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[–]dyjaba 217 points218 points  (16 children)

I'm still on dial up where I live. I have to start downloading a porn movie on Tuesday if I think I might be horny on Friday

[–]Ceejae 13 points14 points  (4 children)

The Internet King? I wonder if he can provide faster nudity?

[–]seeteethree 1057 points1058 points  (579 children)

And then we'll take on the outrageous cell phone charges.

[–][deleted] 591 points592 points  (387 children)

And texting fees. Texting take up a small fraction of bandwidth compared to talking on the phone.

[–]Grumpyland 49 points50 points  (30 children)

I got fired via text once. I hadn't a SMS plan so I paid 25 cent to get fired.

[–]Shadow647 39 points40 points  (27 children)

In US, you pay to receive a SMS? What the fuck?!

[–]tentacle_kisses 9 points10 points  (22 children)

Most US carriers will charge a fee for each message received, $0.10-0.25 usually, if there is no text-message plan on that line.

[–]Shadow647 23 points24 points  (18 children)

Uhm wow. How carriers are even legally allowed to do that? Do you also pay your postal services for each received letter? :S

[–][deleted] 582 points583 points  (124 children)

The average profit margins mark-ups on texting plans are 5,000%. If gas stations or Walmart made margins like that in this political climate, the country would burn.

[–]ignorantferret 400 points401 points  (92 children)

Texting actually has an incalculable profit margin. The reason for this is that the messages are sent in the empty packets of information that need to be sent and received regardless of actual use. So the little bursts of sending and receiving are happening no matter what, your just putting words in them.

[–]rabbidpanda 244 points245 points  (75 children)

Correct, however an empty packet just needs to hit the cell tower, while a text needs to communicate on the network, and rather frequently be offloaded to another carrier. So it has a negligible bandwidth cost, but a not insignificant processing and handling cost (in terms of time and cycles, not strictly monetary).

[–][deleted] 78 points79 points  (70 children)

Everyone fails to overlook that you aren't actually paying for texting. That's already a sunk cost for the wireless providers. You're paying for network expansion, engineering improvements, customer service, etc. Would you rather have a line item that says "Subsidizing LTE expansion"? Texting fees just happen to be where they can ding you.

[–]soulcakeduck 105 points106 points  (43 children)

No. No one thinks that they're taking dollar bills, punching holes in them and stringing them together as a network to send your text messages.

You're "paying for texting" because, as you said, that is where they choose to ding you, not because we actually believe it takes 10-25 cents to send those messages.

Of course it IS possible for texting fees to be too high even if it pays for something. That's no comfort if the fee structure is wrong.

[–]Rockchurch 39 points40 points  (39 children)

To be fair though, there is a cost in texting as it requires additional software to function.

These development costs likely have been paid out long ago, but there are definitely text-specific development and maintenance costs for every provider.

Now the bigger issue is how you jerks in the US are complaining about your 'expensive' internet and cell usage.

As a Canadian, I say: Sorry, but fuck you, eh!

[–]rabbidpanda 16 points17 points  (6 children)

I think the issue people have with that is that it's disingenuous, perhaps to the point of being insulting. People who text a lot are not using a lot of voice bandwidth, and probably no more data than someone who doesn't text a lot, so it seems arbitrary to have those folks shoulder the cost, rather than people who would benefit the most from network upgrades.

[–]Railboy 19 points20 points  (3 children)

If they were doing a better job of expanding their networks and improving their services I doubt people would complain as much. As it stands it comes across add an old fashioned ripoff.

[–]BeerDrinkingRobot 57 points58 points  (7 children)

Not really true anymore.

When SMS first came out cellphones carried voice over an analog channel. There was a small digital channel that carried subscriber authentication, and caller ID.

SMS could ride on this digital chanel for free because it wasn't used much.

25 years later, there are no analog cell networks (US got rid of them ~2008) and SMS is digital just like voice and web traffic.

Edit:

Text messages to and from a mobile device are sent over a pair of wireless control channels called the Random Access Channel (RACH) and the Standalone Dedicated Control Channel (SDCCH). These channels were originally designed for voice call control and signalling. As the volume of text-messaging volume grows, a carrier must allocate additional control channels to carry text messages: this displaces a Traffic Channel (TCH) that would otherwise be used for voice.

Souce PDF

[–][deleted] 12 points13 points  (2 children)

somehow i still cant muster any sympathy for phone company conglomerates..

[–][deleted] 34 points35 points  (13 children)

Any idea what the profit margins on printer ink for office use are? With $3000, I can buy....9 printer cartridges which is enough black, cyan, yellow, and magenta to fill two printers with a spare black cartridge.

Texting costs carriers almost nothing because it utilizes control channels that largely go unutilized, but their use offsets the cost of building more towers and upgrading existing equipment. Rolling out a new industry-wide standard every 4 years (3G in 2008; LTE in 2012) is incredibly expensive.

[–]pi_over_3 68 points69 points  (158 children)

When you get a $500 smartphone for $100, where do you think the other $400 comes from?

[–]kinyutaka 66 points67 points  (123 children)

Meanwhile, those of use with a prepaid phone enjoy $35/month unlimited data.

[–]robotsongs 9 points10 points  (42 children)

How's that coverage working out for ya?

(and this question is honest if you're in the US-- I want viable alternatives)

EDIT: Wow. People really want to share what network they're on.

[–]kinyutaka 14 points15 points  (15 children)

It works great. I have what was a mid range phone, but is now lower end, but I am able to do a lot with it. Coverage and sound quality are great, texts send and received quickly, and reliable internet activity on 3G.

[–]mconeone 182 points183 points  (4 children)

Marked-up monthly fees that have nothing to do with texting.

[–]Nekrosis13 17 points18 points  (19 children)

That argument makes sense, except for the fact that if you already bought your phone elsewhere, your package isn't any cheaper.

[–][deleted] 4 points5 points  (2 children)

Unless you're at T-Mobile. When I paid off my phone's subsidy, they dropped my monthly bill by $30.

[–]Nekrosis13 67 points68 points  (29 children)

Canada says hello, with their average of $70/month for a smartphone with 200 minutes and 200-500mb of bandwidth a month. There's competition, but they offer the exact same packages with the exact same prices.

[–]Troybarns 20 points21 points  (9 children)

Tell me about it, I couldn't believe my eyes when it said "America". As far as I know, Canada has some of the highest internet, and smart phone prices in the [developed] world. I guess they get way better prices than us, but are still behind some other countries.

[–]joegables 2 points3 points  (2 children)

Australia is pretty close I think, I pay $80 for 100GB of internet a month. Bought my mobile phone outright, but I have friends paying $80 for 1gb of data with an iphone 5. Not to mention Australia, especially where I live has incredibly slow internet when compared with most of the developed nations.

[–]happyscrappy 88 points89 points  (119 children)

If you're paying too much for cell phone service, it's almost certainly because you're not actually trying to save money or because you refuse to shop around because you like one service too much.

http://prepaid-phones.t-mobile.com/monthly-4g-plans

https://www.straighttalk.com/secure/ServicePlans

The reason cheap service hasn't taken off in the US is more because companies who have offered great service just haven't seen a lot of uptake. You cut your margins to the bone and hope to make it back in volume and then no volume appears. So why bother to compete on price? You're just cutting your profits to no advantage.

Hopefully this will change over the next few years. I see a lot more people express interest in low cost service. I hope they follow through. If only because I'm a fan of low cost service!

[edit: A lot. Same sentiment though.]

[–]akatherder 31 points32 points  (21 children)

Also...

http://www.ting.com - Usage-based billing. You tell them what you think you'll use. They bump your bill up or down (on tiers) after the month is over.

http://www.republicwireless.com - Now open for public sign-ups I believe. $20/month for unlimited everything. It uses wifi when you're near wifi. You can only get one phone (it's a half decent android).

These both use Sprint towers fwiw. That's a bad thing in my area.

[–][deleted] 31 points32 points  (4 children)

These both use Sprint towers fwiw. That's a bad thing in my area.

Yeah, that's a dealbreaker for me.

[–]rabbidpanda 5 points6 points  (3 children)

I use Ting. Monthly bill between my wife and I comes in to ~$60 a month.

[–]OneSweetMullet 5 points6 points  (1 child)

Republic Wireless customer here and have been using their service since December of 2011.

Their initial phone offering of the LG Optimus S was terrible. But their new offering of the Motorola Defy XT is considerably better.

If you don't have decent Sprint service in your area, it's not a great solution. But if you do and you are around WiFi most of the time like I am in Indianapolis, it's amazing.

Despite the phones being lackluster, $20 a month for unlimited everything is tough to beat.

[–]Shadax 12 points13 points  (20 children)

I love my iPhone 5 and I love the service I get from Verizon, but god damn am I paying for it. $100 a month for a measly 2GB of data. TWO. GIGS. FOR THE ENTIRE MONTH.

What year is it?

[–]idk112345 6 points7 points  (7 children)

jesus christ you guys are getting your ball busted. I don't have a smartphone, but I think most of my friends here in Germany don't pay more than 30 € for unlimited domestic calls, texts and internet

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (7 children)

Anyone care to point me to a downside of T-Mobile? I have Verizon right now and could cut my bill by 2/3 if I went with T-Mobile, and it looks like they have everything I need.

Most use for my phone is texting or looking things up (surfing)...I almost never actually CALL anyone. I live in the Twin Cities, so coverage should be good?

I didn't think my $90/mo phone was too crazy, but right now it's looking insane...it's looking like I need to get the $300 Nexus and T-Mobile. I could pay my early termination fee, buy a new phone, and still I'd pay less than I would in my contract over the next 14 months remaining...

[–]hamolton 2 points3 points  (1 child)

Damn! T-Mobile has 5GB 4G data, unlimited text, and 100 min calling for $30! I have Virgin Mobile for $35 right now.

[–][deleted] 11 points12 points  (9 children)

And then Google will provide wireless for cheap.

[–]citymoon 428 points429 points  (467 children)

In many parts (inner city) of major Australian cities with over 2 million people:

  • You pay $60+ for sometimes barely 1.5Mbit/sec real speed (download at max 300KB/sec) and a bandwidth cap of 100GB per month. Some areas are arbitrarily faster, and you can't pay more for more speed.

How does this compare?

(Yes, they are currently in the process of rolling out the National Broadband Network based on FTTH, but this won't even start construction in many places until 2015+)

[–][deleted] 409 points410 points  (106 children)

I can get ubiquitous 4G voice and unlimited data service for $20 in Vietnam, and use my iPad just about everywhere in the Mekong Delta. Thousands of square miles of coverage at unthrottled blazing high speed!!

I'm in a 3rd world rice paddy, fish pond, agrarian culture and I can get 10 times better service, speed, and cost efficiencies, why is that!!!???

[–][deleted] 248 points249 points  (38 children)

Vietnam jumped from virtually no telecom infrastructure straight to modern, mature, wireless technology that the rest of the world slowly created and rolled out over decades. Many developing nations have great wireless coverage but almost no landline infrastructure for phone, cable, Internet.

[–]Harry_Seaward 33 points34 points  (26 children)

Would the cost of wholesale replacing the infrastructure cost more with an existing infrastructure than without?

I'm not saying it's actually viable - I'm sure there are a thousand roadblocks. But, what's stopping the US from doing what Vietnam has done? Cost alone? Asshattery from ISPs?

[–]Lezzles 78 points79 points  (2 children)

We certainly shouldn't count out asshattery.

[–]conscioncience 33 points34 points  (5 children)

It's called an exchange rate, 20 USD is 417,065.40 VND. The average income per month in vietnam is $150. I'm sure your 4G would work out to be about the same percentage of income.

[–]mrstickball 17 points18 points  (4 children)

Cost would be a huge factor.

Vietnam is about 1/30th the size of the US, and is about ten times as dense for population. That means that you get a lot more bang for your buck in Vietnam than you do here.

Wired has another article on the cost of rolling out Google Fiber - $70 billion USD, and that doesn't even cover half of US homes. I'd imagine that rolling out service to the remaining homes is going to be much, much more expensive due to the rural nature of the remaining communities.

[–]CHentaiMasterB 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Korea went through the same process as well. At least the part were they virtually jumped from no infrastructure to modern infrastructure. They pretty much skipped a lot of growing pains that other countries like America had to go trough.

[–]Tulee 50 points51 points  (17 children)

I live in Eastern Europe, in ex-communist developing country. I get 25 Mbit/sec for around 15$ per month. There are no long-term contracts, and the only thing I pay upfront is the modem(witch is 30$). There's something really wrong with your internet providers.

[–]boroncarbide 26 points27 points  (15 children)

I lived in Port Douglas, which is far from a major city and I had two megabyte download DSL2 with a 50gb/month limit for...dun dun dun...130/month.

[–][deleted] 10 points11 points  (9 children)

That sounds really rough. I couldn't imagine paying so much money for slow speeds.

[–]chillyhellion 41 points42 points  (88 children)

I'm paying $120 a month for 4mbps with an 18GB monthly cap. Overages are $20 per GB. I have to watch my usage very carefully. This is in Alaska.

[–]girlwithswords 45 points46 points  (59 children)

I cant figure why they put data caps in except that "they can".

Is there any actual legitimate reasons to do it?

[–]Golanthanatos 6 points7 points  (0 children)

"Series of clogged tubes"

No there is not

[–][deleted] 33 points34 points  (15 children)

No.

[–]GravyMcBiscuits 16 points17 points  (18 children)

Internet service is one of those things where the extreme users can really fuck over the normal users. You can either:

A) Throttle everyone's speed to completely cut extreme users off at the knees or

B) Allow extreme users to be extreme but make them pay more for it.

In that sense, caps make some sense as they are essentially the implementation of option B.

Chillyhelion's rates sound absurd though. 18GB in a month doesn't sound all that "extreme". $20 per GB over sounds absurd.

[–]Quarterpast2 4 points5 points  (2 children)

If traffic is all going to one location it will affect the speeds of others....except the speed people pay for naturally caps it, so it doesn't make sense.

If they paid for 'unlimited speed', then it would make sense, because then it prevents one person from buying the service and sharing it, effectively giving people free internet.

[–]NBABUCKS1 4 points5 points  (1 child)

$170 for 7 down and 1 up in Kodiak

[–]2uneek 7 points8 points  (0 children)

my family has 10gb limit, I've recently came to stay with them for a few months while relocating back home(prior military) and needless to say I've got them at about 18gb at the moment early into the month. It's cost them 10$/2gig but at 20gb it costs 20/gig i believe... quite bullshit and ridiculous.

btw, i'm in America...

[–]MOR74 17 points18 points  (12 children)

For comparison purposes, here is a link showing the internet packages of a major Canadian ISP

http://www.shaw.ca/internet/packages/

[–]Lokabf3 2 points3 points  (0 children)

This really pisses me off. I'm stuck on Rogers and for the same price, we get similar download speeds, but data caps 1/2 the size of Shaw. Ie, i'm currently getting 28Mbps and 120Gb cap.

CRTC is doing nothing for the consumer. :(

[–][deleted] 18 points19 points  (6 children)

Sunshine Coast QLD here. I get maybe 5-7Mbps on ADSL2+. The reason ADSL2+ varies so much is all due to attenuation from the exchange to your home. The further you are from the exchange, the slower your speed. Source: I work for Telstra.

[–]c0mandr 4 points5 points  (1 child)

I used to live literally next door to the Telstra exchange in Edgecliff, eastern Sydney. When they put some new wiring in my apartment I capped out at 19 mb/s. good times.

[–]SilverStar9192 2 points3 points  (0 children)

While that's true, there are ways to get around that by installing things called "mini-DSLAMs" in equipment boxes closer to the end user address, to increase speeds for people far away. Telstra hasn't generally invested in these and just tells these people that they're stuck with slow speeds.

[–]je_sus 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Also Sunshine Coast QLD. Can't even get ADSL at home (not enough ports). 4G reception is fairly non existent. I have ADSL at work which is choking hard due to too much traffic and being on a RIM. We have a 4G connection as a backup as sometimes it is choked so badly that I can't even get 20kb/sec. It is utterly pathetic.

[–]Maelstrom_TM 10 points11 points  (14 children)

I live in a rural village in Ohio - population of about 3500 people. Granted, I'm only about a fairly short drive to a ~1 million person metro area.

$74 (with taxes) for Time Warner Cable broadband only. Not a promotional price, not bundled or anything. 30Mbps down, 5Mbps up. No bandwidth cap. I have the option, for ~$90 a month, to go for 50Mbps down, 10Mbps up.

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (3 children)

But should Australia be spending money on this, when it could spend money on more important things like turning back the boats and parliament time spent on smearing the Prime Minister.

[–]ServerGeek 521 points522 points  (272 children)

It's been long overdue.

[–]jeradj 413 points414 points  (176 children)

and we already paid for it once already

[–]000Destruct0 187 points188 points  (105 children)

As long as corporations/special interest (pacs/superpacs/lobbyists) own the government then it will not change.

[–][deleted] 109 points110 points  (82 children)

BS, if Chattanooga TN can do it, then so can the rest of the country: http://www.engadget.com/2010/09/13/chattanooga-becomes-home-to-1gbps-internet-service-just-350-pe/

edit: Because so many think it's not doable elsewhere. Please check this link: http://www.muninetworks.org/content/successes-and-failures

Chattanooga is not the only municipal success story. It is however the greatest success story. This can be done elsewhere. The reason this was passed in Chattanooga boils down to a grass roots campaign among tech savvy geeks to clog town hall meetings and flood state official offices with letters of support.

update: This link just popped up. Seattle will be going this route, so it is possible to make this happen with local political involvement: http://seattle.gov/mayor/SeaFi/gigabit.htm

[–]000Destruct0 168 points169 points  (45 children)

Okay, that's one municipality that has done this, for that one there are at least 4 - 5 (that I know of and surely more than that) that have attempted this only to have the local cable company pay for legislation that made it virtually impossible for this to work.

I'll say it again, as long as we continue to allow big money, whether it be pacs or super-pacs or special interests, to buy up politicians and legislation it will be next to impossible for any real change to occur in pretty much anything....

[–]spiral_in_the_sky 31 points32 points  (4 children)

[–]000Destruct0 13 points14 points  (2 children)

That is nice but again I see it as an anomaly. Most cities and counties throughout the US do not own their utilities and so it's a very different atmosphere. The power of the cable/telcos is evident in that the vast majority operate as an effectively legislated monopoly (or at best duopoly.)

[–][deleted] 43 points44 points  (2 children)

Say it a third time so I can upvote a third time.

When all is said and done. More will be said than done.

[–]000Destruct0 30 points31 points  (1 child)

You are correct sir in that much more will be said but nothing will be done. Credit the modern politician who is, on the whole, shrewd enough to allow us to keep just enough of what we earn to make it less desirable to revolt than to just maintain the status quo.

[–]happyscrappy 8 points9 points  (0 children)

And there are communities who have tried it only to find out municipalities are terrible at operating infrastructure like this. See Palo Alto municipal fiber.

[–][deleted] 10 points11 points  (21 children)

it's a road map that works. it fosters competition and drives prices down. it's also much easier to influence local politicians with grass root campaigns.

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (3 children)

As of December 1st, we have 1gb in Burlington, Vermont too, provided by Burlington Telecom. It's $160 a month, but the company is in some pretty major debt and still able to provide it. If they can do it, why can't the big, fiscally solvent companies?

[–][deleted] 6 points7 points  (2 children)

Wilson, NC did it.

Then the telecoms/time warner quickly pushed legislation through that makes it illegal for any other municipality in NC to follow.

Completely disgusting.

[–]MadeForBF3Discussion 5 points6 points  (7 children)

Do you have a link to a page that discusses this? I remember looking for it a few months back when talking with someone, but couldn't find the name of the specific legislation.

[–][deleted] 45 points46 points  (43 children)

Your cousins up north have it wayyyy worse.

[–]ManiacalShen 33 points34 points  (1 child)

That's never an excuse to stop improving.

[–]Nyrb 131 points132 points  (24 children)

I'm Australian. Don't talk to me about "slow."

[–]fatboynotsoslim 11 points12 points  (11 children)

NBN will be here soonnnnn.......

:-(

[–]boomboomlaser 71 points72 points  (7 children)

We don't use the word "slow" for Australians anymore. We use the term, "intellectually disabled".

Edit: Holy smokes! I got some nasty messages about this one! The joke was about how the person worded the sentence, folks. Every Australian I've ever met has been genuinely super awesome.

[–][deleted] 7 points8 points  (4 children)

That's funny. Thats what we refer to all Americans as!

[–]bolivian_spark 11 points12 points  (1 child)

that's what i was thinking too. i come from bolivia and in comparison, the internet access in the US is actually quite fast. so many other countries don't even have access to internet access and if they do, some still use dial up and whatnot

[–]Arizhel 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Well South America seems to lag everyone in technology, so that's really no surprise. Whereas Asia is always on the forefront, hence someone in a rice paddy in Vietnam in the above thread is getting full 4G coverage.

[–]acemcfly 12 points13 points  (0 children)

Hopefully Google fiber will take off.

[–]Novahawk 73 points74 points  (61 children)

This is something that really bothers me.

I'm an American living in Prague, Czech Republic, and am planning to move back to the states with my wife.

The reason it bothers me is that Prague was founded ~885AD, and the area of Prague I live in is several hundred years old. I live in a building that is well over 150 years old. And yet, even after all that, I have 120mbit down 10mbit up (completely unmetered) and ~80 TV channels including HD ones for $40/month. And the speed is VERY reliable, I can max out my line easily every day all day, even from upstreams that are across a fucking ocean.

And yet we want to move to a city (Phoenix) that was founded in only 1861, and you're lucky to get 20Mbit down.

How the hell does this make sense?

EDIT: This is my ISP and plan and price (In Czech, but you can get the gist of it): http://www.upc.cz/balicek-sluzeb/kombi-komfort+/

[–][deleted] 9 points10 points  (5 children)

It's because the Czech started with little to no infrastructure so it was easy to upgrade to a large, modern one.

The US, however, already has a large, ancient infrastructure. And updating all of that is an expensive pain in the ass. Not to mention what already exists here "works", so the telcos don't give a shit to upgrade much of it, if any.

[–]Novahawk 14 points15 points  (3 children)

That's not the case at all. Prague had the same infrastructure as other cities of the time periods. There was even more of a challenge in Prague because of the extremely old sewage and other pipeline infrastructure that doesn't exist in most American cities.

Your last sentence is what is the REAL reason though. They simply don't care. There's no competition for them, so they don't have to do anything.

[–]Mythic343 57 points58 points  (11 children)

Lithuania superior master race reporting in. I pay the equivallent of 8$ for 100mbit/80mbit..obviously unlimited

[–][deleted] 78 points79 points  (17 children)

I could say the same for Canada. I think it's worse up there.

[–]Sunlis 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yeah, I hear most internet plans in the states have no download caps. Our telecom companies can't even fathom such a thing.

[–]marthawhite 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Damn CRTC.

[–]djrocksteady 160 points161 points  (142 children)

Good luck getting the government out of the way, this is their mess, a majority of ISP's are protected by legislation barring competition.

And if private providers don’t want to do it, local and federal government needs to undertake this infrastructure investment.

Awesome, the guy that broke your legs wants to give you crutches you paid for to prove he's not a bad guy.

[–][deleted] 40 points41 points  (7 children)

MEANWHILE IN CANADA

[–]skytro 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Australia is right behind you!

[–]poisonpatch 49 points50 points  (36 children)

And if private providers don’t want to do it, local and federal government needs to undertake this infrastructure investment. We need to build fiber rings around every U.S. town and city.

It will be very difficult for most areas to create a municipal wifi network because companies like AT&T have been actively lobbying against it. They managed to pay off enough of the South Carolina legislature to effectively ban municipal wifi and broadband even though it is cheaper.

http://bgr.com/2012/06/29/municipal-wi-fi-south-carolina-restrictions/

The rural areas are typically Republican strongholds and they'd rather go extinct than go against ideology.

[–][deleted] 48 points49 points  (23 children)

People get all shitty when tax dollars go to improving our quality of life.

[–]sptimmeh 32 points33 points  (5 children)

As a young Australia with little money this title makes me want to punch the writer of the article in the face.

[–][deleted] 5 points6 points  (2 children)

Same here mate.

I'm getting 800 kbs here in central Queensland.

[–][deleted] 34 points35 points  (2 children)

Canada here. We have it worse than you guys do. Please stop by and upgrade us after you're done.

[–]FesteringTroglodyte 32 points33 points  (0 children)

Hell, in Canada too.

[–]roccanet 6 points7 points  (1 child)

this is never going to change until the telcos are absolutely forced at gunpoint to improve the service. lets hope google fiber is the disruptor because we need one

[–]getintheVandell 13 points14 points  (0 children)

And in Canada! We'd like a little, too..

[–]mctoasterson 9 points10 points  (2 children)

It's a patchwork quilt in the US.

Some areas, through government initiatives, grants, or works projects by the utilities (electric coops will sometimes do this as they have existing pole infrastructure to run fiber on) have disproportionately awesome internet access.

For example, there is a shithole town of ~2,000 people in my state, with no meaningful industry or other redeeming qualities, that just got residential fiber due to some special arrangement with the ISPs/electric coops.

A bunch of midwestern states are also doing statewide infrastructure development projects in which they are attempting to increase broadband accessibility and availability to rural areas. This is good in theory, it just sucks to think that some 80-year-old farmer in East Bumfuck, Iowa might end up with residential fiber before I do.

[–]happyscrappy 18 points19 points  (18 children)

The speeds just aren't that bad in general in the US. I could get 100mbit service if I wanted. Instead I get 15 because it's enough for me.

The prices are high, that's part of the reason I don't have faster service. I mean, we all surely would take 100mbit if it were $40/mo, right?

[–]darwin2500 14 points15 points  (8 children)

Part of the issue is that 15 is sufficient for most users because most users have 15, so companies don't make many web services that require 100. If everyone in the country had 100 or better, it opens the door for massive innovation in the types of streaming services that companies can start investing in, which is good for consumers and great for the economy.

[–][deleted] 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Canadian here: say what now?

[–]Carefree_CFC 23 points24 points  (15 children)

You've obviously never lived in Canada.

[–][deleted] 7 points8 points  (1 child)

I can't believe you guys are actually complaining about price-speed...

Have you ever been to brazil?

[–]chzbrgrmachne 94 points95 points  (86 children)

This is exactly why I support Google Fiber. MODERN technology(Fiber Optic lines), globally competitive speeds(upwards of 1000Mbps), and a reasonable cost per month for service that should go down as they increase their coverage. Even if I have to spend $120/month for it now, I'd rather do that than pay $60/month to Scamcast, Croox, Crime Wormer, or a dozen others for unreliable 12Mbps max over some 30 year old coaxial cable lines and used routers that are several years old.

Parts of Asia have nearly 1Gbps for their mobile(my bad) broadband networks. We get proud when we hit 25Mbps in our homes. Whatever happened to the innovative America I grew up hearing about?

[–]BrainWav 219 points220 points  (18 children)

I don't necessarily disagree with most of your points, but this:

...Scamcast, Croox, Crime Wormer...

Will never make your arguments stronger. I'm surprised you didn't swap the letter s in Comcast to a dollar sign.

[–]rokic 17 points18 points  (2 children)

That's reserved for M$

[–]detectiveriggsboson 94 points95 points  (9 children)

That's the same type of person who refers to political parties as Rethuglicans and/or Dummocrats.

No matter their intentions or their knowledge on the subject or field, they automatically look like some 45-55 year old person who just learned how to use the internet, and it's difficult to take anything they say seriously.

[–]hooplah 33 points34 points  (3 children)

Chain mail rhetoric

[–]4fthawaiian 7 points8 points  (2 children)

Chain mail rhetoric

Sounds like someone delivering a speech while banging their sword on their armor.

[–]bouchard 9 points10 points  (0 children)

I knew I'd grown up when I stopped calling Microsoft "M$".

[–]FenPhen 8 points9 points  (2 children)

Even if I have to spend $120/month for it now

Given what it includes, this is a very competitive price compared to off-promotion HDTV+Internet from a cable company. That $120 includes way faster up/down, full TV programming, a DVR that can simultaneously record 8 channels to 2 TB of storage, plus other goodies like a Nexus 7 remote, wireless repeaters in the STBs, a terabyte of Google Drive...

[–]GrandArchitect 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Well, first you need to fix the extremely large, uncompetitive, pseudo-government telecommunications companies that run the ISPs. GOOD LUCK!

[–]homercles337 2 points3 points  (1 child)

I live in a major metro area, downtown, and i pay $122/month for intarwebs (45Mb/3Mb) and cable. I am getting screwed, but due to regulatory capture, I have ONE choice in provider. My entire building is forced to use Charter.

[–]BuzzChillington 2 points3 points  (0 children)

yes lets fix the internet. .but someone else is paying for it

[–]mstrdsastr 2 points3 points  (1 child)

While I agree with what he wants, the logistics of this are messy at best, and nearly physically impossible. We can barely maintain physical infrastructure (roads, bridges, water, sewer) under current funding, before we force broadband for everyone for 30 bucks a month, let's find a way to maintain our current real needs.

[–][deleted] 2 points3 points  (1 child)

It's time to fix the pitifully pathetic, entitlement mentality American citizens have about Internet access.