Editing Telecommunications in Australia (section)

===After Federation===
A trunk line between Melbourne (headquarters of the PMG Department) and Sydney was established in 1907, with extension to [[Adelaide]] in 1914, [[Brisbane]] in 1923, [[Perth]] in 1930 and [[Hobart]] in 1935.

[[Image:Old Ash Tray With Single Digit Phone No.jpg|thumb|An old [[bakelite]] ash tray showing an example of a single digit phone number used in the early days of telecommunication.]]

On 12 July 1906 the first Australian wireless overseas messages were sent between [[Point Lonsdale]], Victoria and [[Devonport, Tasmania]].<ref>http://tja.org.au/index.php/tja/article/view/9/30 Given, Jock. 2010. 'Wireless politics: Marconi and the Parliament at Point Lonsdale, 12 July 1906'. Telecommunications Journal of Australia. 60 (4): pp. 60.1 to 60.7. Monash University ePress.</ref> Australia and New Zealand ratified the 1906 Berlin Radio-telegraph Convention in 1907. The PMG department became responsible for some international shortwave services, particularly from the 1920s and for a new Coastal Radio Service in 1911, with the first of a network of stations operational in February 1912.

The [[Sydney–Melbourne co-axial cable]] was officially opened on 9 April 1962.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://primeministers.naa.gov.au/timeline/results.aspx|title=Australia's Prime Ministers|publisher=National Archives of Australia|access-date= 14 September 2013}}</ref>
The coaxial cable infrastructure supported the introduction of [[subscriber trunk dialling]] between the cities<ref>{{cite book|title=The Australasian Engineer, 1962, p.32}}</ref> and live television link-ups. After its commissioning in April 1962 the cable carried telegraph and telephone traffic.<ref>{{cite book|title=Telecommunications Journal of Australia, vol.13, no.3, February 1962 (special edition), p.173}}</ref> It also provided the first inter-city television transmission in Australia, allowing simultaneous television broadcasting in Melbourne and Sydney for the first time.<ref>{{cite book|title=The Australasian Engineer, 1962, p.33}}</ref>

[[Optus]] was formed as AUSSAT, a government owned corporation, in 1981. It was privatized later in the 1980s under the [[Bob Hawke|Hawke]] Labor government. [[Telstra]] (previously known as Telecom), another government owned asset, was also privatized in 1997 under the [[John Howard|Howard]] Liberal government.