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Does Faster Broadband Matter?

tsa writes "There is an interesting piece on Ars Technica discussing the implications of faster broadband services for the users, and for the internet as a whole. From the article: 'Most online activities, like standard websurfing, are not significantly sped up by high-bandwidth connections, and the few that are, such as downloading, are not typically time-sensitive anyway. Many service providers are starting to prioritize their own content at the expense of those from rivals. Many countries have started or are considering blocking Voice-over-IP (VOIP) traffic in order to protect the phone companies from competition.'" How does faster broadband actually impact your Net usage?

3 of 442 comments (clear)

  1. Pornography by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Pornography

  2. UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA CUTS HEALTH INSURANCE by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    FOR GRAD STUDENTS.

    So if you are from India or China and are deciding whether you should go to the U of Minnesota or some other school, choose that other school.

    With our GRE scores, we have a choice of grad schools anyways, so why get stuck with U of M: whose health insurance charges $10 per visit to a doctor, $700 (not covered under grad. student insurance) per semester in insurance fees?? Assistantship packages should include all this, but here in the U of M, they do not.

  3. Re:Article misses the point by moresheth · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    That's very true. You can think of it like magazines. You can get a subscription to one, and they'll send it to your house, or you can pick them up at random from stores, similar to downloading movies or television shows. But no magazine can ever be produced by only the subscribers' slim pickings. The real revenue comes from the ads inside it.

    This is also why you can get subscriptions for a fraction of the cover price, because then the publishing company has statistics of you to give to the advertisers.

    None of this will change for television and movie downloading. There will still be commercials, whether in the show or "around" it, but the big bucks will come from that and not what you pay to download it.