This thorough, controversial and enlightening book takes us from small beginnings to today's borderless world where fast, pervasive always-on Internet has arrived at our digital doorstep. It backgrounds the evolution of electronic communications in New Zealand from the telegraph and telephone, through to advances in computer and Internet technology which continue to transform government, business, communities and our personal lives. From promising beginnings-New Zealand was the fi rst nation in Asia-Pacific to fully connect to the US-based Internet backbone-werre lead to the question of what went so wrong that a nation of early adopters of technology and the Internet plummeted to the bottom of the OECD scorecard for broadband, research development and technology reinvestment. We look at just why New Zealand has had to re-regulate the telecommunications market and, looking ahead, examine what happens when telecommunications, broadcasting, entertainment and computing converge on a common platform. Connecting the Clouds takes the reader on an informative and entertaining ride through our telecommunications history and the people who have shaped it.
This comprehensive, thoroughly researched and illustrated book provides invaluable insights into the evolving communications framework that helped New Zealand shift from an isolated outpost of the British Empire to a nation of digital pioneers intimately connected and active in the emerging global village. Writer Keith Newman has conducted over 100 interviews with visionaries and scientists, computer programmers, telecommunications experts, engineers, business leaders andpoliticians, including those who have played a part in the rise of the Internet and those who will drive it forward into the next wave. The result is a fascinating, highly readable account that marks a key chapter in New Zealand's development as a modern nation.