Telstra Media

Last updated

Telstra Media
Product of Telstra
Industry Telecommunications / Media
Founded1996 as Telstra Corporation
Headquarters
Melbourne, VIC
,
Australia
Key people
Andy Penn
Group Managing Director
Services Internet service provider
News
Email
Online Television
Number of employees
10,500 (2007)
Parent Telstra
Website media.telstra.com.au

Telstra Media (formerly known as BigPond) is an Australian Internet service provider and a product of Telstra. It is Australia's largest [1] [ citation needed ] ISP and is based in Melbourne. The BigPond brand has been in the process of being phased out in favour of full Telstra branding since 2013. As of May 2016, BigPond Movies is the only remaining service using BigPond branding. [2]

Internet service provider organization that provides access to the Internet

An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides services for accessing, using, or participating in the Internet. Internet service providers may be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, non-profit, or otherwise privately owned.

In marketing, a product is an object or system made available for consumer use; it is anything that can be offered to a market to satisfy the desire or need of a customer. In retailing, products are often referred to as merchandise, and in manufacturing, products are bought as raw materials and then sold as finished goods. A service is also regarded to as a type of product.

Telstra Corporation Limited is an Australian telecommunications company which builds and operates telecommunications networks and markets voice, mobile, internet access, pay television and other products and services.

Contents

Internet

Note that the remainder of the article has not been changed to reflect the name change from BigPond to Telstra Media.

Telstra Media offers five types of Internet access;

In telecommunications, cable Internet access, shortened to cable Internet, is a form of broadband Internet access which uses the same infrastructure as a cable television. Like digital subscriber line and fiber to the premises services, cable Internet access provides network edge connectivity from the Internet service provider to an end user. It is integrated into the cable television infrastructure analogously to DSL which uses the existing telephone network. Cable TV networks and telecommunications networks are the two predominant forms of residential Internet access. Recently, both have seen increased competition from fiber deployments, wireless, and mobile networks.

Adelaide City in South Australia

Adelaide is the capital city of the state of South Australia, and the fifth-most populous city of Australia. The demonym Adelaidean is used to denote the city and its residents.

Brisbane capital city of Queensland, Australia

Brisbane is the capital of and the most populated city in the Australian state of Queensland, and the third most populous city in Australia. Brisbane's metropolitan area has a population of approximately 2.5 million, and the South East Queensland metropolitan region, centred on Brisbane, encompasses a population of more than 3.6 million.

Naked DSL – A six-week trial of two kinds of naked DSL to "assess customer demand" was launched on 1 June 2010. 'Pure DSL' having the ability to receive incoming calls and make emergency calls, and 'Naked DSL' being offered without a dial tone. [3]
Hotspot (Wi-Fi) Wi-Fi access point

A hotspot is a physical location where people may obtain Internet access, typically using Wi-Fi technology, via a wireless local area network (WLAN) using a router connected to an internet service provider.

Customer service

In 2007 a survey of 14,000 people by PC Authority magazine found BigPond users rated poorly for customer service, and less than a third considered their service a value for the money. However, BigPond argued that the survey's structure had encouraged people to provide extreme opinions. [7]

The Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO) reported 14,692 complaints against Telstra BigPond for the period 1 January 2009 – 31 March 2009. [8] This reflected 47.5% of all complaints against all internet service providers reported to the TIO in Australia in that period. Customer Service, Complaints Handling, Faults & Provision accounted for 8,103 complaints in that period.

BigPond uses offshore call centres to provide most of their technical support. The Technical Support 133933 number connects through a VoIP line to support staff based in The Philippines, by call centre outsource companies, TeleTech & Teleperformance. [9] Technical Support officers have limited ability to resolve issues and cannot refer any issue to a Complaint Handling Officer or Customer Advocate. If the support call relates to network issues the Technical Support team cannot take any action to resolve the problem.[ citation needed ]

In November 2009 Telstra chief executive David Thodey promised a "new Telstra" which will be much more responsive to its customers in a bid to improve the telco's corporate reputation, stating that the new mantra at Telstra would be "customer service, customer service, customer service", and announcing increases in speed and data allowances for BigPond customers. [10]

Services

BigPond Music

BigPond operated a music download store, offering 15 million tracks encoded at either 256kbit/s or 320kbit/s in MP3 format.

In April 2012, MOG announced a partnership with Telstra to bring MOG to Australia, the first region outside of the US to have access. [11] Telstra and MOG launched under the BigPond Music branding on 21 June 2012. [12] The BigPond Music service ended in late 2014.

BigPond Games and GameArena

GameArena was a website dedicated to video gaming operating under the BigPond brand that was managed by Mammoth Media and based on the east coast of Australia. The site provided news, downloads and servers primarily for the PC, and Mac, though it later branched out to include console sites. GameArena provided an online game shop GameNow, which sported various benefits to Telstra customers. [13]

Usage of the GameArena file library, gaming servers and booking service were freely available to anyone, but provided specific advantages to Telstra customers such as preference in downloads and unmetered usage, as well as various bonuses in competitions. In 2005, GameArena went through a new shift with the merging of GameNow and Gameshop into itself. The name became simply BigPond GameArena. [14]

GameArena once operated over 100 gaming servers, which were monitored by a volunteer force of administrators, known as GameOps. GameCreate was a service offered free of charge where users may book a server for a specific game for a 2-hour period of time. This server was private and could be used for either ladder training or social events. [15]

GameArena servers and its website closed on 20 October 2014. [16]

The Pond in Second Life

Telstra BigPond owned and operated a number of virtual islands in the online game Second Life [17] for approximately three years. BigPond closed its Second Life presence in December 2009. [18]

See also

Related Research Articles

Telecommunications in Uruguay includes radio, television, telephones, and the Internet.

Digital subscriber line is a family of technologies that are used to transmit digital data over telephone lines. In telecommunications marketing, the term DSL is widely understood to mean asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL), the most commonly installed DSL technology, for Internet access.

Telecommunications in Australia

Communication in Australia through electronic means using devices such as telephone, television, radio or computer, and services such as the telephony and broadband networks have always been important in Australia given the 'tyranny of distance' with a dispersed population. Governments have driven telecommunication development and have a key role in regulation.

Digital subscriber line access multiplexer Network equipment

A digital subscriber line access multiplexer is a network device, often located in telephone exchanges, that connects multiple customer digital subscriber line (DSL) interfaces to a high-speed digital communications channel using multiplexing techniques.

A leased line is a private bidirectional or symmetric telecommunications circuit between two or more locations provided according to a commercial contract. It is sometimes also known as a private circuit, and as a data line in the UK.

iiNet Australian internet service provider

iiNet Limited is an Australian internet service provider. It was acquired by TPG Telecom in September 2015 for $1.56 billion, but retained its retail brand name in the market. Its subsidiaries include Internode, Westnet, AAPT Limited, Adam Internet, TransACT and Netspace. The company provides ADSL-based Internet access, using their own ADSL2+ infrastructure and reselling Telstra ADSL services, as well as reselling the NBN. iiNet also provides optical-fibre, dial-up, and voice services.

Internode (ISP) business enterprise

Internode Pty Ltd is an Australian Internet service provider (ISP) that provides ADSL and NBN broadband Internet access, business-class access, web hosting, co-location, Voice over IP, and a variety of related services.

Telkom (South Africa) telecommunications provider in South Africa

Telkom SA SOC Limited is a South African wireline and wireless telecommunications provider, operating in more than 38 countries across the African continent. Telkom is a semi-privatised, 39% state-owned enterprise.

TM Net

TM Net is an Internet service provider in Malaysia. As of 2009, it was the only fixed line broadband provider in Malaysia It also provides Internet Protocol television and other multimedia services. TM Net is a wholly owned subsidiary of Malaysia's main telecommunication provider, TM Bhd.

G.992.5 is an ITU-T standard for asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) broadband Internet access. The standard has a maximum theoretical download speed of 24 Mbit/s. Utilizing G.992.5 Annex M upload speeds of 3.3 Mbit/s can be achieved.

TransACT is the trading name of TransACT Capital Communications, an Australian telecommunications company based in Canberra which provides broadband internet access, fixed telephony, cable television services, and mobile phone services in Canberra and a subset of these services in Queanbeyan, throughout South-east New South Wales and in Victoria.

TelstraClear

TelstraClear Limited was New Zealand's third-largest telecommunications company before being acquired by Vodafone New Zealand in October 2012.

Whidbey Telecom is a private, independent telecommunications company operating on the South End of Whidbey Island in Washington State, the community of Point Roberts, Washington, and its affiliate Hat Island Telephone Company on Hat (Gedney) Island. Whidbey Telecom is unusual in the region because it is locally owned and has never been a part of a larger company. Whidbey Telecom is also unusual in that 100% of the lines it services are buried underground. The company attributes this action to its mission to provide customer highly reliable telephone and Internet service in an area racked with storms that cause frequent down trees and power outages.

Permanent Internet access was first available in Australia to universities via AARNet in 1989. Pegasus Networks pioneered public use in June 1989. The first commercial dial-up Internet Service Provider (ISP) appeared in capital cities soon after, and by the mid-1990s almost the entire country had a range of choices of dial-up ISPs. Today, Internet access is available through a range of technologies, i.e. hybrid fibre coaxial cable, digital subscriber line (DSL), Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) and satellite Internet. The Australian Government, in partnership with the industrial sector, began rolling out a nationwide Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) and improved fixed wireless and satellite access through the National Broadband Network in July 2009. Subsequently, the roll out was down graded to a Multi-Technology Mix on the promise of it being less expensive with earlier completion.

Internet access is widely available in New Zealand. Like Australia, it first became accessible to university students in the country in 1989. As of October 2015, there are 1,926,000 broadband connections and 53,000 dialup connections in New Zealand, of which 1,661,000 are residential and 316,000 are business or government.

Internet in the Czech Republic

Internet in the Czech Republic and Internet access are largely provided by the private sector and is available in a variety of forms, using a variety of technologies, at a wide range of speeds and costs. In 2013, 68% of Czechs were connected to the Internet.

The prevalent means of connecting to the Internet in Germany is DSL, introduced by Deutsche Telekom in 1999. Other technologies such as Cable, FTTH and FTTB (fiber), Satellite, UMTS/HSDPA (mobile) and LTE are available as alternatives.

Internet in the United Kingdom

The United Kingdom has been involved with the Internet since it was created. The telecommunications infrastructure provides Internet access to businesses and home users in various forms, including cable, DSL, and wireless. The Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for the United Kingdom is .uk and is sponsored by Nominet.

Broadband Internet in Israel has been available since the late 1990s in theory, but it only became practical to most customers in 2001. By 2008, Israel has become one of the few countries with developed broadband capabilities across two types of infrastructure—cable and DSL—reaching over 95% of the population. Actual broadband market penetration stands at 77%, ranked 7th in the world. in 2010, Israel was ranked 26th in The Economist's Digital Economy Rankings.

References

  1. ↑ Lawley, Brian (2012). 42 Rules of Product Management (2nd Edition). Happy About. ISBN   9781607730910.
  2. ↑ Coyne, Allie (18 May 2016). "Telstra hits another nail in BigPond coffin". IT News. Retrieved 18 October 2016.
  3. ↑ "Telstra BigPond trials naked DSL". Ben Grubb, ZDNet.com.au. 2 June 2010. Archived from the original on 4 June 2010. Retrieved 2 June 2010.
  4. ↑ "Mobile Broadband Coverage". Telstra. Archived from the original on 23 January 2010. Retrieved 19 January 2010.
  5. ↑ "Telstra Wireless Hotspots". Telstra.com.au. Archived from the original on 28 December 2009. Retrieved 19 January 2010.
  6. ↑ "Satellite plans and pricing". My.bigpond.com. Archived from the original on 28 February 2009. Retrieved 2010-01-19.
  7. ↑ Ramadge, A (7 December 2007). "Telstra's BigPond bombs out with consumers". News.com.au. Retrieved 17 March 2010.
  8. ↑ Archived 21 May 2009 at the Wayback Machine
  9. ↑ Schneiders, Ben (10 October 2008). "Telstra jobs head to Philippines". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 17 March 2010.
  10. ↑ Korporaal, Glenda (27 November 2009). "ETS pushes Telstra issue to parliamentary backburner". The Australian. Retrieved 17 March 2010.
  11. ↑ http://exchange.telstra.com.au/2012/04/17/mog-powered-by-telstra-a-massive-deal-for-music-lovers/
  12. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 29 June 2012. Retrieved 6 February 2016.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  13. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 14 March 2008. Retrieved 2008-02-27.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) ITWire article on GameNow
  14. ↑ http://pcworld.idg.com.au/index.php?id=976973335 PC World GameArena article
  15. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 27 September 2007. Retrieved 23 December 2007.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) GameArena list of servers
  16. ↑ "Telstra confirms it is closing Game Arena". MCV Pacific. 16 September 2014. Retrieved 30 June 2015.
  17. ↑ "The Pond on Second Life". My.bigpond.com. Retrieved 23 November 2011.
  18. ↑ Hearn, Louisa (17 November 2009). "BigPond pulls plug on Second Life". Sydney Morning Herald. Archived from the original on 20 January 2010. Retrieved 19 January 2010.
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