It's the Internet's 30th Birthday

Superloop is set to celebrate the Internet’s 30th Birthday in Australia! More than 400 industry leaders, pioneers, technologists, entrepreneurs, decision makers, executives and policy makers will gather on the 31st October to remember the history – and re-imagine the future – of the Internet in Australia.

Superloop is a proud partner of this gala event which pays tribute to the pioneers of the most fundamentally transformative technology to have occurred in our lifetime.

It all started on 23 June 1989, when the first trans-Pacific link from Hawaii to Australia heralded the beginning of Australia’s connection to what would become the global Internet. From its humble beginnings in the early 1990s, Australia’s Internet presence rose steadily.  

At first, its users were early adopters - a small band of enthusiasts at the University of Melbourne on low bandwidth with dialup connections. Today it boasts a universal presence, with more than 86% of households now connected to the Internet mostly via broadband and dominating much of the nation’s commercial and social activity.

Overcoming a Difficult Heritage
The birth of the Internet faced challenges in its early days, and while adoption is ubiquitous, these difficulties have continued in our modern times. The early days of the Internet faced technical hurdles that were slowly overcome by innovation and the ingenuity of a growing band of technologists.

The first challenge was the tyranny of distance. While Australia had networks in the 1980s, distance and lack of commercial impetus meant they were not connected to global networks.

That first trans Pacific link provided just 56 kilobits of national connectivity. To put this into perspective, it's not enough to stream music and it would take a week to download a movie.

Furthermore, policy challenges remained difficult in the face of a communications medium that has no centralised control and encourages disruption of traditional models of business and governance. These challenges were in some ways more critical to the development of the Internet as we now know it.

We have seen these policy decisions continue to impact how the Internet is provisioned for Australian citizens and businesses. Today, most people take Internet access for granted. However, the gala dinner will pay tribute to its pioneers and revolutionaries who will recount the highs and lows of delivering to Australia something that many today take for granted. Superloop is proud to support this event, which acknowledges the pioneers who championed that right from the very start.  

The event will see speakers discuss what it was like being at ground zero. They will also talk about the challenges that had to be overcome. And finally, it will look ahead - what kind of future will the Internet continue to bring?

Superloop’s Commitment to High Quality Internet Access
Superloop has been making significant investments in high quality Internet access to all Australians. They have built a network that was designed for some of the biggest technology companies in the world, and it’s now available to home broadband users.  

In recent years, the rollout of the NBN has given all Australians access to fast, reliable Internet. That means better streaming, gaming, banking, shopping, socialising and browsing, Australia-wide. However, not all NBN plans are created equal.

While all providers buy the same wholesale NBN connections that home users purchase, the NBN only carries traffic between your home network and your provider's domestic or ‘backhaul' network. Beyond this point, the quality of Internet access and service you get rests upon your service provider.  

Superloop Chairman Michael Malone, said “Superloop’s vision for home Internet is providing the best possible connection. To this end, we have engineered dedicated backhaul to all 121 NBN™ POIs (Points of Interconnect) - this ensures full control over the end user experience.”

“It may seem like a small point of note, but this attention to detail is lost when home users choose smaller, cheaper providers, as they need to outsource this network. With Superloop, our network is directly linked, so if anything goes wrong, we can pinpoint the problem instantly,” added Malone.

Superloop’s IT & Telecommunications entrepreneur Bevan Slattery, and Chairman, Michael Malone are super proud to sponsor this upcoming event - Celebrating 30 Years of the Internet in Australia on the 31st October in Sydney.

To find out more about the event or attend click here.