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Why Broadband In North America Is Not That Slow
An anonymous reader writes "The Globe & Mail has an article written in response to a recent study done by the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard about how far behind the rest of the world the US and Canada are with regard to broadband internet. The refutation basically tears apart Harvard's analysis and shows why the US and Canada are actually far ahead of most European countries. 'Canada has a true broadband penetration rate of close to 70 per cent of households. And North Americans use the Internet somewhat more intensively than do Europeans, according to Cisco Systems data on Internet traffic. Further, business Internet traffic in North America appears to be at levels substantially higher than elsewhere in the world. Sadly, there is little systematic effort by international agencies to measure the intensity of Internet usage. Instead, we see comparisons of advertised speeds and "price per advertised megabit," which are especially misleading. Advertised broadband speeds vary from actual speeds. In North America, this is largely a result of "network overhead," and is quite modest. In Europe, however, the variation is often dramatic.'"
Stuck inside? If something the winters were awesome as a kid. Snowboarding, playing in the snow, cute girls with red cheeks and all the crazy stuff we used to do (and as a little vigilante throw snowballs at cars and run hiding :). Of course, when you got inside you could enjoy a game of Civilization. I would take all of that anytime over surfing or making sand castles on the beach as a kid, as these things I can do now as an adult.
And I still like winters, but just for other reasons - they're romantic time and nothing better than putting woolen socks on with a girl and enjoy the warmness together. Though excluding this year it's been way too warm for that, damn global warming.
I never understood this American fear of socialism. What is so wrong with it, that the mere mention of it makes you an agent of the devil ? I mean what's so specific about American culture that plant fear of socialism ? Europe is doing fine, isn't this a more then a good evidence ?