FCC Announces "100 Squared" Iniative:100mbps to 100 million homes | Hacker News Reader

FCC Announces "100 Squared" Iniative:100mbps to 100 million homes

arstechnica.com

20 pointsCoryOndrejka10 comments

Verizon has been promising this for quite a while now. From what I've heard, the third and highest tier of FiOS can only get up to 50mbps (if you're lucky). http://www.newnetworks.com/tellthetruthverizon.htm

"We estimate that nationwide, through tax cuts and overcharging, customers have paid an estimated $70 billion dollars for non-existent broadband services. In Pennsylvania alone, we estimate that Verizon already collected $785 per household for services customers never received."

As long as the US leads in suburbia, we will follow in last mile bandwidth.

Wonder if this will disincent private sector innovation and investment.

10 years is a long time to implement this with only 100Mbps. By 2020 many other countries will be on gigabit connections. I think they're aiming too low here.

Couldn't agree more. Who knows what the world will look like in 10 years? This is tomorrow's technology half a year after tomorrow.

The US only has 300 million people[1]. 100 million households is a big chunk of the population. Some quick looking around online reveals that currently only ~29% of the US has broadband[2]. Not everyone needs broadband, etc etc. So this seems to actually be pushing for a sea change in the availability of internet connections in the US, and that, I think, is a much bigger deal than any sort of numeric metric.

1: http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8... 2: http://www.websiteoptimization.com/bw/1001/

What are these "other countries"? Yes, one can point to some countries that are doing considerably better on broadband on speed to some customers - specifically Japan, South Korea, and France. After those three, speeds drop off a cliff (to the 10-20Mbps range).

And Not everything is perfect in those countries. About 35% of Japan's broadband users are on lowly DSL. And Japan, while having one of the most urban and tech-savvy populations out there, has lower broadband penetration than the United States. That's right, a greater percentage of Americans have broadband than Japanese people. France, despite its urban population, barely beats the US on broadband penetration and most of it is DSL! A tiny fraction of it (a few percentage) is cable of fiber.

Part of the problem is how the OECD reports on broadband. They report on advertised offers of service (and what speeds companies are advertising as their theoretical maximum). US companies tend to create a uniform structure where they serve their urban areas in the same way they serve their suburban areas.

And it should be noted that the US is 7th in fiber connections and 15th of 30 in penetration all with one of the most subruban/rural populations. So, saying that we're behind is factually wrong. Saying that we're mediocre could be correct.

The US should improve. It needs to improve. However, the situation isn't as dire as many like to make it seem. Many countries are getting in the 10-20Mbps range and the US is on the low end of that at 9-10Mbps. It should improve. It should be a priority. However, it also needs to be noted that the situation isn't as rosy in other countries as people make it out to be and the US does have a more difficult challenge due to its suburban/rural population.

*All statistics come from the OECD broadband statistics.

My understanding about Japan is that an inordinate number of people access online resources only through their phones. So, lower broadband penetration there may be a red herring.

Many countries simply don't have the kind of cable infrastructure that North America has. That makes DSL the only sane choice for existing construction. I would not call ADSL2+ inferior to cable though.

My "lowly DSL line" in Japan, 6 years ago, was 40Mbps.

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