Always found it amazing how the US is so far ahead on tech yet is so terrible at actual internet penetration.
My building hit that price/speed level maybe 3-4? Places with actual fast internet like S Korea probably much sooner.
I'm in the US and I've had fiber since '01. Not all places are equal in the US when it comes to internet penetration.
The US is BIG, with a lot of rural areas.
Arguably, as a muni utility, you don’t care about turning a profit versus Comcast and other for profit enterprises. And you have local governance over the infra and how it’s operated through local government. But it still takes a lot of effort; effort that can be distributed across the country, but effort that needs to be expended nevertheless.
"New York Votes to Kick Spectrum Cable Out of the State" https://fortune.com/2018/07/29/spectrum-communications-kicke...
"New York City sues Verizon for not completing citywide fiber network" https://techcrunch.com/2017/03/14/nyc-sues-verizon/
Europe is bigger by area actually, but yes I hear you on the practicality front.
We can argue reasons all day long - point is US consumer internet seems pretty terrible from an outsider perspective, esp when considering the US's overall tech role.