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We Don't Need No Stinkin' Broadband
Ant writes "eMarketer has an article on The Yankee Group's analysis on why some Americans aren't feeling the broadband love. It was based on Ipsos Public Affairs. 45% of Americans say it's simply too expensive. 30% say that they just don't want it. 14% say they feel dial-up is adequate for their needs. Less than 10% are not able to get broadband access in their area. Five percent insist broadband is "too complicated". Another 5% aren't even sure why they don't have it..."
Not everybody lives in the service area for PacBell DSL.
And not everybody is savvy or patient enough to get the $15/month plan.
I try to renew at $15/month , and the dumbass on the phone says I can only renew for $35/month. I call again, and I can renew for $25/month but only if it's the second tuesday of the month and my right foot wearing a shoe. What to non-techies do in this situation?
94% of Repubs and 21% of Dems voted to renew the Patriot Act
You're right - for the most part. But there are legitimate uses of large media files that don't include advertising. Go ahead - try to send video of your newborn baby to your relatives across the country using 56k. You can do it in real time with good quality for the cost of a $25 webcam and broadband - 56k is impossible, and non-internet options start getting really, really expensive.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
Price was an issue until just recently. SBC/ATT dropped to $13, and Verizon dropped to $15/mo. That's less than large ISPs (Earthlink, MSN, AOL) are charging for dial-up, and only slightly more than most others (Netzero, Juno, etc) with crappy dial-up service and software.
The only excuse now is if you travel a lot, and need access all across the country.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
Not all areas have the same deals that the metropolitan areas have. I wish I could get DSL for less than $30/month. Check this out:
http://home.shentel.net/DSL/cost.cfm
It doesn't help that this one company runs the telephone, cable TV and internet access for the entire county, and they refuse to offer internet access via cable for faster speed.
Ramen
I think you are a bit mistaken about broadband penetration outside the US.
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*Especially* outside the US broadband is more the norm than the exception since the late 1990's.
Some facts (based on Q3 2005 numbers):
80% of the South-Koreans have broadband, 75% of Hong Kong, 60% of Israel, 60% of Taiwan, ~57% of Singapore, 55% of The Netherlands, 53% of Monaco, 53% of Canada, 51% of Switzerland, and 50% of Denmark. (source: http://www.marketingfacts.nl/images/uploads/20060
The following is also interesting to see: http://www.marketingfacts.nl/images/uploads/per-c
Growth broadband in percentage first half year of 2005: http://www.marketingfacts.nl/images/uploads/europ
And Eastern Europe is very active right now revamping a lot of their telecommunication systems so that will mean that in the coming time their broadband penetration will soar as well.
Jeroen Ruigrok/Asmodai
But while I'm not at all surprised by this, I think the fact is that the US will eventually have cheap broadband like it or not.
The problem with broadband for many Americans is that they don't see the advantage in it. Many Americans can afford to pay for many of the things that people in other countries might only be able to get by downloading them freely off the net. So, in a way Americans have blinders on with regards to the possibilities of the Internet.
An excellent, and I would even say profound, example is academic journals. An American could be forgiven for thinking that all universities across the globe have libraries with stacks and stacks of academic journals just like the local state university library does. In fact, that's not the case at all. In many nations, broadband is enabling a great leap in educational quality that gives millions of students the chance to study meaningful cutting-edge research for the first time in their local academic history. Americans naturally have a hard time imagining what that means or how important it is because they already have practically free access to these things. Anybody in the States can use the university library after all. So, for an American, the issue of getting journals on the Internet seems somewhat irrelevant.
So, broadband is definitely something that the US is only going to accept reluctantly, but slowly or not it is most certainly going to come even if the US is the last place on earth to get decent broadband penetration which I could easily imagine having just visited there and having been forced to use a modem on a number of occasions.
NTT provides broadband access for a fraction of the price that we get it for in the U.S.
Maybe that has something to do with the fact that Japan was essentially reduced to mostly rubble 60 years ago while we in the U.S. deal with OSP that is both that age and has never been properly maintained.
But here is a good example of why most people don't get even DSL. I'll present two cases here, the first my own, the second that of a relative in the same state.
Verizon said that I was too far from the central office to get DSL. "That's funny" said I since I could basically throw rocks at the central office.
Did two go arounds on this until finally I got the bright idea to call repair and get them to do an MLT. Sure enough, MLT said I was less than half a mile from the CO. I asked repair to enter the distance into my customer record and then called Verizon DSL back. Lo and behold - I now qualified.
In my aunts case, the home had DSL before she bought it and the previous subscriber had the line disconnected. When my aunt tried to get DSL installed she was told by Verizon that they she was too far out. I told her to use the trick I'd discovered and sure enough, two weeks later she had here DSL.
I've since ditched Verizon entirely but this demonstrates that in the case of DSL, if you don't know how the system works, you're screwed.
I'm a consultant in central Illinois, USA. Once you're outside of Chicago with it's associated 'burbs, your options for broadband become pretty limited. If you're near Peoria, Springfield, Champaign, Decatur, or Kankakee, you have some options with DSL and cable broadband. Some of the small towns, populations > 200, also have cable, but it's typically only because some mom and pop cable company built it up and then. SBC offers DSL only within a couple of miles of town. There is a subdivision of more than 500 homes right outside of Peoria and Bartonville, both of which have DSL. Yet the subdivision doesn't. Until the cable provider brought in a couple of T-1's about 3 years ago, no options existed. Yet this is less than 3 miles as the crow flies from Bartonville. And there is a new switch and fiber (both less than 10 years old) running right along the road outside the subdivision. And we all know that SBC isn't readily doing any landline buildout for areas they "already cover." Verizon covers some of the towns in the region, like Canton. But guess what? You can't even get proper caller ID for your PBX from Verizon in that region. Antiquated equipment with no likelihood of change for a while. There are also numerous other telcos involved in the region, none of who provide services beyond basic voice grade lines if you're outside of town limits. Insight (ATT) provides high-speed services via cable, and they were doing build-outs in central Illinois, but they have a formula that they use to determine whether they're going to invest. They look for existing fiber, but will add as needed. However, more than 75% of the towns in the region don't fit their profile. If the town's population is less than 1,000, meaning a likely household count of less than 300, chances are you will never see cable. Insight even does a drive-though, counting satellite dishes if the numbers get close. If they see too many, forget it, they're not returning. Riverton has cable and DSL and is just 4 miles from the city limits of Springfield, the state capital. Yet if you live only a mile outside of Riverton, you have no broadband options. The list goes on. Effected population? Hundreds of thousands in Illinois alone. And they don't all have the option to "move to town for a better connection."
Umm...the US may be a "freakin' huge land mass" compared to Japan, but it is still dwarfed in size by Canada. Yes you are right, most of the population of Canada is concentrated in certain areas, typically towards the Canada - US border. But, our broadband providers also started setting up service in high density areas first, for the same reasons you cite the US telcos doing it.
I think there are a couple of factors that explain the difference:
1) As the article says 30% don't want it and 14% say dial-up is just fine. So, thats 44% that don't want broadband because they are not interested in it or see no benefit to it. Though I can't understand why, I would die without my broadband connection.
2) When broadband was initially offered in Canada there were very few ISPs offering it. Bell Canada, our major telco up here, and Rogers Cable our major cable tv provider. That made it alot easier to decide who to go with for broadband. As market penetration progressed many smaller companies popped up offer some form of a DSL package. Cable internet is pretty much solely in the hands of a few cable providers such as Roger's and Shaw Cable and there is less competition for cable internet. Basically if you want cable broadband and you are in an area serviced by Rogers, you get your broadband from Rogers, unless you want DSL then you have more choices.