities (Chief Executive) and representatives of the Concessionaire (enet)....

The National Broadband Plan – the process from hell

The National Broadband Plan – the process from hell Eamonn Wallace, spokesman for IrelandOffline said “Once again, last week, we witnessed a government in chaos. First they ask an independent auditor of the NBP to produce a report stating that the process that he has been involved in since the beginning is perfectly fine and no “damage has been done” and no-one did anything “wrong”, while generally this may be considered to be a correct assessment it actually does open up many more questions than it actually answers…it’s almost like the report’s conclusions were drawn up in advance and the...

Virgin Media – pirates of suburbia

Another Study Shockingly Discovers That Cable TV Needs To Compete On Price from our “well-duh” department For the last decade the cable and broadcast industry (Sky now Comcast) and UPC (now rebranded Virgin Media) have gone to great lengths to deny that cord cutting (dropping traditional cable tv for streaming alternatives and/or piracy) is real. First, we were told repeatedly that the phenomenon wasn’t happening at all. Next, the industry acknowledged that, certainly, a handful of people were ditching cable, but it didn’t matter because the people doing so were losers living in their mom’s basement. Then, we were told...