For National Communications Commission (NCC) member Hsieh Chin-nan (謝進男), the goal of delivering broadband Internet access to every village in Taiwan is the only reason for remaining in his job.
"I would have quit a long time ago if it wasn't for this [the service]," Hsieh told the Taipei Times.
His desire to execute such a challenging project started 32 years ago, when he landed a job as an assistant engineer at the radio waves department of the Directorate General of Telecommunications (DGT).
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE NCC
Hsieh was asked to help install pay phones for residents living in more than 300 remote villages. The order was given by the late premier Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) and had to be completed in two years, no matter what.
Hsieh was intimidated by the challenge. Carrying electronic equipment on his back, he hiked nearly all the meandering mountain roads in central and southern Taiwan and became familiar with some distinctive tribal cultures along the way.
He still remembers the day when the service finally became available to residents in Alishan's Shanmei Village (山美村), who previously had to travel 9km to make a 911 call.
"They were so happy that they couldn't wait to give you the best things they could offer," he said.
Hsieh later worked in the private sector for many years before securing the Taiwan Solidarity Union's (TSU) nomination to be an NCC member last year. In the meantime, the DGT was partially privatized in 1996 and was renamed Chunghwa Telecom.
The policy of offering broadband service nationwide was part of the Executive Yuan's "e-Taiwan" plan, which aims to have 99.6 percent of the nation covered by broadband next year.
Because of his previous experience, Hsieh was entrusted with the task.
He and another NCC member Lin Tung-tai (林東泰) first identified that 18 villages in Taiwan had no broadband service at all. They also found 28 villages that could only receive Internet at a transmission speed of 256 kilobites per second because of their distance from the nearest service station.
Hsieh and Lin went to these villages and attended meetings to hear about telecommunication issues from residents. For example, some complained that Chunghwa Telecom cut off services immediately if payments were missed, despite the fact that many residents have trouble traveling to the nearest service center to make payments.
Others living in remote regions said they had applied to have phones installed in their homes, but Chunghwa would only agree to do it if they were willing to pay an installation fee of more than NT$100,000.
Still others said they had been applying for ADSL services for years, but Chunghwa kept turning down their applications.
Faced with these problems, Hsieh believed that the way the Telecommunications Universal Service Fund (電信普及服務基金) was used must be changed before anything could be accomplished.
The fund was established in 2001 to prevent telecom service providers from overcharging customers if profits failed to cover costs.
By law, the fund is contributed by designated service providers.
In the past, the fund was supervised by the DGT and mainly used to subsidize companies such as Chunghwa Telecom for providing telecom services to Taiwan's outlying islands and other economically-challenged areas.
The DGT, in general, only provided subsidies at the request of telecom companies and tended not to initiate action.
Hsieh, however, faced complaints from NCC staff when he proposed that the fund be used to subsidize broadband infrastructure.
"They [the NCC staff] were used to handling the fund in a more passive manner, but we think that the fund must be actively appropriated for things people actually need," Hsieh said, adding that he spent three months communicating this to staff.
Hsieh's vision also met with resistance from Chunghwa Telecom, who, in Hsieh's words, "consider remote villages non-profit zones."
Eventually, he managed to persuade Chunghwa and some other telecom operators to voluntarily construct broadband infrastructure in some villages.
Hsieh thought both the telephone service (VoIP) and a high-speed Internet connection could be offered with a broader bandwidth. As optical fiber cables are likely to be damaged by bad weather or earthquakes, he suggested a more reliable connection could be produced using microwave signals. Chunghwa Telecom subsequently introduced broadband, Wi-Fi and Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) technologies.
While the Executive Yuan had set next year as the deadline, Hsieh was confident that the goal could be met by November.
He says approximately NT$70 million has been spent on the project.
The NCC also plans to work with Gjun PC School (巨匠電腦) to offer free Internet lessons to children.
Many questioned how much tribal villages could benefit from having such costly infrastructure available to them, but Hsieh said that one must focus on the long-term results that will follow.
"With a faster Internet connection, children in the tribes can have almost equal access to educational resources as those in cities," Hsieh said. "Young people who have chosen to return to villages can make a living on their own with such advanced technology. Aboriginal cultures in Taiwan can be made known to the world via the Internet."
Hsieh said he plans to publish two White Papers at the end of this year. In one of them he will expound the broadband construction experiences of each of the 46 villages.
With telecommunication issues solved, Hsieh is ready to take up the challenges of cable television.
When asked if his successor will share his passion after he resigns in January, he smiled.
"I'm not sure if anyone would enjoy working in an organization that is constantly chastised by the Executive Yuan for whatever they do," he said.
Taiwan is to receive the first batch of Lockheed Martin F-16 Block 70 jets from the US late this month, a defense official said yesterday, after a year-long delay due to a logjam in US arms deliveries. Completing the NT$247.2 billion (US$7.69 billion) arms deal for 66 jets would make Taiwan the third nation in the world to receive factory-fresh advanced fighter jets of the same make and model, following Bahrain and Slovakia, the official said on condition of anonymity. F-16 Block 70/72 are newly manufactured F-16 jets built by Lockheed Martin to the standards of the F-16V upgrade package. Republic of China
Taiwan-Japan Travel Passes are available for use on public transit networks in the two countries, Taoyuan Metro Corp said yesterday, adding that discounts of up to 7 percent are available. Taoyuan Metro, the Taipei MRT and Japan’s Keisei Electric Railway teamed up to develop the pass. Taoyuan Metro operates the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport MRT Line, while Keisei Electric Railway offers express services between Tokyo’s Narita Airport, and the Keisei Ueno and Nippori stations in the Japanese capital, as well as between Narita and Haneda airports. The basic package comprises one one-way ticket on the Taoyuan MRT Line and one Skyliner ticket on
A new tropical storm formed late yesterday near Guam and is to approach closest to Taiwan on Thursday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. Tropical Storm Pulasan became the 14th named storm of the year at 9:25pm yesterday, the agency said. As of 8am today, it was near Guam traveling northwest at 21kph, it said. The storm’s structure is relatively loose and conditions for strengthening are limited, WeatherRisk analyst Wu Sheng-yu (吳聖宇) said on Facebook. Its path is likely to be similar to Typhoon Bebinca, which passed north of Taiwan over Japan’s Ryukyu Islands and made landfall in Shanghai this morning, he said. However, it
Starlux Airlines, Taiwan’s newest international carrier, has announced it would apply to join the Oneworld global airline alliance before the end of next year. In an investor conference on Monday, Starlux Airlines chief executive officer Glenn Chai (翟健華) said joining the alliance would help it access Taiwan. Chai said that if accepted, Starlux would work with other airlines in the alliance on flight schedules, passenger transits and frequent flyer programs. The Oneworld alliance has 13 members, including American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific and Qantas, and serves more than 900 destinations in 170 territories. Joining Oneworld would also help boost