A hilarious picture brought to you by Digi, who have just launched rediscoverbroadband.com.my. The expression is priceless, and I really salute the artist who put it together - first thing, getting a visual reference is hard, and doing it semi-photorealistically with the expression is not easy.

Anyway, oh yeah, the packages - seems to be around the same price as Maxis Broadband. (RM128). It’s interesting that they choose to highlight also the fair usage quota of 50GB. (50GB is roughly…152 episodes of Gossip Girl in high quality video, or approximately 3413 Youtube videos).

Which is pretty decent, given that at some point my entire office used around 50-80GB a month. This is interesting - now all three telcos are using the ’sanitary pad’ style USB broadband modem! Also, there seems to be a rebranding of their internet services as ‘Digi Internet’ instead of ‘Digi Mobile Broadband’ as previously.

This doesn’t seem to have been promoted a lot - and you can only apply via the Digi SS2 outlet, strangely enough.

Btw, did you know that turtles cannot survive without their shells? A turtle without its shell is a dead turtle - it is part of them, not like a hermit crab which can survive without a shell.

Meanwhile, something suspicious is going on at P1 Wimax’s site (owned by Green Packet). Their site is interestingly, down for maintenance, with little explanation. Even the subpages indexed on Google are redirected to the maintenance page. This is the only thing you see when you go to p1.com.my:

This is either a sign that something screwed up really badly - OR - they are launching something new. Given that I’ve met a lot of the people there and they are a smart bunch, and that it is about 2AM as I post this, it’s likely they are doing some major updates to the site. Will wait excitedly and see.

Update: It’s now 4:46AM, same day, and there seems to be a new site up! I’m probably one of the first to see it.

They seemed to have merged the sites - there is no longer both a flash version and a html version (as a web designer, I have to say that those kind of arrangements are very impractical to maintain). The new site works quite well - I like the implementation of Flash here, it’s simple enough yet the little touches (slides, fades, etc) give it a nice polish.

Pricewise - P1 has a competitive low entry point with packages starting from RM49 monthly(!), but here’s what’s interesting -

- Digi is offering download speeds of 3.6 Mbps for approx RM143 (it was sneaky of Digi though to put different prices for the first 6 months and for the second 6 months.), with 50GB fair usage threshold.
- P1 is offering download speeds of 2.4 Mbps for approx RM199 a month with 40GB fair use threshold.

It remains to be seen whether:
- Digi and P1 will compete on pricing
- Or download speed

And oddly enough:

- It’s interesting that there are a lot of styling cues that are similar on both websites: Use of light grey, rounded font for headlines (VAG Rounded or Arial Rounded I believe), curved boxes, slanted fonts - these were design conventions that were established first by P1 in most of their marketing materials, especially the outdoor advertising. There is probably reason to believe this is intentional on Digi’s part, sort of a creative hijack that would work to their advantage perhaps? The turtle is a very original touch though Did I mention I like the turtle? Hahaha!

It’s interesting that BOTH of them are putting out the ‘fair usage threshold’ clearly in their materials. This may be a sign of tighter regulation on the part of the MCMC.

My thoughts? I would sign up for the first one available with decent coverage and speed in my area, regardless of RM50 or so difference

Generally, these point to good times for broadband, with Digi and P1 now set to compete. And yes, even for TMNet - I recently was invited to and attended a session to ‘revive’ the long dead TM Net User Group, and managed to have a good talk with TM Net staff, and upper management. There was also a detailed technical briefing as well as statistics shared on call centre complaints (yes, really!). There are some interesting things ahead, and I will be blogging about it soon.

Btw, I also have another blog now. If you like reading blogs, go read it.

I would now like to end with a joke…about turtles!

Q: What did the snail say when he rode on top of the turtle?
A: Wheeeeee!

(If you don’t get it, it’s okay…)

Lately, me and everyone else who uses Streamyx have been getting slow speeds and frequent timeouts. Guess it’s going to be about a week more for things to return to normal.

From The Star

Circuit faults slow down Internet

PETALING JAYA: Streamyx broadband users will have to bear with sluggish surfing speeds until March 5 due to technical problems, according to a statement by Telekom Malaysia Bhd ™.

The statement said there has been a disruption of TM’s Internet services since Feb 18 due to circuit faults on the Asia Pacific Cable Network 2 (APCN2) between Malaysia and the United States.

Due to this, customers using Internet services may now experience slow browsing while accessing content hosted in the United States, said the statement.

Additionally, customers using Internet Protocol services such as Virtual Private Network (VPN) and other critical business applications linked to the United States may also experience some service degradation.

To alleviate the problem and ease the congestion, some links have been rerouted, TM said.

Hello. This starts off as a “summary type post” written inspired by the following article on BusinessWeek. The article : Ten Stories that Defined Broadband in 2008 actually talks about broadband globally (with a definite US slant), and I recommend you read it before reading my comments below - which are relevant to Malaysia.

And then later on, it’s followed by a summary of some hopes for 2009, some random comments, and further developments for RedesignMalaysia.com in 2009.

1. Optical cable cuts bookmark the year

A total of three cables went out throughout the year 2008, but thankfully, internet access here wasn’t quite as badly affected as it was last time when the Taiwan earthquake affected our connection locally. As this time, it was only if you were surfing a website that was hosted in Europe or countries close to it that you would be affected.

Details on what happened here at MalaysianWireless

2. Peering Troubles Disrupt the Internet

Probably irrelevant to most Malaysians, as it is mainly a US issue between Cogent, Telia & Sprint.

3. The unwelcome rise of metered broadband.

In the time to come, it looks like local ISPs such as Streamyx will continue throttling P2P downloads. So much for “unlimited broadband”. It’s easy to market something as “unlimited”, and while most of this may be fine and unnoticed for newbie users, those that have legitimate needs for things such as video streaming, P2P and online gaming will definitely feel that they are getting shortchanged.

It remains to be seen if TM Streamyx will either:

a) provide true “unlimited” access to all
b) admit in a way that “unlimited” was a misleading term, and start offering uncapped packages at different price levels.
c) continue exactly as the way it is

Option A is unlikely, Option B is possible (but will look bad for them), and Option C unfortunately, is the most likely.

If you’re interested to see what other local ISPs to do cope with P2P traffic, read more here.

4. Wireless Broadband Takes Wings, Thanks To The iPhone 3G

There is an astounding amount of Malaysians with iPhones (well, at least among my friends). Considering that its not officially launched here, and neither do Maxis, Digi or Celcom support it officially, its quite interesting that people here have taken the trouble to crack the phone and get it to work. You cannot get an iPhone from the local Apple store - the only way is to buy it from overseas, or get it from a grey market retailer.

But anyway, the topic here is basically surfing on mobile. Local mobile wireless surfing is rapidly growing due to devices such as the iPhone, and smart phones. Which brings us to the likely conclusion of what we may see more of soon: Phone + Laptop + Internet Access packages. This is a good thing, provided that the package actually makes things cost less rather than more.

5. Planet Broadband

There are now 400 million broadband users in the planet. Malaysia still lags behind in terms of speed, price and availability. Meanwhile, Singapore which is like, 50 times smaller than Malaysia can offer broadband packages of 100 Mbps and in the United Kingdom, there are 50Mbps connections available.

Meanwhile, in Malaysia, we’re stuck with an average of 1-2, with a upper limit of 5-10 Mbps which tend to be for expensive corporate packages. There’s a rumour going around that Google wanted to host a datacenter in Malaysia, however, there is insufficient bandwidth available for their needs.

6. Outages become commonplace

In 2008, even Google, Yahoo and Amazon went down due to increased load. Malaysians will find its nothing new as we frequently are unable to access all kinds of websites on a regular basis, though, not due to problems on the part of the websites themself - rather, our connection to the internet.

7. Clearwire and the divergent fortunes of Wimax

Wimax wise in Malaysia, P1 (Packet One) Wimax is gaining some ground, together with the unfortunately obcure AsiaSpace Amax (which seems to cover only select parts in Klang Valley). YTL has missed the deadline in implementing Wimax, while Redtone has launched corporate broadband services in Sabah. More news here.

8. Troubles Return To Telecom Land

In the US, the banking, automotive, property and telecoms industry were affected by the credit crunch. Locally though, we have a dubious situation: Not many companies are affected, simply because there aren’t that many companies and choices around.

9. Good-bye, Mr Martin

While this references an FCC chairman who is largely responsible for US Telecommunication related items, it’ll be interesting to see how Barack Obama’s new team and new FCC leader will affect connectivity in the US and consequently, the world. Malaysia is very much dependent on international connectivity as well - eg, most of us use MSN Messenger, and use Google for search, etc.

Conclusion & Other News

Mobile Number Portability was probably one of the bigger things to happen in 2008 for the local telecommunications industry, and definitely shook things up. Both Digi and Celcom seem to be benefiting from this so far.

Btw, there’s now a new mobile operator apparently! If you like the novelty of having your number start with 010 (eg 010-3456789), check out XOX or news here. And if you find the service sucks, you can always keep the number, and switch operator.

Let’s hope 2009 is a better year for broadband in Malaysia! Hopefully the competitiveness happening with Mobile Number Portability in the telco field will spill over into broadband, or result in some smart “joint packages” of sorts. For example, an incentive for telcos to keep their customers from switching: Offer a broadband + mobile service package to make it cheaper/more convenient overall for customers to stay with them.

If you’re wondering what I use personally, and my thoughts on it as a consumer (it may help you make a decision if you have similiar usage patterns): If you’re planning to use a mobile broadband package: DON’T USE MAXIS BROADBAND. I did, and it was terrible. Slower than dialup although they told me my area was covered. I’m still using them for my mobile service, however that may change. There were quite a bit of dropped calls in November 2008, as well as recently, I find that SMSes need to be recent.

The BlackBerry Bold promotion for Celcom is quite tempting (switch your line to Celcom, get a free Blackberry Bold if you use above RM500 a month), though I wonder if their mobile coverage is decent (I used to have quite a bit of issues reaching people on Celcom numbers - including one of the children of someone in upper Celcom management!). I’m still using Streamyx at home/work, and its been mostly reliable in my area (Aman Suria/Dataran Prima/Tropicana/Kelana Jaya). However I’ll probably be considering the following options for broadband too: P1 (as soon as they launch in my area), or Digi or Celcom (depending if I get the Bold).

Meantime, in 2009 I resolve to update this blog more often. Hopefully even a few times a week, however most likely shorter, “breaking news” type articles. We’re still the number one result for “malaysia broadband” on Google as of 2007, 2008 and now 2009 - and hopefully, I will be able to update this blog more often and add new features (such as the broadband coverage map which is due for a rehaul).

Given that Advertlets.com (which is my day job and 1.8 year old baby startup) is set to expand quite a bit in 2009 with a new injection of funding and staff, I hope to be able to also put together a volunteer team for RedesignMalaysia to make sure this site continues to expand as well. Drop me a mail at RedesignMalaysia@Advertlets.com if you’re interested to contribute. Telcos and broadband providers are also welcome to contact me to share details - things like your IP ranges, and coverage information will be very useful. Cheers!

PS: Also look out for The Star this Sunday. Why? Oh, no particular reason

There’s a new site up at www.saveandinvest.my . The purpose of the site is to encourage Malaysians to save money, and share their tips with others.

The part which I feel might interest you is the following: The prize of free broadband for a year - a 1 yearsubscription to Celcom Broadband for the best tips submitted.

I’ve posted up two tips so far: (go vote for them!)

Phone Bills : TM Net Streamyx Combo for new residences (waive fixed line rental fee)
It links back to this site (of course, haha), which shares the list of ISPs with pricings.

General : List of broadband service providers in Malaysia with prices
Two, a tip on how you can save on your phone bills through the TMNet Streamyx Combo which waives your fixed line bills.

Check out the site, and do post your own tips as well. I’ll be just as happy if one of the blog readers here read this.

Will be posting more broadband tips soon Including how to choose your broadband provider and cut down your costs, various pricings of broadband service providers compared, and more.

Meantime, you can check out also what some other Advertlets Bloggers have to say about the site:

Party girl Amanda Choe shares how you can get unique pieces and lower prices at flea markets
Naomi Tham writes about how sleeping early can save you money.
Student LogicYuan is smart and suggests charging your phone at work/at school.
UncleJosh talks about the growing global financial slowdown and offers some tips on how to go on dates cheaper
AprilCherrie takes you on a step by step tutorial on how to post up your tips on the site

Till then, cheers.

This news struck me as a surprise, and was relatively quietly announced - I didn’t get to know about it until someone told me recently.

Apparently, TM is the lead player in a consortium to implement an Asia-US submarine cable, formed by AT&T Inc. (USA), Bharti AirTel (India), Government of Brunei Darussalam (Brunei), British Telecom Global Network Services (UK), CAT Telekom (Thailand), Eastern Telecommunications Philippines Inc. (Philippines), Indosat (Indonesia), Pacific Communications Pte Ltd (Cambodia), Philippines Long Distance Telephone Co. (Philippines), PT Telkom (Indonesia), Saigon Postal Corporation (Vietnam), StarHub (Singapore), Telstra (Australia), Telecom New Zealand International (New Zealand), Viettel (Vietnam) and Vietnam Post & Telecommunications Group of Vietnam (Vietnam).

The cable is called the AAG, or Asia America Gateway. The AAG will provide a seamless direct link between the US and other Asian countries via one single cable. It also has the ability to be expanded to Australia, India, Africa, and Europe. Spanning over 20,000 km, AAG will link Malaysia to the US via Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Vietnam, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Guam, Hawaii and the West coast of the US. The cable system is designed to provide a capacity of up to 1.92 Terabits per second of data bandwidth.
It will have an initial capacity of 480Gbps.

TM holds 9% in the equity of the project (majority shareholder). The contract is worth approximately $US500 Million. (Which means TM’s 9% equity is $US45 million / RM157million).

A quote from CEO, Datuk Abdul Wahid Omar: “While we are present in 13 countries in the region and involved in seven existing major submarine cable consortiums, this initiative is still one of the biggest we have undertaken. It will provide TM with additional 60Gbps of capacity, which will help reduce any future potential congestion we may face.”

Another quote: As the AAG is from a single cable network, not only will it have improvements in lowering latency, it will also simultaneously ramp up the international bandwidth capacity to Malaysia at more competitive costs.”

“This impressive joint-effort will go a long way in increasing broadband uptake in this region, which will in turn increase the overall appeal for global investments and increase the competitiveness of the countries benefiting from direct links to the Asia-America Gateway,”

Analysis: Assuming this goes well, Malaysia will surpass Singapore and Thailand in being a regional hub. That means, just like how Malacca was a hub for international trade in the days of yore, Malaysia could be come a hub for international traffic.

Congratulations TM! Let’s hope this happens soon, and that we can see some speed improvements by early next year. My internet connection is getting slower as of late…and from the news article, this project is scheduled to be completed only by December 2008…

You can read more here, on IT Wire, or on TM’s press release section on its official website.