Are you happy with your Internet connection speed? Glad to have that zippy broadband access and always carping at your cheap-ass dad to finally make the upgrade? Yep. You’ve got Road Runner, so you should be proud.

Or should you? While you’re mulling over your support for the Brodsky Telecom Bill (aka, Wire New York), consider this: of the top 18 most expensive broadband countries, Americans rank 17th, paying $36 compared to an average $43. Good so far, but what about quality of service? Well, we only get about 1.9mbps (megabits per second) download speed, as opposed to Japan’s fifth most expensive market, where the speed is around 61mbps. You don’t need to be a computer whiz, a mathematician or even Exile on Ericsson St. to see that $49 for Japanese broadband is a far-and-away better deal.

And if that makes you sick, read about the latest record-setter in broadband speed, once again, not in the US:

The Local – Sigbritt, 75, has world’s fastest broadband

A 75 year old woman from Karlstad in central Sweden has been thrust into the IT history books – with the world’s fastest internet connection.{{snip}}

Sigbritt will now be able to enjoy 1,500 high definition HDTV channels simultaneously. Or, if there is nothing worth watching there, she will be able to download a full high definition DVD in just two seconds.

No word on what that will cost, but can you even imagine such speeds without paying for some commercial-grade service like a shared T1? Of course not.

Does it get worse? Oh, yes. Much, much worse below the fold: » Continue Reading…

The SaveTheInternet.com folks are back on the offensive, harrying attempts to create the much-sought-after two-tiered Internet proposed by Big Telecom. Now, they’re asking us to submit our own stories to be sent to the FCC for consideration.

Well, anything I can do to stop this effort, I will do. And so, I do-ed it.

Below is my “story,” and you can send your own to the FCC by going to their site here:

All too often, the biggest change in political life in this country goes unnoticed. That change has been from getting our news and entertainment from paper publications to getting it from television news. Even large paper publications have letters to the editor, but paper publications are cheap enough that independent media always had a voice.

But when television media became the mode of choice, the ability for the citizenry to respond to what they saw in the media ceased to be. Television only talks at you, and you only watch and listen. There is no second side of the conversation.

This has led to a decline in civic involvement, generally, because people begin to see political arguments as people carping on television instead of neighbors talking about important business. Also, because we cannot tell broadcasters what we want, they decide for us, and then their decisions become self-fulfilling prophecy because people are getting force-fed it. That is not democratic, that is not American. It is wrong.

The Internet moves the conversation back into the hands of the people. Now anyone can own a blog and say what they think about whatever they’d like to talk about. Unsurprisingly, very little of it is about Paris Hilton and much more of it is about Barack Obama. People are involved again, and it’s upsetting the apple-cart for those who believed they controlled the message.

Moreover, there is the Telecommunications industry which would like the opportunity to advertise “at us” the way television has for years, . . through the Internet. No more responding to our demands, no more individuals with the power to create something more interesting, no more open competition, no more reacting to the will of the people; if they get their way, only the wealthy and powerful will be able to afford high-speed connections to broadcast the same one-sided television-style programming that has ruined our culture for lo this past several decades.

But you have a chance to see to it this does not happen. You have a chance to let the Telecom industry know that there is such a thing as “the public good,” and it transcends their desire to make money. Please support Net Neutrality and a free and democratic Internet.

Go ahead, let ‘em know what you think!

In the midst of so many other problems and arguments, the Net Neutrality issue is slowly moving to the back-burner, even for those of us whose very voices depend on it.  Fortunately, not everyone has forgotten:

YouTube – Moyers on America “The Net at Risk” | PBS

The future of the Internet is up for grabs. Big corporations are lobbying Washington to turn the gateway to the Web into a toll road. Yet the public knows little about what’s happening behind closed doors where the future of democracy’s newest forum is being decided. If a few mega media giants own the content and control the delivery of radio, television, telephone services and the Internet, they’ll make a killing
and citizens will pay for it. In this clip from the upcoming PBS documentary “The Net at Risk” from Bill Moyers, airing on October 18 (check local listings), reporter Rick Karr looks at the issue of “net neutrality”- rules that the FCC eliminated, which allowed every American
and every company equal access to the Internet.

Technorati Tags: Net Neutrality, Internet, Freedom of Speech

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