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AT&T Says 10Mbps Is Too Fast For "Broadband," 4Mbps Is Enough
An anonymous reader writes AT&T and Verizon have asked the FCC not to change the definition of broadband from 4Mbps to 10Mbps, contending that "10Mbps service exceeds what many Americans need today to enable basic, high-quality transmissions." From the article: "Individual cable companies did not submit comments to the FCC, but their representative, the National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA), agrees with AT&T and Verizon. 'The Commission should not change the baseline broadband speed threshold from 4Mbps downstream and 1Mbps upstream because a 4/1 Mbps connection is still sufficient to perform the primary functions identified in section 706 [of the Telecommunications Act]—high-quality voice, video, and data,' the NCTA wrote."
F your ISPs in the US and F your corrupted "FCC"
I think $200k top salary including bonuses far exceeds what many CEO's need for living a basic high quality life. Any more than that would just be wasted on blow and hookers.
FCC: We're redefining what constitutes "high speed broadband", as the current description is about 10 years old.
TelcomLobby: We're good with what we have now.
FCC: Unfortunately no. Your networks haven't really grown in capacity for the end-user in several years now. And by the new definitions, your service won't qualify as "high speed".
TelcomLobby: We're good with what we have now.
FCC: No, that's what we're telling you, you're not.
TelcomLobby: Uh. Can we just bribe you not to make this change? It might affect our killer bottom line!
While I don't own a gun, it's times like these I wish I fucking did.
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
TFS mentions high quality video. You're not streaming high quality video with 10 or even 20Mbps.
Netflix recommends 5Mbps for HD streaming, so you are wrong.
When I called Netflix for tech support, they recommended 5MBps for HD streaming. However, their FAQ do say 5Mbps for HD streaming. Also note that they call 720p "HD". As we get more devices connected to the network and higher resolutions become standard, we will need more bandwidth.
How can we mandate that AT&T executives must not drive faster than 45mph, which is as fast as you need to go to get basic transportation?
Yes, well, when your whole country is the size of one or two of our states...
The US is pretty freaking large, and we're fairly spread out - even on the coast.
Wake me up when you can go to a random hovel in Siberia and get those speeds... because that would be a closer comparison than what you're saying.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
All of Europe is about 1/2 the size of the US. Size matters.
Area of Europe: 10.18 million km
Area of USA: 9.827 million km
So "All of Europe" is slightly larger than the USA, not "half the size".
The map you use as a citation is NOT a map of Europe. It is not even a map of the European Union.
Your apparent point, that ISP rates are proportional to population density, is also wrong. Remote areas of Finland and Sweden have very low population density, yet still have more bandwidth and better prices than some large American cities.
Give anyone 4 mbps connection who is living in an area that still has dialup as their only option, and ask them if its broadband. If someone works to bring 4/1 mbps connections to more areas, they should be able to advertise it as broadband.
That's like saying I should be able to advertise my bicycle as a car if I'm selling it in an area that is still using horses.
Do you measure speeds to Google only from houses in MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA? Speeds to Netflix from LOS GATOS, CA?
Connecting every point to every other point in Latvia is an easier problem than connecting the tips of Maine, Florida, Texas, Alaska, and Hawaii.
Go on, tell me that Alaska and Hawaii are trivial, or how they aren't in the US, or how they shouldn't factor in to average speeds. Or tell me about how you can get a huge packet round trip from California to Hawaii or Alaska in under X milliseconds. I'm talking about every small town wired to every other one. That's nowhere near the same solution as Latvia.
Population density is not a great argument. But the solution doesn't just scale because the Alaska to Orlando problem is not just Latvia times a scaling factor.