America ranks 15th in the world in broadband access

[one...two...tree 2,762]

by Tana Ganeva, AlterNet

The North Carolina legislature just sent a bill to study committee (a.k.a shelved it at least until next year) that would have crippled municipal broadband projects in the state.

Here’s why that’s a really, really good (albeit temporary) thing: According to a recent study, America ranks 15th in the world in broadband access. This is partly because we have a very large population spread over a very large amount of space. But it is also because private companies don’t care about poor people and refuse to build broadband infrastructure in rural areas and many low-income city neighboorhoods.

This is where municipal broadband plans come in. Local governments set up networks providing fast Internet access to underserved or totally ignored areas, for free or at significantly lower prices than would private providers.

But not if the telecoms can help it! ISPs, distressed by the prospect of actual competition in an otherwise monopolized industry, claim that municipal broadband has an unfair advantage over private broadband providers.

And one way to “level the playing between between the public and private sectors”, as a TWC spokesperson ridiculously put it, is to lobby for deeply unpopular legislation that would effectively kill local government broadband projects.

The North Carolina bill, backed by Time Warner Cable and Embarq, an offshoot of Sprint, would have placed such onerous restrictions on municipal networks as to effectively make them unworkable.

Among other things, the bill would have:

http://www.alternet.org/blogs/peek/suck_it...arolina/#139876

[Giskat09 2]

who's first?

[fozzie 41]

Japan I believe.

UK not even in the top 30.

[Giskat09 2]

Japan I believe.

UK not even in the top 30.

ohhh... by the way im working with Tiscali at this time... whats ur provider if u dont mind me asking?

[GaryC 7]

who's first?

I thought I read that S. Korea was first. I could be wrong though.

[It's me 1]

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

I directly blame Comcast. I wanted to switch from satellite back to cable, and those yahoos can't even figure it out. I already have a drop. All they have to do is remove the trap from the pole, and assign me an account. After two days of trying to make that happen, I gave up. I can't even get them to have a local rep contact me. I don't know where their call center is, but English is their first language, and I don't think they can find their way home at night without leaving a trail of hominy.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

I directly blame Comcast. I wanted to switch from satellite back to cable, and those yahoos can't even figure it out. I already have a drop. All they have to do is remove the trap from the pole, and assign me an account. After two days of trying to make that happen, I gave up. I can't even get them to have a local rep contact me. I don't know where their call center is, but English is their first language, and I don't think they can find their way home at night without leaving a trail of hominy.

You're not happy with satellite?

[natty bumppo 297]

the USA is 15th in broad band ??

so the USA is not as fat as people say? there are other countries with more expanding waistlines?

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

I directly blame Comcast. I wanted to switch from satellite back to cable, and those yahoos can't even figure it out. I already have a drop. All they have to do is remove the trap from the pole, and assign me an account. After two days of trying to make that happen, I gave up. I can't even get them to have a local rep contact me. I don't know where their call center is, but English is their first language, and I don't think they can find their way home at night without leaving a trail of hominy.

You're not happy with satellite?

Not completely. Too many trees blocking the signal when the wind blows or it rains. It's the one drawback of living in a forested area.

[Ban Hammer 13,360]

I directly blame Comcast. I wanted to switch from satellite back to cable, and those yahoos can't even figure it out. I already have a drop. All they have to do is remove the trap from the pole, and assign me an account. After two days of trying to make that happen, I gave up. I can't even get them to have a local rep contact me. I don't know where their call center is, but English is their first language, and I don't think they can find their way home at night without leaving a trail of hominy.

You're not happy with satellite?

hughesnet blows for internet!

[natty bumppo 297]

I directly blame Comcast. I wanted to switch from satellite back to cable, and those yahoos can't even figure it out. I already have a drop. All they have to do is remove the trap from the pole, and assign me an account. After two days of trying to make that happen, I gave up. I can't even get them to have a local rep contact me. I don't know where their call center is, but English is their first language, and I don't think they can find their way home at night without leaving a trail of hominy.

You're not happy with satellite?

hughesnet blows for internet!

on a bad day ... still better than 1500.0 Kbps here ..

[trillium13 84]

We live in East Texas, and our internet service is horrible. A good portion of the time our internet service is out. When it is working, it's incredibly slow. We only have ONE option here (that isn't dial up) so it doesn't even do any good to complain about it. There's no one else to go to.

It's not as if we live in the middle of nowhere, either. It's not a third world country, for crying out loud. Here in this area, if you're not right in a city, you're pretty much screwed. Cell phone service sucks all over, too. I lived in a similarly populated area in NY for most of my life, and it was much better than it is here. For some reason this area seems way behind the times.

Edited May 7, 2009 by trillium13

[Ban Hammer 13,360]

I directly blame Comcast. I wanted to switch from satellite back to cable, and those yahoos can't even figure it out. I already have a drop. All they have to do is remove the trap from the pole, and assign me an account. After two days of trying to make that happen, I gave up. I can't even get them to have a local rep contact me. I don't know where their call center is, but English is their first language, and I don't think they can find their way home at night without leaving a trail of hominy.

You're not happy with satellite?

hughesnet blows for internet!

on a bad day ... still better than 1500.0 Kbps here ..

when i first got satellite internet, it was direcway and it was about 1000 kbps, now it's hughesnet and around 350 kbps.

[DeadPoolX 9]

who's first?

I thought I read that S. Korea was first. I could be wrong though.

They require it to play non-stop Starcraft.