Skye Communications Technology

It seems that just about every man, woman and child carries a mobile phone these days, and a large proportion of these devices are the ‘smart’ variety that can connect to the internet and perform all manner of tasks completely unimaginable just a few years ago.

Now, these devices depend on a bit of high-tech infrastructure in order to carry out their magic, and this is where things, especially here in a slightly remote corner of the UK, begin to go wrong.

There is no mobile signal here at Roskhill, or in many other locations across Skye and the Highlands. That’s not just no 4G or 3G – I mean no signal at all. And at the current time, there is no prospect of that situation changing in the near future.

Still, we’ve go the internet…? Hmmm… Not always, and not everywhere. Our broadband connections rely on an outdated and poorly maintained telephone wire network, so connection speeds are slow and unreliable. Unless new technologies are developed, we have no chance of getting connected to the ‘superfast’ fibre optic grid that we see advertised on the TV and in newspapers. The nature of our current connections and our widely scattered housing pattern make it impossible.

But, yes – we do get TV - but by satellite. Thankfully satellite television connections are pretty reliable and reasonably priced, There are many locations which can’t get a TV signal through a terrestrial aerial. There’s no DAB radio here either.

Does all this matter? Well, no, and yes. I can live quite happily without much use of a mobile phone, though the vast majority of our visitors to Skye find the lack of signal very frustrating. We can also manage with our ‘flaky’ broadband – but we pay the same for our poor connections as people in towns and cities across the UK pay for a much better service, which seems very unfair.

I hold the thought in my mind that when we moved here, we knew we were moving to a remote and somewhat 'behind the times' location. But it is tough trying to run a business that depends on the internet when the connection is unreliable.

Telecommunications mast, Scoval, Isle of Skye