Why Is American Internet So Slow?

I just came across this article and found it rather interesting. I decided to share it in this forum because its a prime example of why I think things are going horribly wrong in this country.

According to a recent study by Ookla Speedtest, the U.S. ranks a shocking 31st in the world in terms of average download speeds...

Its upload speeds are even worse. Globally, the U.S. ranks 42nd with an average upload speed of 6.31 Mbps, behind Lesotho, Belarus, Slovenia, and other countries you only hear mentioned on Jeopardy.

Okay so the question is... why do we suck so bad?

Well regardless of which end of the political spectrum you prescribe to, I think Susan Crawford sums it up pretty nicely...

"huge telecommunication companies" such as Comcast, Time Warner, Verizon, and AT&T have "divided up markets and put themselves in a position where they're subject to no competition."

"We deregulated high-speed internet access 10 years ago and since then we've seen enormous consolidation and monopolies… Left to their own devices, companies that supply internet access will charge high prices, because they face neither competition nor oversight."

How? The 1996 Telecommunications Act — which was meant to foster competition — allowed cable companies and telecoms companies to simply divide markets and merge their way to monopoly, allowing them to charge customers higher and higher prices without the kind of investment in internet infrastructure, especially in next-generation fiber optic connections, that is ongoing in other countries. Fiber optic connections offer a particularly compelling example. While expensive to build, they offer faster and smoother connections than traditional copper wire connections. But Verizon stopped building out fiber optic infrastructure in 2010 — citing high costs — just as other countries were getting to work.

Source

Like I said its an interesting article and I thought it would make for an interesting discussion. Should we bring back regulations on the telecom industry, or should we just let the "free market" do it's thing?

reply to post by Bone75


come to australia and use our backwards internet for a while and you will think the USA is like the jesus of internet

That's about average for me. I do live out in the "boondocks" but it's pitiful.

okamitengu
reply to post by Bone75

 

come to australia and use our backwards internet for a while and you will think the USA is like the jesus of internet

Ha ha it can't be that bad man, you responded to me from half way around the world in less than 3 minutes.

reply to post by Bone75


American internet is so slow because the N.S.A. is using up all of your bandwidth spying on you.

Then your I.S.P. bills you for their usage.

Bone75

okamitengu
reply to post by Bone75

 

come to australia and use our backwards internet for a while and you will think the USA is like the jesus of internet

Ha ha it can't be that bad man, you responded to me from half way around the world in less than 3 minutes.

because I'm bored at work scouring ATS (:

dont tell my BOSS!!

lol

reply to post by Bone75


It's pretty simple! If people pay continuously increasing prices for the same general speeds that are still available on the older tech, why spend money on new tech? It doesn't make financial sense. It's not about innovation, it's about money! A lemonade stand won't improve their recipe if people are still willing to pay for what's already being offered, especially if they're willing to pay more and more for plain old water, lemons, and sugar.

Diisenchanted
reply to post by Bone75

 

American internet is so slow because the N.S.A. is using up all of your bandwidth spying on you.

I'm sure that has a little to do with it as well, but you don't think the NSA is limited to just the US do you?

It all comes down to the person who comes down to your house and doesn't want to do jack-squat. And on your nickel, of course.

reply to post by Bone75


Nope I'm quite sure they have their heads up the butt of most everyone on the planet.

But I do remember reading a story recently where they were taking new computers and installing spyware on them before they went to market here in America.

ouch .. even out here in middle of nowhere I have faster internet then that .. even during monsoon seasons when connection is poor its faster than over there ..

Yeah they have a monopoly over here. It doesn't cost cell phone companies a penny for you text message but if you want it they charge. Ain't that just awesome.

Diisenchanted
reply to post by Bone75

 

American internet is so slow because the N.S.A. is using up all of your bandwidth spying on you.

Then your I.S.P. bills you for their usage.

LOL Yeah really, the tentacles tyeing it all up.
But then there is The "Five Eyes" aka "FVEY" - Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Overall slow American internet is greed.

Hell, I'm #-tickled getting 12MB at my farm now. I had been paying out the arse for Wild Blue's Xcede. Now if I could talk them into extending the fiber to the house, I'd be a happy camper.

In Huntsville, we had fiber to the curb back in 2004, it was amazing for the time. Although if you knew the right people, there was an experimental UWB service running that was 50MB at the time.

I've often thought if you had the bucks, you could buy up a lot of dark fiber and put up a version of that - you can serve a fairly large area with that technology, although the FCC probably won't let you.

The last time I looked there is no grand prize for having the world's fastest internet. If you want faster, in much of the US you can get faster. I don't need it, so I don't get faster. Why would I pay extra for more than I need or for the kiddo down the street to rip off movies and music faster?

Instead of making the internet to the house faster to provide a service I don't care for, I wouldn't mind a little more speed for cell phone downloads and uploads. Oh gee, Isn't that exactly where the development has been going.... Yeah, my cell is getting faster every year.

That's the point of a free market. The investment and improvement goes where the demand is greatest instead of playing some game with pointless metrics like internet download and upload speeds because some politician has a buddy that wants to get a little richer.....

reply to post by BayesLike


The US is now censoring a lot of internet content - making it much slower - via facebook and google -

My son had a facebook account and sent messages out about the phases of the moon and them blackened out - like a top secret document from the gov't -----

he then tried to get out of his face book account - and couldn't ----

try to find courageous nerdz on youtube anymore - you can't - the truth is being censored by the criminals in our gov't........

My internet speed has almost completely gone back to the old "dial up" speed of years ago...

keeping the truth hidden and the propaganda flowing is the game here....

reply to post by Bone75


I would of thought USA internet speeds would be one of the best in the world at least in the top 10.

I live in the UK and currently have a 60mb connection with a 3mb upload. I have had DL speeds of 10mb per second. I am also getting my line upgraded to 100mb for no extra cost sometime before September. I just hope the upload speeds get put to around 10 at least as its the upload speeds that really matter isn't it ?

But i guess I'm happy with pings as low as 10ms in BF4 on UK servers.

Bedlam
Hell, I'm #-tickled getting 12MB at my farm now. I had been paying out the arse for Wild Blue's Xcede. Now if I could talk them into extending the fiber to the house, I'd be a happy camper.

I moved to the sticks and initially went back to dial-up. There are so many scripts attached to websites that frequently the browser would just hang up. Been reduced to connecting via cellphone tethering. It works but it's very slowwww.

Looks like the only viable option left is satellite.

Diisenchanted
.... I do remember reading a story recently where they were taking new computers and installing spyware on them before they went to market here in America.

In the early days (after 8 inch floppies but before 3.5 inch floppies), there were stories that the gov had infiltrated the BIOS on desktops. Lately, there are reports that fedgov has hardwire hooks in Intel CPUs.

Given their chronic criminal nature, none of this should be surprising.

Bone75
Like I said its an interesting article and I thought it would make for an interesting discussion. Should we bring back regulations on the telecom industry, or should we just let the "free market" do it's thing?

edit on 7-3-2014 by Bone75 because: Added another clip

But you said it yourself, regulations are what put us in this mess in the first place. You cited the Telecommunications Act of 1996. Let's get rid of the regulations and let THE free market take over, not the "free market".