The U.S. ranks 28th in internet speed, and not getting any faster.

[SellmeyourDVD]

A good story to shove down the throats of those who say digital downloads are taking over

http://tech.yahoo.com/news/afp/20090...20090825230334

WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States ranks 28th in the world in average Internet connection speed and is not making significant progress in building a faster network, according to a report released on Tuesday.

The report by the Communications Workers of America (CWA) said the average download speed in South Korea is 20.4 megabits per second (mbps) -- four times faster than the US average of 5.1 mbps.

Japan trails South Korea with an average of 15.8 mbps followed by Sweden at 12.8 mbps and the Netherlands at 11.0 mbps, the report said.

It said tests conducted by speedmatters.org found the average US download speed had improved by only nine-tenths of a megabit per second between 2008 and 2009 -- from 4.2 mbps to 5.1 mbps.

"The US has not made significant improvement in the speeds at which residents connect to the Internet," the report said. "Our nation continues to fall far behind other countries."

"People in Japan can upload a high-definition video in 12 minutes, compared to a grueling 2.5 hours at the US average upload speed," the report said.

It said 18 percent of those who took a US speed test recorded download speeds that were slower than 768 kilobits per second, which does not even qualify as basic broadband, according to the Federal Communications Commission.

Sixty-four percent connected at up to 10 mbps, 19 percent connected at speeds greater than 10 mbps and two percent exceeded 25 mbps.

The United States was ranked 20th in broadband penetration in a survey of 58 countries released earlier this year by Boston-based Strategy Analytics.

South Korea, Singapore, the Netherlands, Denmark and Taiwan were the top five countries listed in terms of access to high-speed Internet.

US President Barack Obama has pledged to put broadband in every home and the FCC has embarked on an ambitious project to bring high-speed Internet access to every corner of the United States.

According to the CWA report, the fastest download speeds in the United States are in the northeastern parts of the country while the slowest are in states such as Alaska, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

[HomeTheaterVirgin]

My speed is 13-15Mbs upload and 2-3Mbs download is that anygood?

[Blubaru]

20mb here in Florida

[Batman1980]

You do realize most Europeans pay 1/3 what we do for twice the Internet speed, right? For some reason the wealthiest nation in the world can't build proper Internet networks for the public to use.

[Johnny Vinyl]

Originally Posted by Wolverine1980

You do realize most Europeans pay 1/3 what we do for twice the Internet speed, right? For some reason the wealthiest nation in the world can't build proper Internet networks for the public to use.

Their cellphone plans are less expensive as well! We're getting ripped off!

John

[RustyK94]

54mbs in Scotland

[MarekM]

Originally Posted by Wolverine1980

You do realize most Europeans pay 1/3 what we do for twice the Internet speed, right? For some reason the wealthiest nation in the world can't build proper Internet networks for the public to use.

well I have 30mbit download/ 2mbit upload (both unlimited) for 22$ here in Slovakia..

M.

[HomeTheaterVirgin]

WOW 15MB DOWNLOAD.2MB UPLOAD $59.99 HERE IN NEBRASKA!!!!!!!



Good thing my dad is a supervisor we get it for free

[Lord_Stewie]

Originally Posted by Wolverine1980

You do realize most Europeans pay 1/3 what we do for twice the Internet speed, right? For some reason the wealthiest nation in the world can't build proper Internet networks for the public to use.

Talk of being the wealthiest nation, yet we are still the cheapest in the world.

[rayray8]

its not that the u.s. doesnt have higher speed capability, its because our government regulates how fast the internet provided is.

[RustyK94]

Originally Posted by rayray8

its not that the u.s. doesnt have higher speed capability, its because our government regulates how fast the internet provided is.

So when was the last time they regulate?

19 oatcakes

[smiley]

I have 20Mb/Sec to my house in backwoods Barron WI USA.

[BlackLightShark009]

I'm not shocked bout the ranking.

[Terjyn]

Originally Posted by SellmeyourDVD

According to the CWA report, the fastest download speeds in the United States are in the northeastern parts of the country while the slowest are in states such as Alaska, Idaho, Montana and Wyoming.

This is the core paragraph of the article.

The reason the average speed is slow, is because there are very large parts of the US which are rural and have dialup if anything. Notice that NONE of the top speed providers are large countries. Instead they are smaller countries which pretty much don't have rural areas anymore, or have rural areas without anyone really living there.

Which brings me back to the above quote. The fastest part of the US is the northeast, and the northeast is one giant metropolis. The states of Alaska, Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana are amongst the ones with the largest rural/urban ratio in the US.

If you rank country wealth vs. Urban/Rural ratio I'd bet you get nearly this exact list.

There is no realistic scenario at all that would have the US in the top 10 of average internet speeds. Even government intervention would not do it.

[Anthony P]

One thing you need to realize is population density also plays a role. If you have 20 households on a few feet of cable then all those families pay for that small piece of cable, on the other hand if you have one person every few miles then the cost to the telco is much higher to re-cable to bring him higher speeds.

Also an average (for the point of the OP) tends to be a bit misleading, for every person at 20mbps (which some have) you need 3 @ 1mbps to get 5.75mbps, I guess that is why 18%<1mbps vs 2%>25mbps

[Anthony P]

Originally Posted by Terjyn

There is no realistic scenario at all that would have the US in the top 10 of average internet speeds. Even government intervention would not do it.

you beat me to the point of population distribution making it harder, but even though I agree in theory, I don't think it is right in practice. In order for this to be true, you would need to assume that there is large growth in BW for ever. If BW ever starts stabilizing, be it 20mbps or 200mbps or even 2Gbps then there is no reason that rural would be disadvantaged after a while. Also if it moves to something different (i.e. satellite for example) then again population density won't be an issue.

[RustyK94]

Originally Posted by Anthony P

One thing you need to realize is population density also plays a role. If you have 20 households on a few feet of cable then all those families pay for that small piece of cable, on the other hand if you have one person every few miles then the cost to the telco is much higher to re-cable to bring him higher speeds.

Also an average (for the point of the OP) tends to be a bit misleading, for every person at 20mbps (which some have) you need 3 @ 1mbps to get 5.75mbps, I guess that is why 18%<1mbps vs 2%>25mbps

So China or India should be the slowest?

[Maximus]

What the **** is going on in here.

The politics stops. Now.

[Maximus]

Originally Posted by Terjyn

There is no realistic scenario at all that would have the US in the top 10 of average internet speeds. Even government intervention would not do it.

Exactly this. The US is too big. If you look at the land mass of the top five countries in the report, they are all tiny. It's easy and quite cheap to build a super fast network when your country is that small or the whole population lives in a tiny part of the nation.

Don't get me wrong I would love to see the UK get nice cheap fast broadband, but I'm a realist, there are parts of the UK so cut off and distant from the rest of it, my speedy connection will always have to subsidise theirs if it were to happen.

Afaik, the UK is getting FiOS from a certain monopoly provider in the next 10-15 years, but as of now the government won't give them any grants so they are going to limit it to large urban centres which cuts off around 30% of the population here. Fair? No, but they have to be able to make a profit from their (rather large) investment, and rural areas don't cut it in terms of profit.

I'm going to bet the US has the same issues, but to an even greater extent as more than 50% of the population live in middle America...

[Septimus Prime]

Well, another thing to consider is that the infrastructure in a lot of these top countries, as well as the UK, is government owned and operated. This is not the case in the US, and with all of our telcos also being ISPs and spread out so thinly over our large landmass, our telcos sort of get to exist in an environment where they have no real competition—and therefore no real incentive to improve.