Is your Internet speed and cost good enough?

[Jim C.]

I have no doubt that this new system is great now, when the user count is LOW, time will tell if it survives the masses. In any cases it is not available to single family houses (perhaps "yet").

For some reason, despite being a world power, the US has some of the worst internet service, and at one of the worlds highest rates, mostly due to the monopolized market, changing that rather then the tech might make the internet faster and more accessible.

I quickly scanned thru the article Randy Moe linked to so I'm not 100% up on how it works
but if they are in fact using lasers as the transmission medium then it won't take long before
the FCC will kibosh it and or rates will go up, DSL in my area was like that dirt cheap when it was available
every body was offering deals but it slowly crept up.

If I'm correct the US is the only country where the internet service is not Gov subsidized.

[Kirk Gittings]

I considered myself spoiled using Comcast. I currently get 30 mbps download and 6 mbps upload. But speeds like you (Randy) report? Wow! I wish that would come to the Charleston area!

Comcast sucks here-the evil empire. Expensive and terrible service.

[jon.oman]

Comcast sucks here-the evil empire. Expensive and terrible service.

Overall my experiance with Comcast has been positive. I moved from the Detroit area 12 years ago. At first Comcast here was not as good as in Detroit. But, within three or four months here, things improved. They made a major upgrade to the system about then. They have improved it many times since. I too think that it is overpriced for what you get, but it seems to be the best in my area. I am thinking about dumping the cable part though. At lease to the minimum that they allow and still have the internet...

[Kirk Gittings]

Awhile back I abandoned Century Link for Comcast, which had upgraded their lines. With CL at that time I was averaging 17 outages a day (by their count!). My wife who was taking some online classes had to go to Starbucks to get service stable enough to take an online test. Fast forward a few years and Comcast sucks now-massive slowdowns at night and on weekends-virtually no service at those times. Call them up and they say its not their problem but the whole neighborhood on Comcast has the same issues. But now Century Link has upgraded their service. So we have switched back. In another 3 years........I think they let their service degrade until a certain percentage jump ship. Shitty stupid business model.

[Bob Sawin]

Comcast sucks here-the evil empire. Expensive and terrible service.

Here as well. At least they are consistent.

[rbultman]

Waiting on Google fiber here in Louisville so I can dump Time Warner.

[koh303]

If I'm correct the US is the only country where the internet service is not Gov subsidized.

You are incorrect.
The US is one of those places where the government does not regulate the competition, and allows three major companies to control the entire market without interfeering in the monopoly situation they jointly created. Thats why, in this case specifically, service is bad and prices are high, and the captive customer base has no one to complain to. In most areas in the US there is only one provider option per service, so it's their way or dial-up.

[jp]

You are incorrect.
The US is one of those places where the government does not regulate the competition, and allows three major companies to control the entire market without interfeering in the monopoly situation they jointly created. Thats why, in this case specifically, service is bad and prices are high, and the captive customer base has no one to complain to. In most areas in the US there is only one provider option per service, so it's their way or dial-up.

I used to have a business being an independent Internet service provider. That's the short answer basically.

For Telecom, the phone companies were greatly subsidized by cold war projects (including Internet) based on my visiting CO's, microwave tower sites, and digging into the history of Bell Labs. After the cold war and increases in computers and Internet, phone companies made promises for digital upgrades that didn't work out (See Fred R Goldstein's books that details this fleecing).

Rural phone companies continue to be subsidized in the interest of universal coverage. This rural subsidy has also made it's way into mobile phone companies as well.

Susan Crawford's book "Captive Audience" covers the rise of the cable companies particularly and their dealings with government. http://scrawford.net/books/ There are also oral histories of founding cable executives on youtube if you want some first person information.

For the past several years ISPs have wanted to gain access to public infrastructure, and the utility requirements to get that access create substantial barriers to entry by way of regulation. That's not going change quickly as normal lawmakers of all political persuasions either don't understand the business and technology and/or have developed friendly relationships with the monopoly/duopoly providers.

I have Time Warner at home now and the download speed is fine, but 1mbps upload is terrible for uploading video files, tiffs, backups, etc.. The faster upload choice is only marginally faster and prohibitively more expensive. If I upload a video, even just a couple minutes long, I start the upload and then go to bed and check on it in the morning. Good thing I don't do it professionally. Because of my prior business, I don't mind a provider charging a going rate for service, but I would welcome competition in terms of speed and customer service to keep that in check and serve my interest as a consumer.

[Alan Klein]

I'm getting download of 90mb and upload of 6mb with Comcast copper cable in the mid New Jersey area. I just tried some 4K video from Youtube-looks good. No wait times.

[Alan Klein]

I notice that it will change depending on where the server is connected - higher from NYC (89.39mb) than LA (47.62mb) .


4/8/2016 12:06 PM 47.62 Mbps 4.70 Mbps Los Angeles, CA
4/8/2016 12:05 PM 89.39 Mbps 6.13 Mbps New York, NY