If you think your broadband is bad...read this

From an About.com newsletter http://specials.about.com/service/newsletters/compne...

"ACS Alaska bloooows

Worst Internet competition? Kenai, Alaska is bad. My neighbors get 1 mbps (120KB/s download) - they pay 80$. I have god knows what. They say its 1 mbps but its more like 56k. I download no faster than a steady 40 kb/s. I pay 60$/mo. When i called ACSALASKA (worst telecommunications company ever) to try to upgrade to 1mbps, they told me too many people have broadband and one of my neighbors would have to die for me to pick up his spot. Alaska: If you like fish and hate Internet, come on up.
�Guest aksucks"

Makes our UK services look really good....and cheap.

According to Cisco, South Korea has the best broadband service in the world, with an average download throughput of 33.5 megabits per second � nearly three times the speed of second-place Hong Kong � an average upload throughput of 17 megabits per second � more than twice that of Hong Kong, and has 100 percent broadband penetration.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

� and has 100 percent broadband penetration.

Hmm�

In reference to point-topic.com/free-analysis/south-korea-broadband-subscribers-and...:

There were 18.3 million fixed broadband subscribers in South Korea at the end of Q4 2012. Growth for the quarter stood at 0.39% which was below both the average growth rate for the Asia & Oceania region and also the average global growth for the same period. Population penetration for fixed broadband in South Korea stood at 37.49%.

My bold.

Not sure about that

my friend was on a 400Kbps sync (yes he lived in the middle of nowhere) with bt total bb for £36? a month

thats nearly just as bad.

In reply to a post by billford:

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

� and has 100 percent broadband penetration.

Hmm�

In reference to point-topic.com/free-analysis/south-korea-broadband-subscribers-and...:

There were 18.3 million fixed broadband subscribers in South Korea at the end of Q4 2012. Growth for the quarter stood at 0.39% which was below both the average growth rate for the Asia & Oceania region and also the average global growth for the same period. Population penetration for fixed broadband in South Korea stood at 37.49%.

My bold.

Yup. The UK usually ranks higher than Japan on penetration but below Japan (not by much) on per capita usage. I'm not really sure what the difference is between the two measures. Perhaps penetration is just a measure of take-up (ie;active subscriptions) whereas per capita is looking at data consumption? So we have more 'bums on seats' but the Japanese download more.

http://www.internetworldstats.com/top25.htm

But whatever stats you look at it always puts a lie to the idea that UK broadband is not fit for purpose

Edited by Andrue (Wed 21-May-14 08:24:17)

with bt total bb for £36? a month

How long ago? Is that including voice line rental? If that is just for broadband and recent then he is paying way over the odds - BT broadband hasn't been that expensive for a while. Or he could just move to another ISP - there are plenty out there.

Not just Alaska, there are many parts of the United States where the situation is similar. Get away from the major metro areas and VDSL is no where to be seen, ADSL of some variety may be there but often it can be slow and the Cable companies often miss small town.

As for costs - frequently higher than the UK and $60-100/month for ADSL is not uncommon.

Even where ftth is available using federal grants the speeds are not always great

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/4829574/

Max speed package of 5Mbps and not even a burst to higher speed

In reply to a post by MHC:

Not just Alaska, there are many parts of the United States where the situation is similar. Get away from the major metro areas and VDSL is no where to be seen, ADSL of some variety may be there but often it can be slow and the Cable companies often miss small town.

As for costs - frequently higher than the UK and $60-100/month for ADSL is not uncommon.

Lack of competition. There was a discussion about this recently on The Register. A lot of people over there have no real choice. If they have a choice it's usually between a cable company and a DSL company with the latter often being a poor service.

Afternoon Andrue

Back in the days of simple phone circuits, "penetration" meant the quantity of installed lines.

For the UK as a whole in 1978, Domestic Penetration was 65%.

For Scotland only, it was 55%; but for this isolated estate, it was over 90% - yet GPO Telephones wanted to install a Public Call Box, with no other likely revenue source!

Ah, the dear old GPO, of blessed memory�

NOT!

Not entirely due to poor ISPs, surely - the USA is 40 times the size of the UK (Wikipedia says the area of the USA is 3.79 million square miles, that of the UK 94,000).

Edit: S Korea 38,691 sq miles.

Edited by deleted (Wed 21-May-14 15:45:37)

Population density has a big impact. But, competition does as well and most of the US has little or no competition at wholesale or retail level for broadband.

In reply to a post by ian72:

Population density has a big impact. But, competition does as well and most of the US has little or no competition at wholesale or retail level for broadband.

http://qz.com/186881/nearly-one-in-three-americans-h...

67% have "2 or [sic]less options" according to that pie chart.

In reply to a post by mikebear:

Makes our UK services look really good....and cheap.

There's a relevant article here but be warned that the author has chosen to use strong language right from the beginning. To avoid accidental clickage I've mangled the URL:

h t t p://tinyurl.com/nsc2ech

(and yes, if I'd included the original URL the strong language would be present )

One interesting snippet is:

"THE FCC IS SCARED OF ONE THING: ACTUAL PEOPLE"

The FCC is basically the US equivalent of Ofcom, isn't it?

"This cozy relationship leads to the repeated insistence that consumer protections are too difficult to implement, even when they�re not complicated. "Somehow when they�re pushing through unpopular things that a few big companies want, the FCC can do it," says Aaron. "But when it�s things the people want that the corporations don�t, it�s suddenly impossible.""

Edited by Andrue (Wed 21-May-14 16:11:47)

a few years back and i think that may have included line rental

and for the usa in general when i lived in cincinati

2 providers

CCbell and time warner

i had 10/2 for like 40 bucks a month with ccbell

the best package i think was 100/20 and the price i lol'd it was around 250 bucks at the time.

In reply to a post by ian72:

Population density has a big impact. But, competition does as well and most of the US has little or no competition at wholesale or retail level for broadband.

Given a low population density, competition becomes less likely, unless like here you have a national infrastructure provider and the higher levels of provision all use it.