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America's Not So Up to Speed
indiejade writes "According to The Broadband Life, the U.S. has quite a way to go before catching up to countries such as South Korea, Japan and even Canada when it comes to percentage of the population enjoying high-speed internet access. 'In 2000, the U.S. ranked third in Net users connecting at high-speed among the top-30 world economies. The next year it fell to fourth. Now it's 11th,' the article said." Commentary on this is also available at Foreign Affairs and The New York Times.
I'm still downloading that Pam and Tommy Lee video that i started years ago....
I would have got it but this connection is SO DAMN SLOW!
Why not compare it to Countries like India and China. Places with very large populations and a very large land mass. I think it'd be a little more fair than comparing it to countries with a high population density (the majority of Canadia's population is settled within 100 miles or so of the US border.
Is technology really the end all, be all in America? In the world? Some people do have priorities. And hey, by the way, I am a comp e major, and I realize this.
You know how some people don't own a TV because they simply aren't that interested in watching it?
Well, some of us are the same way about high speed internet. Dialup gets you all that you really need. Applications like bittorrent are not really necessary (unless you're addicted to video pr0n).
Let's see which country uses more speed.
We have so much dark fiber laid it's ridiculous.
In a big city or town in other countries most buildings have ethernet running throughout with one tap to a fiber backbone in the telephone closet. Here every office suite is expected to pay a premium for DSL. And you wonder why we're behind on the times, it's our marketing and poor policy machines at work.
Residential users are a little different, but very rarely do you hear of a homeowners association getting together and buying a fiber trunk or something.
--
NoVA Underground: Where Northern Virginia comes out to play
Just how do you plan to get broadband out to the middle of the country? It's much more profitable for ISPs to hit the coasts and large cities.
I live just south of the border so I get to see how two different countries do it on a regular basis. In Canada internet access seems to be treated like any other public utility, broadband is easy to access, and it is priced affordably.
Compare to this part of the US where companies charge around $50 per month for broadband and act like they are doing us a major favor by only charging double what I pay for phone service or water and sewage on a monthly basis.
I like broadband but its pretty far down on the list of critical infrastructure projects we have neglected to pursue war, enriching the upper class, and funding a global colonial regime.
The reason the US lags behind these other nations in access to high speed internet is because more Americans don't want high speed internet access. The internet is more a part of the life of the average South Korean, so more South Koreans choose to buy high speed internet access.
The fact that more Americans don't want high speed internet access isn't a bad thing, it isn't a good thing either. It's just what makes the people of this country unique.
This story is too US centric, you insensitve clod!
Oh, wait, it is regarding the shortcomings of the United States.
I for one welcome our new America hating overlords (who post regularly to Slashdot).
Reynolds, now a telecommunications analyst at the Organization for Economic Cooperation & Development (OECD), an international body that researchers the state of world economies, says South Korea is a far different place today, with 73% of the population enjoying high-speed Net access at home.
Is it just me or do anyone else find it highly annoying when articles with statistics like these don't bother linking to any source material? I would like to know Swedens position for example. According to TFA 73% of South Koreas population has broadband. What's the figure for other countries?
Shame on you Yahoo Editor.
Uh, Japan and Canada consistantly both have a higher standard of living than the United States of America: Read all about it.
I'm sick of following my dreams - I'm just going to ask them where they're going and hook up with them later.
My town has a population of about 600 and a locally owned telephone company. I've had broadband since early 2000. That is before cities 10 times (or more!) our size got it!
A fine is a tax you pay for doing wrong and a tax is a fine you pay for doing all right.
Yes there is a huge amount of backbone fiber running all over flyover country, and no one really wants it, because it won't make your last mile connection any less crapful.
While the obvious is well, obvious, it stands to reason that S. Korea has a pretty insane population density (supported by the assistance of U. S. Troops, or they would likely be under the thumb of a dictator by now btw.) The U. S., for all its faults (poor legislative knowledge base on things technical being one of them), has its population base stretched over much area, thus making broadband more expensive for the provider. Hence you see the attempt at WiMax et. al.--they realize that they can make money on those far from the wire if they could only reach them......
Geez, it seems you can't go 2 days without reading an article about how America is lagging behind 37 other countries on (insert random metric for technological progress). Won't somebody do something? Our children are falling behind!!!!
Now, I'm sure some of these things truly do deserve concern -- but this kind of scare tactic has been around since the early days of the Cold War, and probably long before that. Last time I checked, though, we haven't been conquered by the Soviets/Japanese/nation-du-jour -- sure, we may be worse at some things, and better at others, but things in general have hummed along pretty well for the last half-century.
Cheers,
IT
Power corrupts. PowerPoint corrupts absolutely.
i think it stems from the image of mounties still riding horses
if i'm not immortal, what's the point of living?
...te?
A.O.L.
I am connected to the web via a cell phone and a USB cable in Bombay. Infact I can be 'anywhere' in this country and get online. The network is generally reliable.
Costs for Rs.600 (about $15) per month with a 1GB download limit. Throughput is twice/thrice of a dialup.
Similar services in Chicago cost much much more with unwieldy annual plans.
Last October I found London had enough open WiFi spots. But that city has not even a single water fountain - wild Brits want you to buy stupid bottles of water for 1 bloody pound.
In Kuwait City airport - one of the big allies of US - there are two public telephones with warning signs - "These instruments are under constant surveillance..." - wild Arabs!!!
Decent dinner for three with a few drinks -
Bombay - $6-10
London - $45-50
Chicago - $20-25
Kuwait - ???
Tat Tvam Asi
but I wonder if these other countries have city wide wifi like you see popping up here now. And if they do, do they have the ISP's trying to stomp this kind of thing out? I think these big companies are our major problem.
Look at the northeast and the southwest. There is population density there but the broadband situation isn't that good overall..the fact that no one lives in flyover country has nothing to do with getting last mile broadband in densely populated areas.
dontcha know that cheap broadband aint for Americans? Only commie countries have cheap broadband! Otherwise, how are the megacorporations media empires gonna keep their god given monopolies. Now git back to Russia, you commienists!
eat shiat and bark at the moon
and laws against municipal wifi! ;P
sum.zero
And foreigners wonder why Americans hate them... their lack of sense for sarcasm!!!
The best education consists in immunizing people against systematic attempts at education. - Paul Feyerabend
...in Korea, only old people use broadband for email....
If you disagree with me on social issues, then it's pretty clear that you are a narrow-minded bigot.
... and then try to explain when countries like Brazil start passing us.
Agreed.
"Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality." -- Dalai Lama
I was just reading in the paper (Vancouver Sun) the other day that the B.C. provincial government plans to make broadband accessible to every community (defined as any area containing a school or hospital or other public building) in B.C. in the immediate future.
A quick look at some fun B.C. facts shows that B.C. is roughly four times larger than Great Britain (~950,000 km^2), has a population of 4.1 million people and comprises of 75% of the world's stone sheep population. So, with a population density of 4 people per square kilometre, I think it is safe to say that population density is not the limiting factor of broadband availability. The article also claimed that somewhere in the neighbourhood of 95% of B.C.'s population already has access to broadband (I hate to paraphrase something like that though).
Aye, but the government in Canada paid for the backbone to be put across the country. Different from the states where such things are done by corporate interests. A consortium of business, educational, and governmental interests worked on the project which brought about the world's first national optical Internet research and education network. This has blossomed into CA*net4, which is our current backbone.
.
Government interest in broadening communications abilities in Canada has always been viewed as culturally and economically important. A country laid out as we are couldn't possibly survive or thrive without such an interest. Canada paid a lot of attention to the establishment of the national telephone network, a great deal of funding is pumped into the cbc to guarantee that every community has access to it, and now
"Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality." -- Dalai Lama
But dude, have you seen them play Starcraft?
A few soldiers dying is worth it if you get to see 7 battlecruisers locked down in 7 seconds. Fucking brilliant.
It's that simple. The cheapest I can get DSL in my area is roughly $45, and that's slow stuff that I wouldn't even want to try to game on. Cable is no better costing $50+ through comca$t, whom I don't trust. In many areas the choice is limited, so they charge like crazy.
What makes me the angriest is that our wonderful Pennsylvania state house voted against townships operating wireless networks. The telecoms even tried to get public support for it, bundling it with bills that would give stuff to schools, then having the audacity to make commercials urging them to call their representives to support it. They also gave verizon 6 billion to bring high speed more places. Verizon being true to their ma' bell heritage promply took the money and did nothing. So it's no wonder that Pa is 50th on the list (last time I saw it) for broadband. Our elected state leaders are so bad, they jam their voting buttons (no roll call) so they can take the day off and still get their wage, plus food and transportation costs.
Pennsylvania: First to vote with electric buttons (supposedly) yet still hasn't made it to the 21st century.
good grief
John 3:16 - The easiest way to a BETTER YOU.
It goes on to say even though Americans are wealthier than people of other countries, somehow people with more wealth in America have a lower standard of living than people with less wealth in other countries because the distribution of wealth in the US is more uneven. That argument doesn't stand up to much scrutiny, does it?
I'm not saying Americans have a higher standard of living, but the wikipedia article you're referencing doesn't provide any support for its assertions.
I have a friend living in a veritable shoebox in Tokyo who is widely envied by his local acquaintances for the luxury of so much space. Here in the US your neighbors would call animal control if your doghouse was that small.
I have a friend in Canada who came to the US for a week so he could get his ACL fixed when the wait up North would be up to ten years. I wouldn't consider that to be an acceptable wait for knee reconstruction.
The point is "standard of living" is impossible to measure across societies, since different societies have different ideas of what's important.
This story seems to be nearly a dupe of yesterays. So I'll dupe the facts I looked up for that one:
t m
E / 2004002/tables/pdf/44_01.pdf
- d ist.html
_ 2_ sense_of_broadband.pdf
Canada, the US, and Korea are all about equally urbanized.
US, 2000 census: 79.2% urban population
Canada 2001: 79.6% (statistics canada)
Korea, 2000: 77% urban
Even better, the McKinsey quarterly uses telco stats to compute the "reach" of broadband, that is to say, the percentage of total households that can be equipped with broadband if they choose to pay for it:
Korea: 95%
US: 89%
Canada: 87%
The houses that actually purchase broadband:
Korea: 54%
US: 13%
Canada: 25%
In short, it isn't for lack of ability to provide the broadband. It's the price offered to the consumer. It's cheaper in Canada and much cheaper in Korea.
NB: Disposable income is lower in Canada and much lower in Korea. But the prices for broadband are that much lower again.
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/planning/census/cps2k.h
http://www.statcan.ca/english/freepub/82-221-XI
www.paulnoll.com/Korea/History/South-Korean-pop
http://www.dalfarra.ch/nds/zusatzdokumente/2003
How much of net use is used for downloading entertainment and playing games?
Having a net connection is really important, but having much cheaper dial-up as opposed to broadband may not be that much of a gain.
This stat seems to get thrown up by people who are either in the broadband business and want concessions from government or are in the business of saying 'America is going downhill fast'.
Korea and Japan were totally rebuilt in many places after wars destroyed everything. Infrastruture in the US is old. Even the stuff installed in new subdivisions is old tech. Korea and Japan didn't do that. Canada didn't build new stuff with old tech.
Most people are fine with dial up for what they do anyhow in the US. Me, screw that, having to use dial up on the rare occasion I have to just flat sucks. Before I bought this place and the place I am moving to I made sure I could get Cable broadband that works (not SBC ADSL or SDSL that is crappy and trouble plauged.) The Cable company give 3 mbt standard and will sell you 8 mbt for more a month. It's been down once in 5 years, my modem died, they replaced it next day.
If you rip all the infrastructure out and replace it you can deliver broadband everwhere thats built up damm near but delivering Broadband on 80 year old wires doesn't work too well. Forget the hugely overpriced wireless offerings, that doesn't even start to play well with me.
Unless hospitals and doctors offices spring up out of the ground unbidden, unless doctors and nurses donate their time for free, unless drug R&D happens all by itself...health care is never 'free'.
It just doesn't show as a line item on your paystub.
Well there is also governement. We used to get vouchers (500$ cdn) to buy computers and broadband compagnies are subsidized a hole lot. Prices are dirt cheap in Quebec compared to what I payed for in Florida. (30$ for cable internet compared to 40$ for slow sprint dsl in florida)
One thing I think people fail to realize is that in the US there is much more area to cover with broadband, than in Europe and Japan. The fact that America doesn't have the current infrastructure to maintain broadband in every rural area is not something that should be looked down upon yet. Now, if this is still the status quo in five years, then we can start discussing quicker implementation models, until then I guess be patient. (note: it took me 4 years of bugging various telcom. and ISPs before I was able to get cable in my area)
The U.S. is slowly starting to come around with certain commercial ventures, such as Verizon, installing fiber to the home. Thier particular service is currently available in certain markets for $50/month with 15Mbps down and 2Mbps up. Check out http://www.verizonfios.com/ for more info.
the link you posted does not have an image of a tank running over two girls
The US is all talk and ego and with not that much punch when it comes to a lot of things.
No Europe is all talk, the US drops bombs (whether right or wrong).
Cross the US and things explode, cross the EU and they will pass legislation to officially say "we don't like what you did"
But seriously, too many times Europe or other nations bow down to US imposed rules. Copyright, patents, trade, etc. Sure the people may be vocal against policies, but the one universal truth is politicians can be bought.
D6 63 0D 70 89 81 BB 8E 7B 7C 5F 5D 54 EA AB 73
In order for more competition, America needs redundancy in utilities. Dual power grids, dual telephone grids, dual cable systems in each munipality will let true competition begin!
Who will benefit? You will!
Viral software licensing is not freedom, it is in fact GNU/Socialism.
But it got you to post and generate ~3 banner ad hits to get your rant out. Something's working.
I don't want knowledge. I want certainty. - Law, David Bowie
In a lot of countries, people pretty much have to buy broadband internet, because there is no alternative. The US has unlimited local calling and unlimited-use dialup internet, which is "good enough" for many people. Most other countries charge you per minute even for local phone calls.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Man....we almost closed out the week without a "USA is a technological backwater compared to all these countries with a lower standard of living with far higher population density and enormous federal pork to build their broadband connections" story. Thank God we dodged that bullet!
I read what you wrote, but all I heard was "Me me me me me me me me me me me me me..." I am PROUD to sacrifice a higher portion of my income so that someone who has no income can get a heart transplant if needed and then go on to get a PhD without spending several hundred thousand dollars on tuition fees and hospital bills. After all, that someone could be me someday. Stop being such a selfish fuck.
Still #1 -- Lonely Gay Geek
It goes on to say even though Americans are wealthier than people of other countries, somehow people with more wealth in America have a lower standard of living than people with less wealth in other countries because the distribution of wealth in the US is more uneven. That argument doesn't stand up to much scrutiny, does it?
Umm, of course it does? Consider the basic economics of this:
1) There are a lot more people with wealth in America
2) Our wealth distribution system entails that people continue to maintain or increase that level of wealth, on average.
3) Many products and services in America are provided by Americans, and those that are not are heavily penalized (so that American businesses can compete).
4) Those providing the products and services to Americans must maintain higher prices to maintain the higher level of wealth (see 2).
In fact, this is obvious to anyone who thinks about it. I am by no means waelthy in America (by our wealth distribution system) -- but my wealth compared to, say, an average person from Pakistan, is pretty ridiculous.
And it's not a matter of exchange rates or currency, obviously. Australians make less money (all things equal) than Americans, but their goods and services cost less because of their distribution of wealth, so their economic system generates a higher standard of living (in terms of goods and products acquirable by the average person).
Now why would you think that wouldn't stand up to much scrutiny?
-----[0_o]-----
We are not amused.
The UK has a highly deregulated telecoms market and pretty good broadband penetration figures, mainly through ADSL. You can now get ADSL from various ISPs for US $30 upwards (512K) with some 2 Mbps and 8 Mbps services (latter costs about $55). This covers 90% plus of population.
There is also local-loop unbundled (LLU) ADSL now, in which an ISP (Easynet/UK Online at present) puts its own kit in the telephone exchange (central office) - costs just $20 per month (£9.95), but since they are just starting to roll out, they only cover 40% or so of population.
ADSL prices are already competitive with all-you-can-eat dialup (people pay per minute for local calls here), and with LLU broadband may end up being cheaper than dialup.
The real solution for broadband to sparsely populated communities is WiMAX or similar non-line-of-sight technologies that are much cheaper to deploy than CDMA/UMTS type cellular networks. NLOS means that you can cover a large area with a single WiMAX tower, and that foliage growth in spring doesn't cut off the service you had installed in December.
WiFi also has a role, but is more of an in-fill or point to point for truly remote communities where you can hop via a point-to-point to link to somewhere that does have wired or WiMAX broadband. Satellite services are also available in the UK - more expensive but useful if you are truly in a remote area.
Despite the unregulated market, government is getting involved with limited subsidies for rural areas that would otherwise not get (reasonably priced) broadband at all. Mostly, however, this is driven by the incumbent telco's vision that they have to deploy ADSL to everyone in order to sell next-generation IP-based services such as VoIP, IP TV, etc. Google for 'BT 21CN' for more about how BT is ripping out the PSTN to replace it with an all-IP network.
Note here that the study isn't pure availability of broadband access, but who actually has it. Prices for such things being what they are in the US, it's not surprising that many other countries supersede us. You can't compete when there are countries that include, on a nationwide basis, high-speed internet access with basic phone service.
Now that should get the Canadians on side, eh?
I mean, it is not surprising that the US is behind South Korea and Japan - but who'd have imagined they were behind _Canada_ too? Gosh, that puts the US at the bottom of the barrel, doesn't it?
I am anarch of all I survey.
Every time one of these "US sucks at broadband" threads comes along there's the tired old argument that the United States is big and the people are spread all over... We just can't reach them all.
:
Pish-posh. In the months coming up to every war US'ians are heard saying, "yeah, we'll kick all their asses! Glass parking lot! We got teh tech!" But given a crack at wide broadband distribution the techies all cry, "wah, it's just too hard!"
Finally, after five years of rural broadband drought someone comes up with the simplistic idea of an antenna on a blimp. Whoa, geniuses they were. But wait... It was the Aussies that "invented" that. And as simple as the idea is and the area that it covers, five years after the idea WE STILL DON'T HAVE IT!
It could be done TOMORROW. You can make up your own excuses why it won't be.
I'll give you a start
Regulation
Capital distribution
Personally, I live 10 minutes from the 11th larges city in the US and couldn't get broadband (aside from that high-latency high-dollar satellite crap) until 2003. If the people in this country keep giving our turds to every other country on earth hoping that they'll polish it to our expectations... well, once again, make up your own excuses.
I live in a town of ~6000 in Colorado, and i have the choice of cable, dsl and fixed wireless. Yet other people nearby lack any choice.
I am in a developing area, but why would three companies choose to compete here, when there are plenty other similarly sized towns where they could have a monopoly.
As it stands i went for fixed wireless since its run by a local firm and they provide (so far) excellent service. Unlike comcast's army of monkies, their phone staff actually know about things like dns servers and latency.
So the US rules through fear. That sounds very enlightened.
What the hell is that supposed to mean? As far as tech goes Canada id right up there in most respects. We've had widespread use of debit cards for years now and it's only just catching on in the US.
How do you create demand for something you simply cannot get?
A lot of people now a days DO demand high-speed internet access. And what they get in many cases is a 1.5Mbit/256Kbit connection via Cable, or DSL if you're in the city. Sure, I can say "I want more" but it's just not offered.
Some of it is user education - if people knew the potential in 100Mbit to the house connections, they might want it more. But what do the broadband companies care? They like the status-quo. They can get paid just as much now for low-tech gear that they could if they spent 40 billion dollars on new networks.
And if you're a residential customer in a rural area (and we're not talking about farm land here) you could be completely out of luck and stuck on dial-up.
I understand that the USA is a much larger land-mass then Japan, which this article seems to ignore. But, that's not what's currently stopping true high-speed Internet - it's the fact that there's absolutely no incentive to give people the access they want.
Our governments are SUPPOSED to help the people they govern, and in this case they really should provide the incentive that the market is unable, or unwilling to give. When that happens, and if broadband is still not offered en-masse, then we can talk about land-mass and crap like that.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
income distribution have anything to do with it?
while playing Counter Strike ??!?!
I don't mind the negative comparisons to Japan, South Korea, Denmark. But *Canada*! That really hurts.
CA*net4s equivalent in the US is Abilene.
Population density is a useful metric for many things, but one must discriminate between global population density, and local population density. Using my home state of Texas as an example one finds that the global population density is 79.6 persons per square mile, but if one looks at the population density for my home county of Smith then the local density is 188.2 persons per square mile. Dallas County has a population density of 2,522.6 persons per square mile, and Brewster County has a population density of 1.4 persons per square mile. What is manifest here is that local population has a wide variance.
In physics one often uses the metrics of homogeneity isotropy and linearity, when dealing with various mediums. Let us consider the population density as the medium of interest. The question now becomes one of the homogeneity, isotropy, and linearity of the global population density.
Given the the size of the United States both in terms of both population, and geography it should come as no surprise that the global population density is not homogenous, nor isotropic, nor linear. That being said, it is the case that local population densities can be large, homogenous, isotropic, and linear. This is true for many parts of the Mid-West, and South. It is these situations that cause the problems with employing broad band in an economically efficient fashion.
If one has a county where the population density is low, but tightly clustered then the population density is both, non-homogenous, and non-isotropic. Providing the population center/s with broadband is then "cost effective," provide the total population of the center/s is of sufficient size.
Another county which has the same population density may however have a highly homogenous, and isotropic population density. In such a case the population is evenly scattered over the entire area of the county. Given that the population of the county is of sufficient size it will very well not be "cost effective" to provide that county with broadband.
One of the most prevalent fallacies that folks engage in is the 'fallacy of the single statistic.' No one statistic, nor metric gives an adequate description of a phenomenon. When an argument focuses on one statistic, or metric it is inevitable that a lot of verbiage is going to be wasted on fallacious argumentation.
In general one needs to examine 'size,' 'percentage,' 'distribution,' and 'variance' in making a statistical argument if one is to avoid spurious lines of debate.
"Oh drat these computers, they're so naughty and so complex, I could pinch them." --Marvin the Martian
...We have other planets to destroy!
But seriously, I had a 6M line from SBC in the Bay Area - They actually discontinued that level of service (was $99/mo) and would only grandfather my service if I shelled out $150/mo. It makes me sick to think that some developing countries have 10-20 times the BW and pay under $50/mo - Haven't we stolen enough oil yet!?
--- Shoo-be-doo-be-do-wop-say-what-yeah!
http://broadband.ic.gc.ca/pub/index.html?iin.la
Canadians believe in trying to smooth things out
a bit so that people are on as level a playing field
as possible, giving everybody a chance to succeed,
and for development to be spread out across
the country.
Americans (not all, probably not even most of the ones
on slashdot, but such a large number that it is a real problem) have a myopic fanaticism about cutting their taxes (to the point where their government can no longer provide even
basic services) and that awful neighbourhoods
are somehow natural. The leading cause
of personal bankrupcy in the US is getting sick.
Bad neighbourhoods happen because society
doesnt give a shit. Canada doesnt have any real slums
because we try to take care of everybody. Not
to the extreme point of communism but trying
to make sure people have a chance: free health care,
low cost education, low cost broadband, reasonable
social safety net.
The only people we do a pretty poor job with are
aboriginal peoples, because they live so far out
in the boonies that it is really hard to bring them
a reasonable standard of living, when it takes a 12-hour
plane ride to get them to the nearest hospital.
We try to level things out, were not fanatics about it,
but we do our level best.
Bullshit. What about the aboriginal people who live in the cities? Have you seen the east end of Vancouver recently around Pigeon Park? Highest rate of HIV positive drug users in the world and so dangerous the police won't even do anything about it. That area is worse than any slum in the US I have seen.
Free health care? Sure, if you are willing to wait months for a service that I (and many others) am more than willing to pay for. Welfare system? The system that ensures no one tries to find a job because unless it pays 10 dollars an hour or more, you end up making more staying on welfare?
Yes, Canada is great for many things. But let's face it... for the taxes we pay, we should be getting a LOT more. Personally, I would rather pay a lot less tax and choose the services I want.
There is a middle ground somewhere between the two countries that is better than both systems.
home of:
-
Telesat is a pioneer in satellite communications. Created in 1969, the Company made history with the launch of Anik A1 in 1972 the worlds first commercial domestic communications satellite placed in geostationary orbit. (http://www.telesat.ca)
- Nortel -- pretty much world leaders in digital technology applied to telephony since it started. present in 150 countries.
(http://www.nortel.com/corporate/corptime/index.h
t ml )
- ATI, Matrox, Alias, Softimage, (this crowd knows who they are.)
- Bombardier -- biggest railcar manufacturer in the world.
3rd largest aircraft manufacturer after airbus & boeing.
Not all of these are in the greatest of health at the moment, and there are a lot of others that arent so easily recognizable or easily described. but sheesh even Canada just rubs my pet seal the wrong way.Keep in mind that Sasktel is going putting fibre to the door of (at least near) everyone in saskatchewan, and has already started the switch to a VoIP system(my livingspace is all VoIP, no POTS)
of course
with their prices I still won't be able to afford dialup. but it's the thought that counts.
GENERATION 26: The first time you see this, copy it into your sig on any forum and add 1 to the generation.
In any event, there is more to it. Unlike the US, where the FCC has been apparently co-opted by telco and other media interests, in Canada, the CRTC does a lot of regulation. What Bell can charge is regulated. They have to ask for cost increases, and they have to be justified. Other companies (third party ISPs) appear at the hearings and argue Bells numbers, mostly downward, because they want low wholesale prices. So you have third party ISPs charging 30-50% less for broadband than Bell.
The vast majority of U.S. households have the ability to access broadband. They just choose otherwise. Most Americans aren't like the slashdot crowd and are happy with their dial-up. OF course, if they ever had fast access they'd never go back.
Just my two cents.
(p.s. last time Canada was at war with the US, we burned down Washington D.C.)
i wonder where we are on the list...
Even CANADA? GASP!!! (*Slaps face with both hands in amazement...*)
Yes, we occasionally do stop squatting in the ditch stuffing berries up our noses, to surf the net. Sheeeeesh.
Love many, trust a few, do harm to none.
One thing that other people havn't said yet is that the government here in the USA has been sitting around and not really doing anything to encourage the development of technology. In eastern Asia, the governments have been pushing to improve the availability of broadband and technology. In the USA, the government is pushing for things that will help George W. Bush in his war on the middle east.
.com crash hit, did government step in to see how they could help the companies that had a good product survive? How about all the people who lost their jobs and had to take retail sales jobs because the programming, IT, and support jobs disappeared when the company they worked for went out of business? After being out of work for over a year, it becomes VERY difficult for people to get back into the work force, and that's what happened to a LOT of people.
.com crash. And people wonder why this country is losing it's edge?
When the
So now, the USA is falling behind. All the entry level support jobs are going to India and other countries. There hasn't been a huge surge of new companies starting up with new ideas to take the place of those who disappeared after the
Could some one please explain? I'm not talking about internet access but broadband specifically.
I've heard this statistic in one form or another for a while now. Is it "America just has to be better?" or is there something more important going on?
-Brian
I have been in bad neighborhoods in the US, in New Orleans, in Dallas, and In the East end of Montreal. People in East end Montreal are poor, but it bears no resemblance to the kind of squalor I saw in the US. Look at the crime rates. Look at the size of the bad neighborhoods, and there is just no comparison.
I have not been to the worst areas in the US... Have you? I havent, because as the locals will tell you, they arent safe to visit. I will take your word for it that there is such a place in Vancouver. In Quebec, I dont know of any such places, even though it is far poorer, on average, than BC.
As for taxes... You are living in a complete dreamworld. Services cost money. You want services, and an environment where you can feel safe, then it is going to cost you money. Canadian spend far less than other industrialized countries to provide services, we are actually doing really well.
You can follow the US model: cut taxes, and spend money you aren't allowed to raise. 500 trillion dollar annual federal deficit, On the US West Coast folks keep passing resolutions that eliminate methods for state and local governments to collect taxes. It is at the point where there is no way to pay for services. California is a complete financial basket case, Washington state has similar problems. This is similar effect to folks that don't want any power plants in their state, and then complain that electricity is expensive.
People don't think hard enough about their choices. If you choose to cut taxes, you will get less services. Sure, you need to audit what is going on, and make value for money evaluations, and tune things as you go, but the basics are there: no money, no services.
In comparison, the Canadian federal system and provices are running balanced budgets.
http://www.finfacts.com/biz10/taxpercentagegdp.htm
We have Sheila Fraser, and her counterparts in Provincial governments, independant auditors who picks apart federal expenditures, and whose only reason for being is to identify poor accounting practices, and a press that will gleefully tear into any spending scandal they can find. It's just fantasy to think that we can change a few decisions and cut taxes by any reasonable amount without massive social unrest.
The vast majority of money in government at all levels goes to providing services. The waste you hear about is what makes it to the press, the vast majority of the spending is done properly and conscientiously.
The real crime is that 30 years ago, in Trudeau's last reign, the economy went south, and nobody paid attention, throughout the Mulroney years the deficit grew and now it is this huge weight on the government.
http://www.budget.gc.ca/budget04/brief/briefe.htm
Look at expenditures. 156 Billion for programs, 36 for just keeping the debt level. What could we do with 36 Billion dollars a year? One hell of a lot, but we can't because a generation ago, people were idiots. Deficit spending is a horrible drag that is going to break something eventually. People like to hear about 'tax cuts' but what they should be doing is looking at what that means: service cuts now, and if that hampers our ability to pay down accumulated debt, then fewer services down the road too for our children, and ourselves in our old age. It is practically criminal to cut taxes, but politically necessary. We're still idiots.
The Canadian government decided quite a few years ago that it was going to try to make broadband available to 80% of Canadians or something like that.
This isn't a suprise. The free market is good, but not as good as pre-existing infastructure and a government mandate.
It's been a long time.
Why is the phrase "even Canada" repeated three times in the article? Is it so hard to believe we're a high-tech country, just because we're homey, cold and large ineffectual in the world sphere? C'mon. We have a history of happily adopting new technologies, including automated banking and debit card purchases, our use of which is (last time I checked) among the highest penetration anywhere. "Even" Canada -- my arse! We lead you dinks in making the Star Trek future real.
I am from a small, grease-loving country in the north called Ca-na-da.
and South Korea, Japan and Canada have a long way to go when it comes to size. It's a lot easier and less expensive to roll out services like broadband when you've got a highly concentrated population. As a whole, the US does not. Wired broadband has only flourished in US metropolitan areas. Wireless technologies have changed that in some smaller places but those are few and far between.
You forgot bloated Social security, welfare, and unfunded social mandates.
>> And foreigners wonder why Americans hate them... their lack of sense for sarcasm!!!
Is that sarcasm?
--Richard
Austin, Texas
I've been using Optimum Online for the last five years and Cablevision keeps raising the rates while giving worse service.
Thank God my town just got the Verizon "swarm" stringing up fiber this week. In a few months I'll finally be able to get my 15/2 for $50/mo and give Cablevision the finger.
You gotta find first gear in your giant robot car
It's that simple.
Here's the big issue: the USA has so much old legacy communications infrastructure that the cost of upgrading it to support broadband Internet is exorbitantly expensive, especially in the older large metropolitan areas in the USA. And of course, because of the large rural population, most of them are out of the reach of DSL or cable broadband. It's essentially the so-called Last Mile Problem, something that's less of an issue in densely-populated Europe, Japan, and South Korea, where there are enough people per square kilometer to justify the exorbitant cost of setting up land-line broadband connections for everyone locally.
So how do we get around this problem? The answer is wide-scale wireless Internet access using 802.16/802.20 WiMax technologies, which will start rolling out in the USA in 2006. Unlike 802.11x WiFi technologies, WiMax can handle thousands of users per antenna array at essentially light of sight range at 2-4 Mbps data transfer speeds. It's vastly cheaper to put up an array of WiMax antennas than to hardware every business or residence to support DSL or cable broadband; this will also allow many rural communities to get broadband for the first time. I think WiMax will roll out by using the same antenna arrays used by cellphones, so already we'll have pretty substantial national coverage anyway.
I live in a major metropolitan area. Trying to get a reliable broadband connection to my house was hellish.
I wouldn't be quite so bitter if Verizon (formerly Bell Atlantic) hadn't gotten billions from the state of PA to be able to deliver 45Mbps upstream and downstream broadband to the door of a majority of the state. Ten years later, the Pennsylvania Utilities Commission let them off the hook on that agreement, and I still can't get a clean DSL connection to my damn house.
If a large company that was paid to deliver such services can't manage to do so to someone who lives in a nice area of a major metropolitan area, especially when given ten years to do so, then the problem isn't the size of the country. The problem is the lack of accountability and the ability to charge for services without delivering.
I should also add that to this day, Verizon keeps sending me ads saying I can get DSL to my house. They're more than happy to try and sign me up again. They just can't be bothered to actually deliver the service.
...why the pompous attitude of recent visitors to the Internet.
If I really am talking out of my ass...explain it to me with respect so I'll at least pull my ears out to listen.
Download first. Then you can keep pressing rewind.
"Americans (not all, probably not even most of the ones on slashdot, but such a large number that it is a real problem) have a myopic fanaticism about cutting their taxes (to the point where their government can no longer provide even
basic services) "
No, it's because the "reps" keep spending on other crap (and it's always hidden behind some title of a bill). If we're not going to have a gov't anyway, why pay them?
If I really am talking out of my ass...explain it to me with respect so I'll at least pull my ears out to listen.
When I lived with my parents, their Aliant high speed was $40 (this was a few years ago), provided of course that you went with Aliant for your long distance provider. While I currently use Eastlink (I agree with you on them being the only ISP worth their salt in the area), I've heard the opposite in terms of availability: that Aliant shows up in a neighborhood before Eastlink's Cable service does.
Regarding Eastlink's BW caps, I don't know if I've truly noticed them... I know they've definitely capped Bittorrent upload speeds to 15KBps (because people were leaving torrents open forever, no doubt), although this only applies to traffic leaving the Eastlink subnet. I still occasionaly get Bittorrent DL speeds of 200KBps, and I haven't noticed any other rate caps on my connection. I've also generated over 50 Gigs ul/dl traffic in a month and haven't heard a peep from them. Either way, they're much better than Aliant, for a much better price (especially if you bundle)
In case anyone hasn't looked at a map lately, let me remind you that Japan and Korea are small. The United States is fucking huge.
Canada is also fucking huge, but has a lot less people than the US and they live in a rather nice line.
Wireing the US is expensive, requires a lot of cable, and a lot of time. It'll get done eventually.
Yep, that's the difference that I was pointing out. I figured I could spare everyone the ARPANET history.
"Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality." -- Dalai Lama
We're only behind because I think it's high-speed internet is expensive.
correct me if I'm wrong
High-Speed
Comcast: $50+
SBC DSL: $30+
RoadRunner: $30+
Dial-up
AT&T: $11-21 (depending on your package)
AOL: $20-25
Netscape: $10
NetZero: $15
see my point? why pay 20-30 dollars extra when you can do everything the same except for downloading speed!
What country are you living in? Last time I looked, the United States was approaching $8,000,000,000,000.00 in debt. We're broke and begging to borrow more daily.
we just don't spend it on things most Americans really want it spent on. For the cost of the Iraq war you could have
purchased a $150,000 home for each and every one of the 1.3 Million homeless children in America and still have enough left over to furnish those homes.
or at least made a dent in the debt.
You misspelled budget deficit. If you took all the money from all the years Bush has spent in Iraq and Afghanistan, it would amount to about half of last years budget deficit. It wouldn't touch the debt with a ten foot pole. Even if you earmarked it specifically for the interest on the debt you would come up short.
There is nothing you can do about this for the next year or 3 (I'm not sure how exactly your state government works), but make sure you remember this when election time comes up. Find out where the local political parties meet (pick one), go to the meetings and propose a resolution to repeal this ban. If your party is the incumbent run for his office.
Now doing this alone isn't going to do much. However get a few friends together and you can change things. Political party meetings are often poorly attended, so just 10 people showing up per area is enough to have a majority in all the votes, and you can force things through.
Then between the meetings and elections knock on doors and tell people to not for for the incumbent to voted for this. Politicians only listen to money because it helps them get votes. When you go behind them in grass roots like this you more than negate all the money - you force them to vote your way again because you are prooven to represent enough votes to get them out of office. If you have a good personality you just might find yourself a powerful congressmen trying to decide which, if any, bribes are worth taking.
It seems that other countries pay less than we do for more bandwidth.Is this correct?And why?
Crisis is the rule, not the exception.
I thought it was knwon as Mumbai now?
Local calling plans in the US by default have unlimited local calling, so using it for the internet has no additional cost besides the ISP's monthly fee. In most countries, if unlimited local calling plans exist at all, they're not default/standard, so you'd have to pay extra for them.
Basically, Americans who have a phone line already have unlimited local calling, whether they want it or not, so the incremental cost of getting dialup internet is much lower.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Who will develop a new "killer app" when there's absolutely no infrastructure to support it?
Who knows what fantastic things could be invented.
What came first? eBay or the accessability of the Internet to most people (be it dial-up or otherwise?)
Even e-mail is a good example, without so many people accessable via e-mail it wouldn't be a killer app at all. And without the infrastructure and equipment to support sending those photos to grandma, how would she demand such things?
Your iPod reference is an even better example of why the infrastructure must be made available first - would apple's iTunes music store be so successful if you had to wait 35 minutes to download every song? Probably not - it's successful because our current infrastructure allows them to be downloaded in moments.
The idea isnt' to pay more - you miss the point completely. The idea is to pay the SAME or maybe less, and get ultra high speed internet. THAT is what accessability is all about; affordable access that everyone can get. And that's what the Japanese are doing, very much to their credit.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
since 9/11. Sure it sucked but eventually folks here will have to realize that the rest of the industrialized world didn't stop competing because we "discovered" terrorism.
We're a net importer of technology now. (The trade deficit in technology grew to $37 billion last year.) Think about *that* for a second.
Good government policy is a critical part of having a competitive economy. (Where do you think the Internet came from? Private industry alone? Hardly.)
The current administration couldn't care less about any of what we're taking about here - it doesn't speak to their core constituencies of the very rich (who are insulated from the public sphere by their gated communities, private schools, etc.) and the very stupid (who are convinced the Rapture is around the corner - "Econamy? Technalogy? Future? What *are* you all babbling about?".)
Unless we get rulers that actually *care* about any of this, we're just going to have to get used to slipping further behind every year.
The US still beats all of those countries in internet penetration.
We got people hooked on dialup when dialup was all the rage. This is one of the reasons broadband is lagging, another is that the US has some of the cheapest rates for local calls in the world.
We could go on like this for a month.
"Actually, over a 40K connections it would take about 15min to download a song."
15 minutes still sucks man. Compared to the 30 seconds on any sort of real broadband connection. It's symantics.
"Most music however on most iPods did not come from the Internet, "
I didn't say anything about the iPod. I said specificially the iTunes music store, which sells a crap load of songs.
"Usually the application has to come first, then the infrastructure will be created."
I don't agree, not one bit. They kind of feed off each other, and I think infrastructure is more imporatant.
" The automobile made for the construction of good roads. "
On the other hand, good roads were required for the modern automobile.
"The Visicalc spreadsheet started the boom in the personal computer."
Visicalc would have never been created without a viable infrastructure (read: many, many PC's at an affordable price.) If nobody could ever own a PC, there would have been no Visicalc. While I have no doubt that early business applications allowed the IBM PC to push forward to where it is now; the PC came first, not the applications.
"Freeways cost more than 2 lane highways and if there are not enough cars to justify freeways, they will not be built if there are already adequate 2 lane roads."
It's not the same. Cars are cars, trucks are trucks. Bigger, more accessable roads won't spark a new technology that will enable you to do things like never before imagined. The point is, a technical person like you should be able to realize that until a technology is possible, people won't invent them. We have no idea what the Internet will become if everyone had Fast Ethernet speeds at work, home, and everywhere else.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
Damn
As a happy canadian bandwidth whore, I'll give you some insight as to why we're "enjoying" high speed more than USians.
:D
1. Bell Canada, Videotron, Rogers Telecom... just three huge service providers for cable and DSL, with a bunch of small-time resellers. Compare that with the US, where each state is like its own distinct country and you have several competing ISPs, many of them losing or selling out to the big guys. Our telcos are much stabler.
2. cheap! for 40$ canadian (roughly 30$ US) we get 5 mbit down, 900kbit up.. capped at 20gb/mo I believe. for less than double that I get 7mbit down with no caps at all. We even have "econo" DSL/Cable, which is only 256kbit or so, but frees up your phone line and costs roughly the same as dial-up. It's a no-brainer!
3. The RIAA/MPAA can't nail us here (yet). P2P heaven!
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Uneven wealth distribution is a political problem, not an economic one. The study I linked above shows some pretty eye-popping statistics about the wealth of poor people in the US. Their material standard of living exceeds the average of wealthy (Western European) countries, let alone all countries.
Now, you could make the argument that material wealth isn't the complete measure of standard of living. I agree with you there (those long vacations would be nice, although I don't think the European model is sustainable). But my point was the wiki article was self-debunking, as its arguments either refute or don't support the point.
I'm even more angry since I learned here that Australians now get 8mbps service for $30, and I can't even get basic DSL for that!
I, for one, am resisting both DSL and cable because of the business practices and pricing of both the companies involved (SBC and Comcast). Somebody, please, gimme an alternative!
In countries like Canada, broadband is laid out because of governmental mandate. I.e. broadband access is provided to as many Canadians as possible no matter the cost. It's subsidised by our taxes. So remote locations get it even if it'll never be profitable for the corporations. This is true of many things in Canada right from the start: railways, radio, telecoms, television, roads - all provided by the government in the first instance....or picked up by the Government after private companies fell over and left everything hanging - like the railways right in the middle of WW I. The US model of ONLY private everything has never worked for Canada and Canadians have had the good sense to do what works and not be trapped by ideology into dead ends and empty excuses.
Only boring people are ever bored.
ya ever heard of the underground railroad ? Slaves would escape from the south, and ... where do you
think they went? Do you
think they all went back to the US after the civil war?
Do you know that the majority of the population of
both Vancouver and Toronto is non-white ? That
In Canada, the splashy news reports that come out
once in a while are about asian gangs, not blacks?
That our biggest crime problem / drug dealers are biker gangs, and they seem to be mostly white? That in Europe, the slums are mostly arab and gypsy, depending on the country...
Looking at it another way... Why the heck do you have blacks in slums? Id say it is because the US public education and social safety net has so many holes that folks in the inner city are completely written off and have very little chance to get out, generation after generation. In other words, you are proving my thesis. Society doesnt give a shit, so there are slums.
I dont know if BT was more like a European PTT mandated monopoly, or more like a independant company with a defacto monopoly like in North america. In North America, the phone companies own the COs. So the word deregulated means nobody messes with the phone companies, and they can do whatever they want (ie. do not allow any third parties access to their networks, competitors would have to build an entirely separate network.) The US is highly de-regulated, in their own understanding of the term. For example, the Cable companies explicitly fight not to be considered a telecom carrier, because that is more heavily regulated. In the US, DSL is open to third parties, but cable is not.
In Canada, the same forces you describe in the UK are at work, but they come about because of intense regulation of organizations that control the last mile, to encourage them to share. Hence third party ISPs can obtain wholesale access to DSL and cable networks. I havent heard of any access at the local loop level yet.
whether american companies are selling all the satellite ground stations, coax, servers, fiber, routers etc that make all this broadband available: we invented most of this stuff and not selling it would be even more pathetic than not installing for ourselves.
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
work, they cut you off completely in many US jurisdictions, or force you to work at jobs in order to earn their welfare.
If you are part of the working poor, you are eating your KD in the states, and you get sick, what happens? You lose everything paying medical bills, and once you are poor enough, the state will take care of you.
In Canada, getting sick isnt a sentence of poverty. There is a safety net. Social entitlements like health care, and welfare are, by far, the biggest ticket items in government budgets.
In the US? Defense. Canada isnt heaven, but compared to the US, we do a far better job of taking care of our own, because doing so is considered a societal priority.
Im not going to defend Mike Harris. Im not trying to promote or defend any cuts to the social safety net, but simply contrasting it with the US one, which I think it is safe to say, is inferior to what we have here.
If youre saying that our welfare program isnt enough to live on, well, OK, but it is already the biggest program in the government, in terms of budget, next to servicing the debt which was built by.... social spending we could not afford...
At least we did not do it by invading St-Pierre & Miquelon.
I think folks who advocate tax cuts are completely irresponsible, but so are those who want to set standards
based on needs without regard to what the tax base
lets us pay for. The last generation paid for welfare by
saddling us with 30 billion in debt servicing per year. Lets not leave an even heavier burden for our children.
The only way to improve benefits is to either raise taxes
or pay off the debt. Were stuck. Well do what we can, but youre right, there wont be a chicken in every pot.
Yes, indeed. That's why you should go and read the link so you can see all the other statistics. Or do you believe Europeans would rather not have TVs or washing machines?