Are you one of the patrons headed along to the sold out Splendour In The Grass 2014 later this month? Be forewarned, you might not be able to call or text your mates, check yourself in on Facebook, or post your blurry snaps of Outkast to the twitter-verse.
Festival organisers issued a statement yesterday containing “important information about using your mobile phone at Splendour 2014” due to concerns over network coverage at the three-day winter music festival following a stoush between the festival and Telstra after the telecommunications giant refused to provide portable network towers.
Telstra typically supplies Splendour In The Grass with CoWs (Cell On Wheels) towers to cope with the huge demand of nearly 30,000 music fans calling, texting, and Instagramming their festival experience; a service the telecoms company usually supplies free of charge. But according to ABC News, Splendour organisers claim that Telstra withdrew its CoWs infrastructure last month and instead provided a costly quote for installation.
Organisers criticised Telstra for seeking compensation over the network rollout, turning down the deal and issuing a statement to Splendour punters noting: “while we are committed to providing you with the best Splendour experience possible, we are not in a position to pay many hundreds of thousands of dollars for a service that actually generates revenue for Telstra.”
Meanwhile, Optus and Vodafone customers will be unaffected by the changes, with Splendour saying they will have “good reception” at the venue.
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For their part, Telstra is defending its decision to charge given the isolated location of the North Byron Parklands festival site, stating that the increased costs of providing the network need to match the increased demand for free Wi-Fi and network coverage was too expensive without financial aid.
According to Gizmodo however, yesterday Telstra did a backflip and instead will be supplying two ’emergency’ CoW units to the festival, at no extra cost, but with one catch: there’ll be no 4G antenna or coverage – which was the sticking point that caused the break down in negotiations to begin with.
That means Telstra users at Splendour can expect 3G/Next G voice and data coverage only, and “these temporary facilities may not provide capacity to support the busiest periods during the festival, so we ask our customers to be patient during these times, wait a few minutes and try again,” according to a statement.
Telstra also says it had proposed a deal to Splendour to share the costs for installing a permanent mobile coverage infrastructure, and is still negotiating with “event organisers about [this] more permanent solution for future years.”
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In related news, following the announcement of the Splendour In The Grass Pre-Party and Splendour In The Craft activities, festival organisers have confirmed the details of this year’s Splendour Forum, a special program where musicians, politicians, and music thinkers will take part in a series of live panels, interviews, debates, live discussions, and more.
Among the Splendour Forum features is a special festival edition of ABC‘s Q&A (prepare your best “I’ll take that as comment” gags for host Tony Jones), a Splendour edition of Marieke Hardy and Michaela McGuire’s Women Of Letters panel featuring Lauren Mayberry (Chvrches), Courtney Barnett, Gossling, Jennifer Boyce (Ball Park Music), Nkechi Anele (Saskwatch), Liz Drummond (Little May), and more.
There’s also an APRA presented songwriting panel with Hoodoo Gurus’ David Faulkner, Rüfüs, and Zach Braff’s favourite Aussie artist, Japanese Wallpaper. Check out the full Splendour Forum 2014 program here.
Splendour In The Grass 2014 Lineup
Friday 25th, Saturday 26th and Sunday 27th July
North Byron Parklands, Byron Bay
Outkast (Only Aus Show)
Two Door Cinema Club (Only Aus Show)
Lily Allen
Interpol (Only Aus Show)
Foster The People
Angus & Julia Stone
City And Colour
London Grammar
Vance Joy
Darkside (Only Aus Show)
RÜFÜS
Ben Howard
Kelis
Childish Gambino
Metronomy
Hoodoo Gurus
Hilltop Hoods
Chvrches (Only Aus Show)
Grouplove
The Jezabels
Tune-Yards
360
Wild Beasts
Danny Brown (Only Aus Show)
Illy
First Aid Kit
Violent Soho
Ásgeir
Sam Smith
Spiderbait
The 1975
Ball Park Music
Art Vs Science
Buraka Som Sistema (Only Aus Show)
The Preatures
Parquet Courts (Only Aus Show)
Sticky Fingers
Peking Duk
Sky Ferreira
Future Islands
Courtney Barnett
Phantogram
DZ Deathrays
Skaters
Gossling
Jungle
The Strypes
Hot Dub Time Machine
The Kite String Tangle
Ry-X
Mikhael Paskalev
Wave Racer
The Acid
Saskwatch
Kingswood
Circa Waves
Broods
Dustin Tebbutt
The Head And The Heart
DMA’S
Darren Middleton
Little May
Darlia
D.D Dumbo
Tkay Maidza
The Creases
The Wild Feathers
Chrome Sparks
Fractures
Mas Ysa
Nick Mulvey
Nina Las Vegas
Yacht Club DJs
Motez
Touch Sensitive
Indian Summer
Airling
Tora
Golden Features
Wordlife
L D R U & Yahtzel DJs
Cosmos Midnight
Sable
Kilter
Basenji
KLP
Fishing DJs
Paces
Charles Murdoch
Red Bull Music Academy Lineup:
Thursday 24 July
L W K Y, wordlife, Sabel, Yahtzel, L D R U, Indian Summer.
Friday 25 July
Young Franco, Flamingo, Cassius Select, Dizz1, Remi, Sampology, Kirkis, Roland Tings, Steve Summers, Peanut Butter Wolf (US).
Saturday 26 July
Young Franco, Black Vanilla, Silentjay, Edd Fisher, Nicole Millar, Jamie Bennett, Hiatus Kaiyote, Andras Fox, Nicolas Jaar (DJ set) (NYC).
Sunday 27 July
Young Franco, Oisima, Jordan Rakei, Retiree, Louis Baker (NZ), bAnnoffee, Oscar Key Sung, Lorna Clarkson, Africa Hitech (UK/Warp), Nguzunguzu (US).
