A study looking at the quality of broadband across 66 countries worldwide has found that only nine countries are ready for future demand, with two-thirds meeting the criteria for today's requirements only. The study placed each country into one of four groups according to network speed and penetration.The study, which was conducted for Cisco by Oxford University's Said Business School and the University of Oviedo's Department of Applied Economics, found that countries such as Korea, Latvia, Bulgaria and Denmark are better prepared for future Internet use than most of Europe and the United States.
Researchers looked at how fit countries were to cope with the demands of today's users by looking at a set of applications consumers are likely to use today, such as video streaming and photo sharing, as well as future applications, such as watching high-definition video.
The research was based on speed tests done via speedtest.net, which were combined with the broadband penetration for each of the countries studied. Cisco's communication manager, Joanne Hughes, believes this gives better results than other studies.
"Most studies are based just on broadband penetration or, if they look at speed they look at advertised speeds rather than real speeds," she said. "We wanted to look at the issue of broadband quality which is vital as new applications come along."
The average download speed globally was found to be 4.75Mbps, with an average upload speed of 1.3Mbps. The results of the study are as follows:
Countries "ready for tomorrow": Korea, Japan, Sweden, Lithuania, Bulgaria, Latvia, Netherlands, Romania and Denmark.
Countries "comfortable for today": Switzerland, Czech Republic, Norway, United States, Slovakia, Portugal, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Russia, Belgium, Slovenia, Taiwan, Austria and Hong Kong.
Countries "meeting needs for today": Iceland, Estonia, Greece, Singapore, Canada, UK, Australia, Spain, Poland, New Zealand, Ukraine, Turkey, Ireland and Italy.
Countries "below needs for today": Malta, Luxembourg, Chile, China, Qatar, Brazil, Argentina, Saudi Arabia, Cyprus, Costa Rica, Bahrain, Thailand, Tunisia, Mexico, Philippines, UAE, Malaysia, Pakistan, Colombia, Morocco, Vietnam, South Africa and Indonesia.
However, finding underdeveloped countries like Lithuania, Bulgaria, Latvia and Romania in the same category as them looks very, very fishy to me.
I seriously doubt their internet is even remotely as good as that of Japan or Korea.
However, finding underdeveloped countries like Lithuania, Bulgaria, Latvia and Romania in the same category as them looks very, very fishy to me.
I seriously doubt their internet is even remotely as good as that of Japan or Korea.
Actually here in Bulgaria we truly have one of the best Inet connections - average local Bulgarian speeds are around 4-6 MB/s (32-48 Mbps) down and 2-4 MB/s (16-32 Mbps) upload and international 1.5-2.5 MB/s (12-20Mbps) for approx 10 EUR/month. There are pretty much optic-fiber connections directly to the home (FTTH). The usual DSL connections in USA/UK here are the last possible option
If we all were on cable internet, rather than the majority on 1-2mbps BT line, it'd be a lot higher.
Yeah we'd all be at 10mb for till we hit the cap. Then throtted back to 1mb
Not here, in Netherlands it is legal to download whether it is music or movies etc.
But illegal to upload.
But illegal to upload.
*Starts packing*
But illegal to upload.
Same here in the US. That's why all the people the RIAA and etc. are suing are the ones using BitTorrent and other "sharing" setups that require you to upload while you download.
But even still, in a vast majority of towns, cable is still not available.
No Surprise that S.Korea are on top, well you can get 1,000 megabit connections there for £10 per month.
Here in Denmark you will also be able to find people who do not have broadband. But I think it will be difficult to find one. Even my 64 year old mom who is highly technology illiterate has a mobile phone and a laptop with 3 G internet. She gets her paycheck over the internet and figured she had to get a computer.
Perhaps one reason for the low broadband penetration in the US is that there are areas in the US that is very low populated. That would make is costly to develop a broadband society. In Denmark there are discussions to roll out fiber to all households. I think that is currently a unlikely to happen. But maybe in a few years... My guesstimate is that US is 5 years behind Denmark. I already now can tell you the next thing for you will be 3G mobile internet on laptop and mobile phone.
I believe the US companies try to milk the cow as much as they can before she drops dead and besides that there are loads of monopolistic issues.
I live in NYC (and don't tell me that it is thinly populated) there is only one and only one ADSL provider here. Even in a country such small as the Netherlands, you'd be able to choose among 10 ADSL providers in any given area. No competition, no innovation. (well the only alternative in NYC is cable and this is what they call "competition")
It should come no surprise to any one that the regular ADSL speed in NYC is 3Mbs (this is sad, as my ADSL connection in the Netherlands was 20Mbs even 5 years ago and I used to live in a rather small city there).
The problem is with the overal infrastructure of the US. No one wants to invest, everyone wants to charge as much as they can.
There is this FIOS service of course which is going to introduce 30MBs speed but I guess so far there are three houses in NYC who has access to this service.
Can you believe that I usually don't have AT&T reception in the office, and my office is in Times Square!!
I believe the US companies try to milk the cow as much as they can before she drops dead and besides that there are loads of monopolistic issues.
I live in NYC (and don't tell me that it is thinly populated) there is only one and only one ADSL provider here. Even in a country such small as the Netherlands, you'd be able to choose among 10 ADSL providers in any given area. No competition, no innovation. (well the only alternative here is cable and this is what they call "competition")
It should come no surprise to any one that the regular ADSL speed in NYC is 3Mbs (this is sad, as my ADSL connection in the Netherlands was 20Mbs even 5 years ago, I used to live in a rather small city there).
The problem is with the overal infrastructure of the US. No one wants to invest, everyone wants to charge as much as they can.
There is this FIOS service of course which is going to introduce 30MBs speed but I guess so far there are three houses in NYC who has access to this service.
Can you believe that I usually don't have AT&T reception in the office, and my office is in Times Square!!
Tell me about it lol, and cable SUCKS...you almost never ever get the speed you pay for.
My house is quite weird, during the day I will get 4 bars AT&T...and at night it magically drops to 1 bar. It's like they shut off the cell phone towers at night or something.
I come back to HK and for what I pay for 15mbps / 2mbps ****ty ass cable in America I get 100mbps / 100mbps here.
Yeah, they're called the Amish
I get around 25-30 down on speedtests but i pay for 15
Id much rather the prices drop, than the speeds go up,because theyll just keep charging more for the internet of 'tomorrow'
well, i havent been having issues with shaw's cap, 100gb
i know ive gone over plenty, but they dont seem to care for my area at least
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8248056.stm
options {
"Download Now"
"Send by pigeon"
"Send by signs of smoke"
....
}
;-;
;-;
and..
Its not as bad as your making it.. only €6 a month for 5Mbps is cheap!
AT&Ts 3g speed isn't even considered 3G...it sucks, big time
Careful with those so-called "unlimited" accounts...last time I checked Sympatico (before I dropped them) they offered an "unlimited" package for an extra $25 above what you're currently paying, but their unwritten rule (I almost had to beat it out of their service rep) is that it still has a 200GB/month limit--making it entirely pointless.
Very interesting list though.
Do I deserve a cookie?
And right now they are trying to axe my bandwidth cap to 60gb a month instead of trying to fix the network. Also the Canada is so big thing is BS i dont live in hicks ville Ontario. I live in the sixth? largest city in Canada bordering on the largest (Toronto) and I cant even get the 5mbits I pay for.
Countries "Ready for Yesterdays Technology"...
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