Talk:Spark New Zealand

NPOV ?

Let's try not to bash excessively ? We are meant to be mature adults ya'know. --2mcm^Gespräch 07:38, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree there's some real negativity there. I don't like monopolies myself, but there's no reason to have things like hacking attempts in the Telecom timeline. ie:

• "Telecom's mobile customers find out that their privacy and security is not safe on the Telecom network, when a phreaker named ^god releases an exploit to the media allowing access to almost anyone's voicemail."

It seems insignificant (every company gets hacked...), and could easily be put under criticisms. Similarly, the "we deliberately confuse people" link would fall under "effects of a monopoly" wouldn't it? Greg 01:13, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

That POV kind of dismisses what was a notable moment in time. Gattung's comments about deliberately confusing people were unusual at the time, and widely commented in the media and relevant forums. 121.75.140.188 (talk) 20:39, 20 February 2024 (UTC)

You cannot blame a monopoly for seeking profits from the monopoly. The government creates the monopoly. Not the company. --Wikismile 14:48, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Depends. Certain practices are illegal. One could argue it's wrong for a company to break the law regardless of whether the government takes action against said illegal practices (not that Telecom appears to have done much that is illegal but my point is just because a company does something and get's away with it doesn't intrinsicly mean that the company can't be blamed to a degree). On a more practical sense, whether or not a company should be expected to have a degree of ethics is an unresolved issue. Also, one could argue as part of doing business in NZ, there are implied requirements for a company to meet. In Telecom's case, there were definitely some directly implied requirements by the government as well as some explicit requirements (remember that as part of the UBS decision, Telecom has to meet a quota which they didn't meet) which Telecom did not meet hence the need for further regulation. I.E. From one point of view, any company which requires regulation, especially when what was expected of them had been spelt out, has failed their responsibility as a company operating in that community. Note that this is not to say the government wasn't stupid to expect them to meet their requirements without regulation simply that just because the government was stupid doesn't mean that Telecom can't be blamed as well. Also even from a business standpoint, there is great debate about whether what Telecom did was really the best thing for their business. Many people suggest it would have been much smarter for Telecom to look to the future and recognise the need to adapt so they will succeed as a company in the long term rather then taking the short term maximum profit POV which may result in onerous regulation and a greater loss of business then they would have achieved were they to choose a long term stratergy. This isn't simple since a company needs short term growth to maintain their shareprice obviously. But a resonable argument can be made that Telecom concentrated too much on short term growth rather the considering long term growth Nil Einne 21:09, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Economic Loss

Does anyone know where that figure of $50m-$250m loss came from? --Nzhamstar 19:26, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

I haven't got the cite (wasn't really worried about it at the time), but it was an NZ treasury finding, that much is correct : ) porges 09:47, 9 April 2006 (UTC)

==

It was based on Treasury figures: "The Telecommunications Users Association of New Zealand (TUANZ) reports that papers released under the Official Information Act 1982 reveal that "in 1996 Treasury and Ministry of Commerce officials estimated the deadweight loss on the New Zealand economy of profits earned by Telecom to be between $50 million and $250 million per year." The same publication acknowledges that Telecom and the Hon Maurice Williamson have disputed the actual figures."

https://nzinitiative.org.nz/reports-and-media/reports/regulation-of-network-industries-the-case-of-telecommunications/ Quote from TUANZ Topics, 7 August 1997, pp 1 and 4.

Hamish.MacEwan (talk) 01:23, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

T3G

Telecom has launched its dedicated 3G network back in 2009 called XT. It runs on WCDMA 850/2100. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 210.54.58.14 (talk) 16:38, 27 October 2011 (UTC) Is it really 3G? --202.36.252.2 00:54, 3 February 2006 (UTC)

It uses the CDMA 2000 connection which is listed on the 3G page. So yes it does seem so. --2mcm^Gespräch 22:52, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

The 3G network uses EVDO Rev 0 and Rev A not CDMA 2000 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 219.89.77.20 (talk) 20:23, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Expensive Internet costs

I added the figures for data costs, they are correct as of 9/4/2006. http://jetstream.xtra.co.nz/chm/0,8763,205170-203090,00.html

employees

Number in infobox appear to be incorrect. See [1] - SimonLyall 10:45, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

The figure you link to is from 2005, but I think our figure is probably much older, so I've adjusted it and done some necessary maintenance to the article.-gadfium 20:31, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

CDPD in 1996

In 1996 Telecom New Zealand announced that it was to launch the first Cellular Packet Data network in New Zealand. The network was to use Cellular Digital Packet Data (CDPD) that was an overlay on the Ericsson AMPS Cellular network. The system supported IP addressing and 19.2Kbps data rates and was connected to the internet. The Product manager who developed the product and set up the service under the product name AirData was David Beale. The system was sold commercially in 1997 and the first customer was NZ Post who used it for wireless courier parcel scanners. CDPD was used to provide telemetry data from Americas cup yacht races in Auckland and feed the realtime TV graphics service.

The regulation announcement

I thought this was leaked wasn't it? Or was it leaked on the 1st then announced officially on the 3rd? --Nzhamstar 19:13, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

It was leaked to Telecom. The Telecom people who received it called up their lawyers and I believe they decided they would have to tell their shareholders and informed the government. The government then brought forward the announcement from it's planned date of during the budget Nil Einne 15:09, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

Re-word?

The selling price is still considered by many to be extremely low, given that Telecom had a monopoly of all phone lines in New Zealand at the time. Others consider that the capital requirements to modernise the network were better provided by private enterprise than the government.

This may need to be reworded. There's obviously no reason why one can thibk the selling price was low but also think privatisation per se was for the best because of the capital requirements 203.109.240.93 00:04, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

xtra as a sub-heading of telecom nz

a lot of the media coverage applies to both telecom and xtra, and the two are seen as one and the same in the public eye. i propose merging the two, with xtra as a sub-heading within Telecom New Zealand Inzy 10:57, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

While their business practices are linked to some extent, they have different businesses and different competitors (although the difference between broadband and telephony does get more muddled as time goes by with many ISPs now offering telephone services). Xtra has a substantial article of its own. I oppose a merge.-gadfium 19:42, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

In the eye of an antipodes (the Netherlands) they are not the same. As opposed to telephony, in Internet terms New Zealand is just as near as the next town. Erik Warmelink 13:14, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

They are two notable entities that although strongly linked are best represented by separate articles. In addition, merging them would create a long article that would no doubt result in calls for it to be split into two. Given the consensus of opinion I will remove the merge tags from both articles.--Mendors 20:45, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

A sub-section for Xtra has been added, even if only as a place-holder for the Xtra article. It may be worth expanding on the new 'Local loop unbundling' sub-section to take into account the increasing importance of Chorus (the new infrastructure division). Deepred6502 (talk) 10:33, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Contradiction

I've put on a contradiction template, due the said market share not quite adding up. Vodafone says that they have 55% market share, and Telecom says that they have 49%. It doesn't take a mathmatical genius to realise that this adds up to 104%, and this doesn't include other companies. Laydan Mortensen (talk) 00:30, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

It's a contradiction in the sense that Census data on ethnicity doesn't ever add up to 100. Many people have both a Telecom and a Vodafone. The market is technically 'over saturated'. -- Greaser (talk) 19:43, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I think thats a fair enough reason to remove the contradiction template, unless anyone else has a problem with it Matt (talk) 11:31, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Removed.-gadfium 19:35, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Number availability as an "advantage"

How is it an advantage to Telecom for them to have 10 million numbers available to Vodafone's 3.4million when the country only has a population of just over 4 million? Also what is the source for this information? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 146.171.254.66 (talk) 05:05, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Every SIM needs a number, including ones people aren't using at the moment and ones that are in stores waiting to be sold.Glenn Anderson (talk) 08:31, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Yea but there's no barrier for Vodafone or anyone to extend their numbers to 11 digits or beyond, and it's not like either of them are running out of numbers anyway. I don't think this is very relevant at all. --antilived^{T | C | G} 08:22, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Xtra ISP page?

Is this relevant considering it's not been used? Also, the overall feel of this document has an anti-Telecom tone. Mattcohen1 (talk) 03:53, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you mean "it's not been used". Are you saying that the subheading "Xtra (ISP)" has no content at present? It should have a summary of Xtra (ISP). This article overall needs reorganisation. Much of it is a timeline and should be rewritten as prose. The criticisms of the company need to be better integrated into the article, balanced and sourced.-gadfium 06:19, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Vagueness, weasel words and lack of citations in this article.

Hi guys, just looking over this article and there are several statements/assertions made that have no references to back them up. The second paragraph of the lead, for instance, is full of weasel words, but no citations (should this paragraph even be in the introduction?). In other places it is more a general vagueness which is the problem, such as in this passage in the Local Loop Unbundling section: Then, in early-June, the Commission announced that calls between a landline and a mobile phone within a geographically defined boundary could be connected free of termination charges. The ruling allowed Vodafone to establish a mobile phone product which could also provide free local calling, in direct competition with a product for which Telecom had long had a monopoly (the government, when it sold Telecom, enshrined free residential local calling as something it must continue with). Reading this, I am left with no idea whatsoever of what the product was that Telecom had which Vodafone's vaguely outlined product competed with, and the result is a borderline meaningless paragraph. Furthermore, given the heavily media-exposed subject matter of the article, I have no doubt that citations for any given part of the article would be easily found. I will attempt to reorganise and find references for some of the material, as suggested by other editors above, although I'm not sure what to do with the example passage given. Genedecanter (talk) 05:37, 22 July 2009 (UTC)

Hi again. I haven't looked at this article for quite some time, but can see that there has been very little change in the past few years. As an overall piece, there seems to be a general POV issue with some writing coming from a clearly anti-Telecom stance. In particular, I feel that the Criticism section should be disestablished entirely, and relevant and referenced aspects of it probably absorbed into the History section. If anyone disagrees with this appraisal let me know; otherwise, I intend to start re-working the page in the next few days. Genedecanter (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 05:11, 2 January 2012 (UTC).

Purchases?

Missing, would appear to be mention of the purchase of Computerland & Gen-i ??? 146.171.254.97 (talk) 20:48, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

XT outage

I'm surprised no one has written anything on the high profile outages yet. I've made a rudimentary attempt on adding a section in the criticisms section, feel free to expand it. --antilived^{T | C | G} 02:25, 18 February 2010 (UTC)

Split off chorus section

It is announced Chorus will be split off into a new company with its own shares. Should we split this article as well? F (talk) 03:42, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Not Recommended - as the precise nature of the split is not yet known, it would be best to hold off on deciding whether to split the article, or to create something new which links/refers back to historically accurate information here.Greyskinnedboy  Talk  05:49, 6 July 2011 (UTC)

My gut feeling would also be to start a new article from scratch. After all, this article might as well describe what the situation was up to the point the company was broken up, and what has happened since. So the Chorus article should stand on its own and not just be a split from this article. In fact, I'll remove the tag - feel free to put it back if you feel strongly about this, but come back here for further discussion. Schwede66 06:41, 3 October 2011 (UTC)

Article restructuring

I'm in the process of doing an overhaul of this article, in particular from a structural point of view. The biggest thing I want to tackle is the History section, which is much too unwieldy. So what I am planning to do is reduce this thoroughly, leaving it as more an overview of the history from a company perspective. Then, details like broadband and mobile points of interest can be transferred to their relevant sections. Genedecanter (talk) 04:20, 3 January 2013 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: page moved. Ollieinc (talk) 07:46, 8 August 2014 (UTC)

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Telecom New Zealand → Spark New Zealand – As of today, Telecom New Zealand is now Spark New Zealand. [2] pcuser42 (talk) 02:35, 8 August 2014 (UTC)

Support - I have requested a speedy deletion of the Spark New Zealand page to make way for the move. Ollieinc (talk) 05:48, 8 August 2014 (UTC)

---

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Name change

Should all mentions of Telecom New Zealand be changed to Spark New Zealand? I've started on the pages, below, but I don't want to continue just to be reverted.

• Advanced Mobile Phone System
• Economy of the Cook Islands
• Telecommunications in the Cook Islands
• Local-loop unbundling (partial)

Ollieinc (talk) 08:04, 8 August 2014 (UTC)

I think whenever we mention what Telecom did before the name change, we should still use the name Telecom. 166.179.71.15 (talk) 08:53, 14 August 2014 (UTC)

Agreed. If a sentence talks about what the company did when it was called Telecom, leave it as Telecom (so "Telecom introduced the XT Network in..." stays as-is). pcuser42 (talk) 21:28, 14 August 2014 (UTC)

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