Surely those must be old Optus Aurora (not Optus Aurora Digital) boxes, because I know the engineers at Optus Satellite go to great lengths to make sure everything works with the oldest Optus Aurora Digital/VAST boxes whenever there’s a configuration change or update.
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I don’t think so. It would be a case of current domestic Aurora Digital installations and equipment not being able to last in poverty conditions.
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Announced as part of Federal Budget last night
The Albanese Government is funding the extension of the Viewer Access Satellite Television (VAST) service across regional and remote Australia for an additional seven years until 2030-31. This supports the provision of free-to-air commercial television to over 1.5 million Australians. The VAST service was established as a safety-net by the then-Labor Government in 2009-10 and, unlike the former Coalition Government who reverted to short-term contract extensions, Labor recognises the importance of stability and certainty for industry and consumers when it comes to long-term investment.
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VAST Funding Extension Provides Certainty to Regional Australia
Free TV today welcomed the announcement from Minister Rowland to extend funding of the VAST satellite service until 2031.
Free TV CEO, Bridget Fair said “This announcement is fantastic news for the 1.5 million Australians who rely on the VAST satellite platform for their free television services. After years of temporary funding commitments, Minister Rowland and the Albanese Government have provided some much needed certainty."
Free TV services connect people and communities across rural and remote areas, and are a critical source of local content, live and free sport, emergency information and trusted news. All Australians expect and rely on these services and this announcement ensures that those in our most remote locations and technology blackspots can continue to share the important moments that bring us together across the nation.
Viewer Access Satellite Television (VAST) remains critical to delivering these services in regional and remote Australia as well as other areas where terrestrial coverage is deficient. VAST was introduced in 2010 to close the digital TV divide between regional and remote Australians and those living in cities, and to ensure that all Australians can access reliable free-to-air television services, even those in our most remote locations where satellite is the only viable means of service delivery.
“We thank the Albanese Government and Minister Rowland in particular for their long-term commitment to ensuring that all Australians, regardless of where they live, can continue to come together to watch great Australian content on their televisions for free,” Ms Fair said.
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Optus welcomes Viewer Access Satellite TV (VAST) funding extension to 2031/2032
Optus welcomes the decision to extend funding for Viewer Access Satellite TV (VAST) to 2031/2032 announced by the Federal Government in the budget.
These funds will provide certainty to the 1.5 million Australians in remote and regional areas that rely on the VAST service provided by Optus satellites for free-to-air television and radio services.
Optus Vice President for Regulatory and Public Affairs Andrew Sheridan said Optus is delighted that the Albanese Government has extended funding for this important public service for an additional seven years.
“VAST provides vital access to television and radio services for 1.5 million Australians in rural and remote areas and Optus looks forward to the opportunity to continue its partnership with government to deliver this critical capability,” Mr Sheridan said.
Optus has operated the VAST platform since 2010 via its D3 and Optus 10 satellites.
VAST also provides crucial emergency broadcasting during disaster events when terrestrial infrastructure has been impacted.
The service includes about 80 television and radio channels from ABC, SBS, commercial free-to-air broadcasters Seven, Nine and Ten and community broadcasters including Imparja and National Indigenous TV.
Optus is the only network provider in Australia to own and operate its own fleet of satellites, the largest in Australia and New Zealand, underpinning its unmatched track record in delivering satellite services to rural and remote areas.
Optus provides a number of critical and sovereign satellite services throughout Australia and New Zealand in addition to VAST, including satellite broadcast capabilities for Foxtel, voice and data services, and emergency connectivity.
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So VAST has up to 1.5 million viewers? Didn’t realise it was that many.
Gives them a similar market size to Adelaide, but obviously less revenue being in renote areas where disposable incomes are generally lower as well as higher costs and 4 different free to air broadcasters involved here.
Most if not all of the revenue in the remote and infill markets would come from national advertisers. Absolutely ripe for cost-cutting and an SCA style of business.
I’ve seen stats that indicate 300 to 400 installations pretty week, being up as high as 800 back in 2017.
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I am expecting that includes the Remote WA and Remote Eastern and Central footprints as well as the fringe/infill sites outside of regular terrestrial coverage.
The ACMA determined population of Remote Central and Eastern is approx 400k and Remote and Regional WA 600k so I don’t know where they get the extra 500k from. Some would be people who don’t live in remote areas but can’t get a terrestrial signal, but that wouldn’t be anywhere near that many.
Bear in mind a large number of the above figures will be in towns with terrestrial TV which is fed from VAST.
I would think it’s Optus using the number of smart card activations as the number of households, then multiplying that by the average household size. But, that wouldn’t account for houses with more than one STB, or travellers that consist of only two people, or businesses that have it in their MATV systems.
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I don’t understand why they don’t they condense these channels to reduce their carriage of channels. NBN for example could just show each version on the one channel over five or six hours (depending if GC actually still has their own window or not).
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All of the regional news channels are a poor use of bandwidth in this regard, its not just limited to NBN News’ channels
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Agreed, the image just proves this point. Why do infills of such small markets need their bulletin repeated every two hours?
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Does the Government regulate what is put on the VAST transponders? Or can any broadcaster just pay Optus to put their service on VAST just like the Christian services did on D2?
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Pretty much.
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But it does only provide funding for the licensed commercial and National operators.
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Technically, the networks that aren’t ABC, SBS, or the commercials aren’t part of VAST. Instead, they’re narrowcasters on the Aurora Digital platform, so aren’t regulated by the government. VAST just also happens to be on the Aurora Digital Platform, but because of the boxes being VAST certified and the smart cards are activated for VAST, the whole lot is referred to as VAST. Even the support and engineering team for Aurora Digital is called VAST support.
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I like having the channels, as I watch the local Toowoomba 7 News in the mornings as I have breakfast…
Looking at the picture quality and listening to the audio I don’t think they have a terribly high Bitrate.
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I think VAST Regional News should be downsized to just NBN News, WIN News and an updates channel, as these are the only news services that don’t have an online presence. It seems very unlikely that a person who has VAST within a region that is served by one of these news bulletins, wouldn’t have access to the internet to watch it.
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