Strongly disagree that they improved the economics at all.

I will say that, if they did improve the economics, then I agree that 'something' failed in getting that point across. They did crow about how bad the original economics was, but really just using scare tactics by quoting the large number that out's of the range of reasonable comparison by the average citizen. Most information I read was that they wasted additional money including paying for a lot, like a lot lot, of copper for last mile connections, including paying Telstra for some of their existing copper infrastructure - the dilapidated state of which was part of the reason that FTTH was the proposed solution for 9x% of the Australian population.

In fact, it's almost impossible that improved economics making changes and causing the (decade+ in some cases) delay of the rollout of FTTH.

One of my favourite pieces of graffiti: https://gadgetguy-assets.s3.ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/wor...

I'm happy to be told I'm wrong, along with explanations, or if there are mitigating factors to anything I've written above.

Edited to add: My rant may be on a different interpretation of 'economics' than which you're referring to. Mine's purely based on the cost of the project - not how it's been charged to ISPs or Customers.

Edited to add post-reply below: Thanks for the detailed reply, that's very interesting information that I had read peripheral information around, but was less intimate with. Thanks for taking the time, two thumbs up.