This is the author's interpretation of the effect of the Telecommunications Act 1996 which comes into effect on 1 July 1997. Only the effect on a UPN using optical links is considered here. The effect on other types of links, particularly cable, are complicated and will be examined sometime in the future.
The impact of the legislation depends to a very large extent on whether any part of the UPN falls within the definition of a network unit. The owner of a network unit that is used to supply carriage services to the public must hold a carrier licence unless responsibility for the unit is transferred from the owner to a carrier. Carrier licences are subject to conditions and fees.
"There are 4 types of network unit:
(a) a single line link connecting distinct places in Australia, where the line link meets certain minimum distance requirements;
(b) multiple line links connecting distinct places in Australia, where the line links meet certain minimum distance requirements;
(c) a designated radiocommunications facility;
(d) a facility specified in a Ministerial determination."
In order to determine whether a UPN node or link is a network unit, consider each of the four types of network unit in turn.
For types (a) and (b), we need to determine what a line link is.
"A facility other than a line does not form part of any line link."
"line means a wire, cable, optical fibre, tube, conduit, waveguide or other physical medium used, or for use, as a continuous artificial guide for or in connection with carrying communications by means of guided electromagnetic energy."
An unguided optical link does not seem to fall within the definition of line. There is no continuous artifical guide connecting distinct places in Australia. An unguided optical UPN link is therefore not a line link.
Consider now type (c) network units, designated radiocommunications facilities. It is a tortuous path through the Act then through the Radiocommunications Act of 1992, but the applicability of this definition of a network unit appears to depend on the following definition of "radio emission" in the Radiotelecommunications Act.
"For the purposes of this Act, a radio emission is any emission of electromagnetic energy of frequencies less than 420 terahertz without continuous artificial guide, whether or not any person intended the emission to occur."
420 terahertz is just in the visible part of the spectrum, close to the boundary with the infrared. It therefore appears that an optical link using any part of the visible spectrum above 420 terahertz is not a designated radiocommunications facility, and is therefore not a type (c) network unit.
The Minister can determine that a facility is a network unit. To the author's knowledge, the Minister has not determined that an optical link which uses a frequency above 420 terahertz is a network unit.
It is concluded that a UPN based on optical links using light of a frequency greater than 420 terahetz does not incorporate "network units", and is consequently not subject to most of the restrictions and costs imposed by the legislation.
It appears that a UPN node owner who configures his node to source information or data would be classified as a content service provider. A service provider must comply with the service provider rules that apply to the provider.
While the author has not examined these rules in detail, they appear to apply also to the owners of BBSs, fax machines configured to deliver information on request by a caller, Internet servers, and even to individuals who set up home pages on the Internet. It is therefore imagined that it would be both impractical and politically suicidal to apply these rules in a manner which was disadvantageous to the Australian public. The author therefore imagines that application of these rules will be uniform across all content service providers, and will not impede constructive use of the UPN.