by optic fibres so cheap to lay and and maintain that there is no longer any economic sense even in maintaining the towers as a back-up. What's happening now is stage two. Having fibred up the long distance routes, the two major Oz Telcos (Optus and Telstra) have embarked on a massive roll-out of optic fibres to the surburban streets. They're planning to link these optic pipes to individual homes via conventional coaxial cables (rather like the ones connecting your TV to the antenna). Although we're being told that the major reason for the roll-out is to deliver Pay-TV services, in reality that's only a small part of the story. The major reason is the battle for market share of the telephony market. (In the USA where Pay-TV is well established, its total revenue is less than 20% of that which US telephone companies generate. In addition, the profit-to-revenue ratio posted by US Pay Operators is only a fraction of that posted by the phone companies). Compared to telephony, Pay-TV is a marginal business. In Australia, Telstra has an effective monopoly on the copper wire links to the home. Optus can compete on long distance calls, but on every call, it still has to pay Telstra for the use of the copper wire links between the subscriber and the local exchange. That's why Optus is so interested in laying optic fibre down your street. Instead of investing in an obsolete technology like copper wire, they've put their money on optic