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U.S. Falling Behind in Broadband Access

Wednesday, April 25th, 2007 at 2:15 PM - by

The U.S. is falling behind the rest of the world in broadband Internet access and paying more, according to BusinessWeek. Rule changes for ISPs and warring factions in the U.S. have contributed to the problem.

An economic study group published their results this week and found that the U.S. now ranks 15th out of 30 countries in per-capita broadband subscriptions. It's a topic that has the interest of the U.S. Senate in terms of American competitiveness.

The study group, The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, shares economic statistics amongst 30 industrialized countries. Their report said that as of December 2006, only 19.6% of Americans subscribed to broadband, meaning 256 kbps or greater.

The leaders are Denmark and the Netherlands with nearly 32 percent. Worse, the U.S. is slipping. In 2001, the U.S. was 4th. Six months ago it was 12th. Now, Australia may be emerging to push the U.S. down another notch.

One culprit may be a 2005 rule change regarding how ISPs lease phone company lines. The policy has kept broadband prices high in the U.S. compared to, say, France, where one can get a service with unlimited phone calls, 93 cable TV channels, and 20 Mbps Internet service for the equivalent of about US$33/month.

The 2005 rule change in the U.S. is spurring companies to look at different technologies, such as pervasive Wi-Fi in cities and WiMax. "Making broadband more widely available at lower prices could create demand for new types of digital products, but first the warring corporate interests and the Federal Communications Commission, the nation's top telecommunications regulator, will need to agree on changes to ensure it happens," BW concluded.

Changes that make the U.S. more competitive in this area will certainly be welcomed by Apple as it seeks to make the Internet our primary source of movie entertainment, music and TV.

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abyrd2000 said:

member since 16 Feb 2006 with 4 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Apr 25, 2007 5:44 pm

The U.S. is "falling" behind? The U.S. has FALLEN behind. When I lived in San Francisco, 6Mbps at $45/month. Currently I live in Tokyo, 100Mbps/$30 month. How can the wealthiest country on the planet have such poor access to broadband?

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A guest said: (hide)

Wed Apr 25, 2007 6:58 pm

abyrd2000 wrote:
The U.S. is "falling" behind? The U.S. has FALLEN behind. When I lived in San Francisco, 6Mbps at $45/month. Currently I live in Tokyo, 100Mbps/$30 month. How can the wealthiest country on the planet have such poor access to broadband?

How? Because the "Baby Bells" are now the "Megalithic Bells"- the last few presidential administrations have loosened restrictions everywhere, killing competition and allowing these companies to rape and pillage their customers, who have no recourse. "Free market", my furry butt.

Our broadband status is embarrassing and pathetic compared to those other countries, but our providers are too busy rolling in gold, and our politicians are too busy counting their lobbyist $$, to give a damn.

We are 10 years behind technologically, but there's no incentive whatsoever for anyone to change the status quo.

That's how.

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reinharden said:

member since 25 Apr 2007 with 3 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Apr 25, 2007 7:17 pm

The original story traces back to <http://www.oecd.org/sti/ict/broadband>

A couple of things to note.

One, the US is behind at the per capita measure. On the other hand, with 58 million broadband subscribers, the US has twice as many as the next closest country. That is ~20% of the population. Although one wonders if one should correct for household side to get a more realistic representation.

Two, consider the case of the Netherlands (#2). The population density is almost 300 people/square kilometer. Japan (#14) is ~337 people/square kilometer. Korea (#4) is nearly 500 people/square kilometer. The US is closer to 30 people/square mile. Which is easier to serve with broadband?

Yeah, it'd be nice if the per capita rate were better. On the other hand, 30% of the world's broadband users are in the US which ain't altogether shabby since we've got less than 5% of the world's population.

reinharden

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Tiger said:

member since 17 Jun 2003 with 1018 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Wed Apr 25, 2007 7:33 pm

How?

1. Greed

2. Giveaways

3. Greed

Instead of pushing the bandwidth envelope and breadth of coverage, our ISPs focus solely on bottom line profits. Get the most for providing the least. It's teh capitalist thing to do. In other countries, there are much stronger government restrictions and idealogies that dictate that utilities have to service the public good.

Not so much here in the good ol' USA. Ask anybody with a bill from Entergy. (or ask Al Gore with a $5,000 a month electric bill!) Green power or not, that's just disgustingly wasteful. And he's not alone. He's just the flag waving hypocrite for conservation.

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Rainy Day said:

member since 07 Jun 2005 with 607 posts, unranked, send him a message or view his profile

Thu Apr 26, 2007 12:15 am

@abyrd2000: How? The same way we’re behind in healthcare.

@guest: Actually, the baby bells have been collecting a federal tax designed to build their broadband infrastructure, but instead of doing that, they’ve just been pocketing the cash while the FCC turns a blind-eye.

@reinharden: Your stats are misleading because you are factoring in part of the world population that doesn’t even have electricity, let alone a computer or InterNet access. Likewise there is an error in your logic regarding population density. The US is a large country with lots of open space/land, but most people live in high density cities, where broadband service should be easily available.

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A guest said: (hide)

Thu Apr 26, 2007 3:37 am

Out here in Hawai'i, there are three ways to get broadband access. 1)Time/Warner Roadrunner. 2)ClearWire via AC lines. 3)Hawaiian Telcom DSL. All of these systems charge well over $30/month for 768K/sec. access. I recently signed on to cut download time for Software Updates to manageable levels. Since this is via a special deal with AOL, this will eventually settle down to $29.95/month for 768K/sec. access. If it were for the usual $49.95/month fee, I'd still be using 56K/sec. dialup. Or, I'd have signed on with ClearWire or Hawaiian Telcom DSL, which charge similar rates. Consequently, broadband access is for the Yuppie elite who can afford Mercedes-Benz, Starbuck's, and shop at Trader Joe's...in California!

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