Major ISPs Seek To Lower Broadband Definition

denobug sends word that major internet service providers in the US are seeking to redefine the term 'Broadband' to mean a much lower speed than in other developed nations. In recent filings with the FCC, Comcast and AT&T both came out in support of a reduced minimum speed. 'AT&T said regulators should keep in mind that not all applications like voice over internet protocol (VoIP) or streaming video, that require faster speeds, are necessarily needed by unserved Americans.' On the other hand, Verizon argued to maintain the status quo, saying that 'It would be disruptive and introduce confusion if the commission were to now create a new and different definition.' A public interest group called Free Press also filed comments with the FCC, recommending that the bar should be set significantly higher, and evolve in a way that corresponds with technological improvements.

Comments

Re:The status quo

[rehtonAesoohC]

While the disclaimer may be in there for FIOS, I have found that every single time I go to download huge files (as in, 13 gigabytes apiece), I consistently get my full 10mb down rate.

When I was on cable, it varied drastically depending on the time of day I was downloading. I have never had more consistent service speeds than I have on FIOS.

Why not?

[raddan]

:start rant

We've already done a great job at butchering the term anyway. Most usage doesn't correspond with reality.

• "bandwidth" is a function of the physical characteristcs of the medium. I.e., with wires, the impedance goes up as the wire gets longer. This changes the wire's ability to transmit high frequencies (it "attenuates" the signal). Even dictionaries get this wrong.
• "baud" or "symbol rate" is a function of bandwidth and your modulation scheme.
• "bitrate" is a function of the symbol rate, and also depends on things like your packet structures and encoding schemes (actually, it depends on a LOT of things).
• "speed" is not a technical term in this context, but most "technical" people equate it with "bitrate". For most other people, "speed" means "how long do I have to wait?"

:end rant

(if you can't complain about this kind of stuff on a website billing itself as "news for nerds", where can you complain?)

But it just goes to show that carriers feel no need to compete. Most of us have no ability to choose the products we want from them, and with Uncle Sam's help, they can keep us from seeing how lame they really are.

News in comparison

[A beautiful mind]

In Hungary, T-online has announced today that they're rolling out 80mbit FTTH to 180-200k subscribers by the end of the year. (This is a country of 10M).

They've also changed the minimum package from 2 to 5mbit, bumped up the non-fibre/vdsl package to 15mbit and drastically increased the minimum guaranteed bandwidth to 1mbit for the 5mbit connection and to 5mbit for the 15mbit connection.

Personally, I pay 50 EUR / mo for IPTV and 33mbit VDSL. I do not consider anything below 8mbit "broadband" these days.

Re:How small is it?

[Anonymous Coward]

The term's already been redefined. Breadth - despite popular misconception - has little or no direct bearing on network speed.

You're confused. The term comes from the mathematical and engineering field called "Information Theory". The key result is called the "Nyquist-Shannon Sampling Theorem", which relates the amount of information a certain amount of spectrum (band width) can carry.

Guess what: 2.4GHz signals can only carry so much information. DSL signals are band limited (that is, there is an upper bound on the frequencies at which DSL modems operate). So are cable modems.

Your link explains this much, so I am not sure why you're confused.

Re:The status quo

[elbobo]

I'm living in Tokyo at the moment, and my (rather cheap) apartment comes with broadband (fibre) bundled as part of the rent. I just did a speed test and I'm getting 52mbit down, 10mbit up. Absolutely no monthly limits.

Pretty much every apartment I looked at when picking this place had broadband (often fibre) bundled in to the rent cost, and all would be unlimited data.

Re:The status quo

[commodore64_love]

>>>I have a max of 10MB on my line, and my neighbor has a max of 5MB, do we assume that the average speed is 7.5MB, even though the ISP might only have 12MB total
>>>

No. A lot of studies do exactly what you suggest - work with the *advertized* speeds. But the place where I got my stats, speedtest.net, uses ACTUAL speeds from a wide range of tests all around the world
.

>>>how many speeds are there in Arizona to add up?

I have no idea for that specific state, but worldwide the site says "over twenty million tests taken every month", so that would be about 1/2 billion connections tested over the last two years. The top continents are:

Europe 6.4 Mbit/s
N.America 6.1
Australia 4.8
Asia 4.3
S.America 2
Africa 1.1

Contrary to what is often said, the North American continent is not "falling behind". In fact the updated U.S. stats now read 6.8 Mbit/s and therefore higher than Europe.