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America's Not So Up to Speed

Posted by Zonk on from the tortoise-only-wins-it-so-long dept.

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.

40 of 516 comments (clear)

  1. No kidding... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'm still downloading that Pam and Tommy Lee video that i started years ago....

  2. Not first post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I would have got it but this connection is SO DAMN SLOW!

  3. Country size matters by Rosyna · · Score: 3, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:Country size matters by Adult+film+producer · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Sure, its settled within a 100 miles of the u.s. border but that doesn't mean they're all stuffed into one corner of ontario or quebec. They live along a huge waterway & lakes, remember the St. Lawrence, Lake Ontario/Erie, etc ? Millions of people living from detroit to montreal.. this is not comparable Hong Kong or New York.

      And then there's a few million people displaced into the prairie provinces that stretches thousands of miles.

      Saying everybody lives within 100 miles of the u.s. border oversimplifies things a wee bit.

    2. Re:Country size matters by Jabolio · · Score: 5, Informative

      While much of Canada's population does lie within 100 miles of the US border, that says nothing about why Canada's broadband infrastructure has been ahead of the States in recent years.

      Where I'm from (Halifax, Nova Scotia), we've had residential broadband access in some form or another since as far back as 1995 or 1996. Much of rural Nova Scotia and PEI have broadband access. The greatest thing about it all is that the prices are relatively reasonable, around $40CAN per month, with varying degrees of speed/accessibility

      On the other hand, there isn't a whole lot of "wasteland" to fill between towns, meaning that setting up so many additional connections will always yield a decent increase in subscriber base.

      This kind of article shows up every now and then, doesn't it? Oh well. It's not Canada's fault that there's just SO MUCH MORE UNITED STATES to cover.

    3. Re:Country size matters by MarkRose · · Score: 5, Informative

      the majority of Canadia's population is settled within 100 miles or so of the US border

      Every time the topic of poor broadband availability in the US comes up, this fallacy is repeated. Yes, the majority of the Canadian population is near the US border, but broadband penetration goes much further. I live roughly 500 miles north of the US border, and a 5 hour drive from the nearest city of over 50,000 people -- yet I have my choice of broadband internet providers -- and at competitive prices. For $20/month Canadian (about $15 US), I get 170 KB down and 60 KB up (bytes not bits). The whole argument is bullocks.

      --
      Be relentless!
    4. Re:Country size matters by 0x461FAB0BD7D2 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Comparing US to developing countries like India and China is ludicrous. The US has had development in IT for far longer than either of those two countries, and has had far more resources for far fewer people.

      Broadband penetration is a matter of public interest, not geography. If there was a demand for it, it would be provided even in the remotest regions, especially in a country as developed as the US.

    5. Re:Country size matters by Rosyna · · Score: 3, Funny

      Always remember to ignore any typos I make while reading my posts. I'll kindly return the favor.

    6. Re:Country size matters by Cplus · · Score: 3, Informative

      It's actually the great distances that are between major Canadian cities that causes Canada to be a leader in communications globally. One of the major things that we've had to do as a country is to enable communication and cultural solidarity across sparsely populated areas. Innovation in the communication sector is something that has always been an important issue to Canadians, and to the Canadian Government. The mandate of Industry Canada is to help make Canadians more productive and competitive in the knowledge-based economy. Broadband being cheap and everywhere is a bit part of that, and has been for a decade.

      --
      "Share your knowledge. It's a way to achieve immortality." -- Dalai Lama
    7. Re:Country size matters by derfy · · Score: 3, Funny
      Finally, keep in mind that this general rule: too much Internet makes you stupid.

      No I'm....doesn't!

    8. Re:Country size matters by xstonedogx · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The point the GP was making is that the US has a higher percentage of it's population living in sparsely populated regions. It's relatively easy for Canada to bring a higher percentage of it's population broadband because a higher percentage of those folks live (relatively speaking) right next door to each other.

      If 5 million Canadians moved out into the prairies, the population density of Canada would not change. But it be a lot tougher to bring them broadband.

    9. Re:Country size matters by Dark+Nexus · · Score: 5, Informative

      Yeah. If I recall correctly, Saskatchewan is (or at least used to be) the province with the highest percentage of the population with high-speed, and is one of the provinces with the lowest population density. I mean, the population of Toronto is several times that of the entirety of Saskatchewan.

      --
      Dark Nexus
      "Sanity is calming, but madness is more interesting."
    10. Re:Country size matters by Senjutsu · · Score: 4, Insightful

      the majority of Canadia's population is settled within 100 miles or so of the US border.

      Three quarters of all Americans live within 80kms (49.7 miles) of the coast or great lakes. If having larger parts of the population in a small number of clumps was the over-riding factor here, the US broadband penetration would still be expected to be higher than it currently is.

    11. Re:Country size matters by Adult+film+producer · · Score: 3, Informative

      You say that you're 5 hours away from a city with over 50,000 people in it. OK, how many towns of 5000 people are within 2.5 hours of you?

      I'm not the person you were replying to but I know many small towns (Villages if you want to call them) that are wired. I can name 15 small towns with populations under 1000 that have broadband access up north (sitting hundreds of kilometers outside of the 401 corridor.)

    12. Re:Country size matters by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      The US has 80.3 percent urban population

      Canada has 79.6 percent urban

      People clump around cities, it's an industrialized nation thing.

      As another note, here in Canada almost everyone has cable or satalite TV. We don't have the population density to get more then a couple of channels.

      US stats - see p32

      Canadian stats

    13. Re:Country size matters by Feztaa · · Score: 3, Funny

      I have to say "Look at the picture!"

      All this map proves is that Canadians are more conscious of light pollution... ;)

    14. Re:Country size matters by 1u3hr · · Score: 3, Insightful
      it simply isn't cost effective to wire up a "small" subscriber base of 100,000 people

      I live in a village in rural Hong Kong (it's not all high rise) with a population of about 3000. We got broadband three or four years ago; 3M DSL. All they had to do was install the equipment at the local phone exchange, then we coul;d plug in our DSL modems.

      As TFAs point out, the problem isn't that providing broadband is unprofitable; but that it will eat into the profits of the phone companies (by allowing IP telephony) and cable companies (by allowing downloading or streaming of video content). So they're delaying installing broadband as long as they can get away with it, while doing everything to block other providers using their circuits. Here the old phone monopoly company was forced to share its network, which led to several companies offering DSL at less than half their rate, along with IP phones and broadband TV.

  4. Fiber by caryw · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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

  5. US v. Canada by pilot-programmer · · Score: 5, Interesting

    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.

  6. ALL infrastructure by Ars-Fartsica · · Score: 5, Insightful
    How about the hole in the roof of the local school? How about the 50% of bridges the US govt says are in need of serious repair? How about the 50%+ of municipal sewer systems local govts say are in need of "major" overhauls? Roads? Same. Don't even mention the power grid.

    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.

    1. Re:ALL infrastructure by Ars-Fartsica · · Score: 4, Insightful
      I'm not trying to troll, but is money really this tight in the US?

      No, there is plenty of money, 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 demolished and rebuilt from the ground up, a significant portion of all of the school in the US. Or you could have paid for everyone's healthcare for one year (every US resident), or you could have wired most major cities for 100MB connections to the residence, or at least made a dent in the debt.

      Americans pay taxes comparable to other market-based nations too, so the idea that they are saving the wealth is also wrong,

    2. Re:ALL infrastructure by coaxial · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'm an American. I'll fill you in.

      Yes. Our infrastructure is falling apart quite literally at the seams. Yes. The corporations have enough power to shutdown municiple WiFi ("It amounts to unfair government price controls, and government price controls are communist.") Yes. Education spending and educational standards are falling. Yes. The wage gap is getting larger. Yes. some care. No. Not enough are willing to do anything about it because they're distracted by gay marriage. Yes. America is moving full tilt to dismantle every socioeconomic safety net in the country, and effectively repeal the 20th century.

      America's best days are behind it.

  7. wrong conclusions by Dr+Kool,+PhD · · Score: 3, Insightful

    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.

    1. Re:wrong conclusions by lifebouy · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Way to not say much. But I'll retort anyway. It's not that "more Americans don't want high speed internet access," but that noone wants to pay more than about $20 for it. For most people, it's simply not worth more than that. Apparently Moore's Law doesn't apply to internet access, or we'd be paying much less. The main reason municipal wifi is getting roadblocked is because that would drive high-speed internet prices way down, and ruin the oligopoly that currently strangles internet access. Bottom line.

      --
      Drop me a line at:
      Key ID: 0x54D1D809
  8. Just me... by Psionicist · · Score: 5, Insightful

    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.

  9. Re:Ok, So They Do One Thing Better by Nimrangul · · Score: 5, Informative

    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.
  10. Population Density by tankenator · · Score: 3, Insightful

    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......

  11. Them is all COMMIE-NIST countries by Cryofan · · Score: 3, Insightful

    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
  12. Re:What's up with these "scare" articles? by clandestine_nova · · Score: 3, Insightful

    This articles exist because it's sort of an American ideal to be good at everything, and also because America has been a global superpower for a long time.

    Moreover, the gist of this article doesn't mean that the U.S. is going to suddenly become irrelevant - it means that the U.S. isn't as technologically advanced in certain areas as other, seemingly weaker countries. And that the U.S. is falling behind, as well, which is certainly something to note.

    --
    Discworld.
  13. Re:"... and even Canada"? by Cplus · · Score: 5, Informative

    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
  14. Bureaucracy, pure and simple by N5 · · Score: 5, Informative

    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.
    1. Re:Bureaucracy, pure and simple by iwadasn · · Score: 3, Interesting

      How about this, don't live in the suburbs. I live in NYC, and I can get broadband for about $30/month, and it's relatively fast (1.5 M/bit each way, roughly, for pretty much any of the options), available everywhere, and has very low latency.

      Live in the suburbs, die by the suburbs. The real problem with the US is that we subsidize soccer moms paving over the forests to ahve their white picket fences. Then people bitch because they can't get superfast internet access 1000 miles from nowhere, and they complain that gas costs too much money. Isn't it the responsibility of the city folk to pay for their 100 mile long power lines, phone lines, roads, and the cheap gas to run their SUVs?

      Move somewhere decent, and you'll have excellent broadband. Many of the apartment buildings in NYC (like the one I'm in right now) just buy their own DS3, and merge their signal onto the cable going to every apartment. Works quite well, it's the new trend I think. Even if that doesn't work for you, we have at least two providers of DSL, and probably two more of cable. $30 will get you quite a lot of bandwidth around here, even though everything else is quite expensive.

      Also, NYC is expensive, but the wages are huge. Travel anywhere, and even when they charge you the ripoff tourist rates, it'll be cheap by comparison. Make 4 times the pay, pay 4 times the bills, save 4 times the money, and get vacations for the same price, not a bad deal.

  15. The facts & figures by rbrander · · Score: 5, Informative

    This story seems to be nearly a dupe of yesterays. So I'll dupe the facts I looked up for that one:

    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.ht m

    http://www.statcan.ca/english/freepub/82-221-XIE / 2004002/tables/pdf/44_01.pdf

    www.paulnoll.com/Korea/History/South-Korean-pop- d ist.html

    http://www.dalfarra.ch/nds/zusatzdokumente/2003_ 2_ sense_of_broadband.pdf

  16. IT'S NOT A WEEK AT /. WITHOUT THIS STORY! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    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!

    1. Re:IT'S NOT A WEEK AT /. WITHOUT THIS STORY! by RollingThunder · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Lower standard of living? Interesting assertion.

      What's your prime metric? Percentage of encarcerated adults? Deaths due to firearms? Bankruptcy due to medical expenses?

    2. Re:IT'S NOT A WEEK AT /. WITHOUT THIS STORY! by Stoutlimb · · Score: 4, Funny

      " Its people are better educated, they live longer, and they have a smaller homeless population. "

      I personally think that our low homeless population is due to our harsh winters. They provide a very strong incentive for people to live indoors.

      And the hobos we have that do live outside in the winter are usually DAMN tough customers.

      .

  17. Excuses, Excuses... by smokin_juan · · Score: 4, Interesting

    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.

  18. *Even Canada!* by blorg · · Score: 4, Funny

    I don't mind the negative comparisons to Japan, South Korea, Denmark. But *Canada*! That really hurts.

  19. Re:"... and even Canada"?-- Its policy. by anon+mouse-cow-aard · · Score: 3, Interesting
    More relevant is the following link:


    http://broadband.ic.gc.ca/pub/index.html?iin.lan g= en


    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.

  20. Gasp!!! by PhotoGuy · · Score: 3, Funny
    even Canada...

    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.