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US Falls to 24th Place For Broadband Penetration
amigoro writes "According to research done by the consultancy firm Point Topic, the US has fallen to 24th place in terms of broadband penetration, with only 53% of households connected. South Korea led the pack, with 90% of households having highspeed connections. The US remains the largest broadband country in the world with more than 60.4 million subscribers in the quarter with 2.9 million new broadband additions, but China is fast catching up and has cut the gap to the US from 5.8 million at the end of 2006 to 4.1 million at end of March 2007. The firm's research also pointed out the disparity between the connectivity of first world nations and other places throughout the world. 'Many Sub-Saharan African states do not register in the figures at all: only South Africa, Sudan, Senegal and Gabon make it onto the list, with household broadband penetration running from 1.79% in South Africa - with 215,000 users at the end of March - to just 0.05% in Sudan - with a mere 3,000. North African states fare slightly better with Morocco scoring 6.78% penetration with 418,000 users and Egypt at 1.55% or 240,000.'"
Pleeeeease......
That is such bullshit. Not even in the densely populated areas you can get decent broadband in USA. The kind of figures you can get in Scandinavia, Korea and Japan is just not possible and that has NOTHING, NOT A BLOODY THING, to do with population density. Its about money and its about how involved the government is. Both in Japan, Korea and in Scandinavia the governments have been investing in black fibre just for the purpose to create a better internet for the people. companies that wanted to invest also got tax breaks and counties built their own black fibre networks. In my home town, Gothenburg, the city has built a large black fibre network. Unlike US cities where the city itself have run as an ISP (or tried to until they got sued in some case) the city doesn't provide internet access. other companies do that. I hear lots of baby whining from American "Why should I pay my taxes so someone else can surf porn" and I find it strange that I never hear some one whining about that your tax dollars goes to people paid by the CIA to rape young Iraqi girls in front of their fathers as a torture method (yeah, that actually happened). Hmmmmmmmmmm... Weird isnt it???
Just shut the bloody hell up with that "its not so densely populated here". California is the size of Sweden and have 4 times as many people but you can in Sweden easily get better and faster broadband than you. Yeah, right sorry, that is because the more people there is means that there is less of a market and less demand for it.
No, not again!
EVERY time a story like this pops up on Slashdot, the exact same discussion ensues. There are a lot of readers from the US who for some reason or other just can't stand the fact that the US is not #1 in everything tech-related, and start slagging the story.
"But we're leading in total numbers!"
Yes, but penetration is important because it will be a lot more interesting when everyone in society has it, not just you, or your friends, or everyone in the upper-middle class and above.
"But we have such low population density!"
Yes, on average, the US population density is pretty low compared to the rest of the west, but on the broadband penetration list, there are countries that are less dense than the US, but still have better penetration.
"But, population density is only an average, we have such low levels of urbanization!"
Yes, on average, the US' level of urbanization is pretty low compared to the rest of the west, but on the broadband penetration list, there are countries that are less urbanized than the US, but still have better penetration.
"But, averages suck, we should compare big cities!"
Ok, New York might have the best penetration in the US for example, but there are plenty of other big cities that have better penetration, and are not situated in the US.
"But, those stinking pinko liberal commie Europeans have government subsidies on broadband!"
Well, there are lots of places in the US that had the phone copper paid for by taxes, and there are lots of place sin the US where local government subsidizes broadband, and the same goes for lots of places in the west. But not all places.
There are other countries/cities/areas that have better broadband penetration than the US, in relative terms, in absolute terms, despite being less urbanized and less densely populated, without government subsidies, and in a free market economy. Get over it for fuck's sake.
If you so desperately want to be #1 in this as well, DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT instead of dismissing the reports or refuse to believe in them or squint and look at them sideways. Stop the whining already. Look at those that do better and LEARN from it.
This is an old, tired argument. Sure, North Korea is more densely populated. The Netherlands too. But the density does not really say it all, it's just an average. My dad got top marks in his course in statistics, and he went on all his life pontificating about the "chicken average": I eat two chickens, you eat none, on average we ate one each". There are surely immense areas of the US without broadband (like Yellowstone park, say), but what about areas as dense as NYC?
The question is better put as: how many Americans live in high-density areas? Quite a few. The overall density is low because there is a damn half of the country that is uninhabited, and that's before counting in Alaska.
Also, what is the "threshold value" beyond which population density can sustain broadband, and how many Americans live in areas beyond this density?
America's broadband problem is not just less density (granted, that plays a role): the problem is that US culture refuses governmental intervention in infrastructure. South Korea's government, instead, invested heavily in Internet connectivity, and their lead position is the result. If you want your government out of your business, fair enough, but don't think anyone else is going to come in and build infrastructure if they cannot turn a profit in less that 24 months. The argument that society as a whole will benefit from broadband does not really appeal to private actors: they want money, not to benefit society.
Victims of 9/11: <3000. Traffic in the US: >30,000/y