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[DouglasteR]

Almost like Brazil !

The difference is that we're slowing gettting better speeds.

25Mb/30Mb in the capitals and 2mb in the rest

 

[ZombiePlatypus]

America is the world article#341545443

Do you not believe this can spread elsewhere?

 

[leroidys]

America is the world article#341545443

How can world hunger be a thing? My fridge is full of food!

 

[Deleted member 13876]

Do you not believe this can spread elsewhere?

It's ironic, since as I mentioned before in his/my country of origin an American ISP bought a 58% stake in one of our two dominant ISPs. Stuff like Netflix forking over the cash for Comcast sets a precedent that can easily have global consequences.

 

[AngmarsKing701]

Save us google

This

 

[lupinko]

Comcast is just taking a page out of Robellushaw's playbook, sorry American bros.

 

[Chichikov]

It's funny, there's nothing really wrong with the Netflix deal or paid peering in general, but man, it sure woke up a lot of people to the systematic real problems about the way the internet is run.
And while what sparked this piece seem to be misguided, I agree with most of rest of the article, so fuck it, let's make internet a utility, who said misinformation cannot give birth to great things?

 

[mnannola]

I don't know. This argument is blowing very close to the 'teh Internet is a human right'. Businesses owe people nothing. They are service providers. ISP's function on fulfilling a want, NOT A NEED. People can function in society without being online. They really can.

I want to participate in the modern economy. I do participate in the modern economy. I enjoy the Internet. I like having a Fast Speed, which I appreciate I am lucky to have. I pay for this service, and if my provider makes faults or I am unhappy with the service, I complain or withdraw.

But make no mistake - equating it to heating, water and gas, semantically what people equate Utilities to be (regardless of how the reality is), is a dangerous game. My family would cope just fine at home with no Internet. I'm 31. Society was just fine before it, and it will be fine with whatever comes after.

But society also functioned without any Utilities back in the day. I am not going to argue that Internet is more important than those items listed, but I would say that every person in a 1st world country should have access to affordable internet. You are at a severe disadvantage these days if you have zero internet access for many careers, hell I expect pretty much everyone I meet to have some kind of access. Poor children especially need access to the internet if we expect them to be a functional member of society in the decades to come.

 

[Windu]

Have you tried looking for jobs without the internet?

public library

 

[flamingotripod]

public library

Libraries are a dying breed, they are all becoming digital libraries.

 

[clav]

Libraries are a dying breed, they are all becoming digital libraries.

or rather Facebook machines

I rarely see anyone do productive things on the library computers.

 

[kess]

public library

Half the local libraries by me got defunded last election. The city libraries are going to be okay, but rural/suburban areas are simply not paying for it.

 

[Loxley]

I don't know. This argument is blowing very close to the 'teh Internet is a human right'. Businesses owe people nothing. They are service providers. ISP's function on fulfilling a want, NOT A NEED. People can function in society without being online. They really can.

I want to participate in the modern economy. I do participate in the modern economy. I enjoy the Internet. I like having a Fast Speed, which I appreciate I am lucky to have. I pay for this service, and if my provider makes faults or I am unhappy with the service, I complain or withdraw.

But make no mistake - equating it to heating, water and gas, semantically what people equate Utilities to be (regardless of how the reality is), is a dangerous game. My family would cope just fine at home with no Internet. I'm 31. Society was just fine before it, and it will be fine with whatever comes after.

Yeah, all of those tens of thousands of people who have jobs in web development and design, they don't need the internet to do their jobs, right? All of the people who are employed by companies like Google - what do they need it for? The fact is is that as time goes on (and as the author of the article points out) the internet is becoming more ingrained into the way people live their lives. Entire jobs and industries require it's existence now, they NEED it to exist.

If we were talking about 1994, then sure, nobody needs the internet. It's a cool novelty, but people live their lives perfectly fine without it. But in 2014? Claiming that the internet is not a need is a pretty farcical statement.

 

[Davidion]

Internet isn't a right, much like access to recorded knowledge isn't a right.

Let's rephrase it this way: without some kind of nominally reasonable access to the internet you are de facto culturally, professionally and competitively behind , if not straight up inferior, in modern American society. You are a step down on the ladder of evolving fundamental human communications, and are about as competitive as an intellectual and productive force now as someone who relied on telegrams for communications would have been in the last half of the 20th century.

Let's kindly put this "but it's not a right" nonsense down and not treat as anything but semantic fluff.

 

[JaseC]

wut?
100Mbit VDSL sais hello

VDSL speeds begin to drop off a cliff after a few-hundred meters, but more to the point America has always used "DSL" to refer to "ADSL" as far as I can remember.

Edit: Ignore the red lines; I added them in myself as I used in the image in a separate discussion.

 

[Atraveller]

"No."

Fool (I dream of Zack Snyder)
Member
Today, 06:47 AM, Post #130

 

[DarkKyo]

Americans do nothing against it. Therefore, they agree.

Hey who has the time to do anything with all this great television they got on.

 

[travisbickle]

Oh great, another internet forum populated by a global community that shares knowledge and information with each other arguing about universal access to the web!

 

[iceDragon7]

Unlimited SMS? 10-15 dollars.
1 gig of data? $20 dollars w insane overages.
IT'S ALL 1s and 0s!!!!!!

It's not just cable companies. It's the entire telecom/cable/wireless industry.

 

[Qvoth]

my current plan is 600 USD monthly for 5mbps

and i'm not even mad

 

[BigDug13]

my current plan is 600 USD monthly for 5mbps

and i'm not even mad

Did you type too many zeroes? $600 a month? That's more than some people pay in rent for a place to live in the US.

 

[Qvoth]

Did you type too many zeroes? $600 a month? That's more than some people pay in rent for a place to live in the US.

no, it's 7 million rupiah monthly, that's around 600 USD now
i'm in indonesia

 

[PAULINK]

This shit sucks, it's already bad enough that in most areas, you don't even have a choice, but how much they charge for such subpar speeds. They should spend more time upgrading people's lines, DSL can only go so high.

 

[And_Gignac]

Internet will end up becoming a utility sooner or later and whether companies like it or not. There are plenty of cities with free, government funded wireless access in certain spots of minor and major cities.

Elizabeth Warren will save you, Americans.

 

[RedSwirl]

As far as the importance of having internet and other utilities go, I think we need to differentiate between "not dying" and "being able to work and participate in today's economy."

You definitely could physically survive without the internet. Just like you definitely could physically survive without running water, electricity, gas, and a telephone. But as I stated earlier, things like electricity, phones, and now the internet have basically become essential to a ton of jobs and fields. None of the jobs I've held would have been possible without internet. In importance I would say internet is now on the same level as having a phone.

Internet will end up becoming a utility sooner or later and whether companies like it or not. There are plenty of cities with free, government funded wireless access in certain spots of minor and major cities.

Elizabeth Warren will save you, Americans.

I also think eventually we'll reach a point where most people will agree it's a utility. My hope is that future generations look at these "early days" of the internet the way we look at how, I dunno, railways and coal were handled 100 years ago.

 

[BBboy20]

To add to this (for the UK at least), when looking for work in the UK, most jobs on the Job centre website require you to apply via either the job centre website system, via email or via another website - they're also making it a requirement over here to use it (the Job centres website), at the moment its requested, - but soon its required.

To make it worse, they're removing the Job centres phones and in some places removing the job points (things in the Job centres to search for jobs), so if your looking for a job and signing on in the UK, you pretty much need a way to access the internet.

Are they being cheap or scheming to not hire as much people as they should? Because surely they have to know not every person has the internet due to their current living conditions.

I'd rather have a Google dictatorship than a Comcast cox Verizon att oligarchy.

Do they still have connections to the Russian mob?

 

[Jay Sosa]

THE INTERNET IS A UTILITY, JUST LIKE WATER AND ELECTRICITY

This is such utter nonsense.

 

[andthebeatgoeson]

Americans do nothing against it. Therefore, they agree.

Stop. Most Americans hate their cable company, which is their default internet company. The service is that necessary that we DEAL with it. Many are upset that Verizon gave up on FiOS. And many are very interested in Google. If you asked the average American, I would wager they would drop their cable company in a heart beat for a more competitive service.

This is the government's fault for not regulating it. The idea of forcing a company to allow a competitor to use their cable seems brilliant yet so foreign it catches me off guard. Because as Americans, we have unfortunately gotten used to our government not working for us. Half of our government is directly trying to make it tougher to vote. So less people will vote. It's almost impossible to change anything significant in America unless you have a billion dollars. Even millionaires seem quaint and ineffectual in this country. Makes me want to start a newsletter.

 

[Chichikov]

This is such utter nonsense.

Why is that?
It's an important piece of infrastructure, like power, sewage or gas.

You don't have to treat it as a utility, but I think the public sector is failing American consumers here, and moving to a utility model is going to improve things.

 

[Angst]

Still around 5 times faster than my 80 dollars per month broadband.

how is that even possible

He's doing a speedtest now and will report in with the results when they are done and he has uploaded the screencap to imgur.


Look forward to 1cmanny1 posting again in 24 hours.

 

[andthebeatgoeson]

Is it me or are people against calling it a utility thinking about Facebook and not the other useful things done on the internet? There's a ton of essential things allowed by the internet. I would say a significant, if not the majority, of business communication, happens on the internet. It's a utility.

And when you factor studies that show internet poor communities do worse, you can start to think of it as a right.

Thinking of Facebook in this context is similar to thinking of water balloon fights and trying to deny water being a utility.

 

[Jay Sosa]

Why is that?
It's an important piece of infrastructure, like power, sewage or gas.

You don't have to treat it as a utility, but I think the public sector is failing American consumers here, and moving to a utility model is going to improve things.

On a personal level you don't need the internet. It's nice to have it but that's it.

 

[Hitokage]

On a personal level you don't need the internet. It's nice to have it but that's it.

What if you get your pay stubs online? Pay bills online? Do your taxes online? Renew your car registration online? A lot of companies are cutting down on paperwork this way, increasing the expectation that you have internet access.

 

[Jay Sosa]

What if you get your pay stubs online? Pay bills online? Do your taxes online? Renew your car registration online? A lot of companies are cutting down on paperwork this way, increasing the expectation that you have internet access.

You can still do all of that the old fashioned way.

I mean seriously what are most people using the internet for? Posting stupid stuff on twitter or on facebook.

I just think it's stupid to call it a necessity and comparing it to WATER.

 

[GCX]

I think that was Estonia, but it could've been introduced in Finland, too.

No, it was Finland. The purpose was to ensure that everyone even in the most rural areal would have at least some kind of broadband access:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10461048

 

[Hitokage]

You can still do all of that the old fashioned way.

I mean seriously what are most people using the internet for? Posting stupid stuff on twitter or on facebook.

I just think it's stupid to call it a necessity and comparing it to WATER.

Guess what's on the decline? Water as a utility. You're expected to buy that shit in name brand bottles now.

Also, by "you can still do all of that" I suppose you mean "get another job" or "switch to a different company".

 

[D4Danger]

You can still do all of that the old fashioned way.

I mean seriously what are most people using the internet for? Posting stupid stuff on twitter or on facebook.

I just think it's stupid to call it a necessity and comparing it to WATER.

if some people had their way you wouldn't even have water.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEFL8ElXHaU

are you starting to see the problem now?

 

[Jay Sosa]

Guess what's on the decline? Water as a utility. You're expected to buy that shit in name brand bottles now.

Also, by "you can still do all of that" I suppose you mean "get another job" or "switch to a different company".

Without water you die. I rest my case.

if some people had their way you wouldn't even have water.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEFL8ElXHaU

are you starting to see the problem now?

I see the problem. I'm just saying that comparing the internet to something that is necessary for SURVIVAL is a bit...dramatic.

 

[SeanR1221]

I wish the title wasn't so vulgar. It's a really interesting article I want to share on my Facebook.

 

[Future]

Didn't read the whole thread so maybe this was covered. But comparing to utilities is dangerous. The more you use a utility, the more you pay.

 

[Hitokage]

Without water you die. I rest my case.

Sure, but why does it have to be piped into my home? Like any upstanding citizen I collect rainwater in barrels. I can do without!

 

[Sneds]

Internet will end up becoming a utility sooner or later and whether companies like it or not. There are plenty of cities with free, government funded wireless access in certain spots of minor and major cities.

Elizabeth Warren will save you, Americans.

Neoliberalism seems to be intensifying rather than waning.

 

[Jay Sosa]

Sure, but why does it have to be piped into my home? Like any upstanding citizen I collect rainwater in barrels.

lol, yeah yeah

 

[Dead Man]

Yeah exactly. I'm old enough to remember life before pervasive internet access. We did just fine. Internet access is important, but by equating it with water and electricity the argument falls apart.

We did fine because it wasn't available. People did fine before mobile phones, try going a month without one now. What is necessary changes. People did fine before electricity too.

It may or may not be essential, but this is a pretty weak counter to use.

 

[BigWeather]

My kids need access to YouTube on a daily basis (so going to the library is an inconvenience) for school. My unemployed wife needs access to the Internet to look for high-tech jobs. Access is fast becoming a necessity, much like water, power, and sewer. At one time we dealt without the latter three but now they're essential. Access to the Internet is fast approaching that status.

 

[sonicmj1]

On a personal level you don't need the internet. It's nice to have it but that's it.

You can still do all of that the old fashioned way.

I mean seriously what are most people using the internet for? Posting stupid stuff on twitter or on facebook.

I just think it's stupid to call it a necessity and comparing it to WATER.

You could have said all of this about electricity 75 years ago. But governments still worked at great expense to bring it to distant rural areas, and the nation's quality of life benefited from it enormously.

 

[Jay Sosa]

You could have said all of this about electricity 75 years ago. But governments still worked at great expense to bring it to distant rural areas, and the nation's quality of life benefited from it enormously.

That's why I didn't take 'offense' to the comparison with electricity.

 

[Shake Appeal]

On a personal level you don't need the internet. It's nice to have it but that's it.

If you want to participate in the modern economy (which is an important qualifier the article does add a paragraph or two later), you need to have Internet access. It is essential. And even if you don't have personal Internet, you rely on it being free and freely available to every business and entity you come in contact with on a given day. So even if you believe you can get by without it by choice, the world you live in cannot.

You may decide you can live without it (spoiler: you almost certainly can't), but even the local grocery you walk in to and scan your credit card at the networked till of bears the cost of Internet access (and passes it on in their pricing).

 

[Chichikov]

On a personal level you don't need the internet. It's nice to have it but that's it.

Define need.
You don't need electricity, gas, or sewage, right?

That not really the point of a utility either, a utility is something that as a society we think is important enough for all people to have access to.

And maybe more importantly, the question I think we need to ask ourselves is if it's going to work better for society as whole as a utility, and I absolutely think it would in this case for internet access.

 

[Jay Sosa]

Define need.
You don't need electricity, gas, or sewage, right?

Maybe it's because I'm old but I did just fine without it. Sure I can only speak for myself but I certainly don't need it. In fact it kinda destroyed my job (at least made it way less enjoyable). So I would have no issue with the internet being gone by tomorrow.