_Over the past year, hopes have risen among Americans that something might finally be done about the third-world quality of their internet access._

As a third-world citizen, the author doesn't have any idea about the network quality their. I live in North Africa and it's only few weeks ago that we got a new 3G operator (Orange) in the country and it's only powering main cities. The fastest connection you can get is 8 MegaBit (whatever place you live in) and it's only recently that it was boosted from the 4M speed.

The quality is hilarious, you get sometimes a 3 days down time. You probably never reach the promised speed and in rush hours, you can do a coffee with friends instead. The 8MB connection costs around $60 a month; 3G promises 1MB speed at around $20 a month.