| reply to fAcEtIOUs
Interestingly, Japan is basically tied in the percentage of people with broadband with the US, according to the OECD. That's, unsurprisingly, related to the fact that FTTH in Japan has been limited to Tokyo and central Osaka, although I hear that they're expanding to the rest of the country now. If you're out in the rural areas, it's not exactly a broadband paradise. But in Japan pretty much everything revolves around Tokyo, especially these days. Still, it's the kind of thing people call the Digital Divide around here-- amazing symmetric 100MBit fiber connections in Tokyo and Osaka, and jack squat elsewhere.
And Ireland is way near the bottom of the OECD numbers on broadband connections, even though last I checked even their per capita GDP was quite good. Oh well, things are complicated.
The US is 12th in the OECD numbers on broadband, and I'm gratified that people are constantly thinking of ways to make us better, and complaining that we're not. However, people rarely seem to read the numbers and see that Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and almost all the other big countries are also behind the US or, like the UK and Japan, essentially tied in the number of people with broadband. (Obviously, though, fat pipe symmetric fiber isn't the same thing as cheap low tier DSL.)
Canada leads the G7 in broadband penetration. Interestingly, all the leading countries in the OECD data are northern countries at high latitudes, except for South Korea. At times I almost wonder if the weather encourages more broadband usage in the Nordic countries as opposed to the Mediterranean ones. |
kaila
join:2000-10-11
Lincolnshire, IL | reply to fAcEtIOUs
Not sure if you can draw conclusions with regard to GDP and broadband in Japan. Their GDP is unfortunately skewing downward due to an accelerating decline in workforce population, with no end in sight. Because of this, it's no surprise Japan is moving or expanding facilities where the workers are (i.e. elsewhere in Asia primarily) with native Japanese holding the top positions. Japan's relative productivity gains are a definite concern, but they clearly started out with way ahead (compare US and Japan's auto industries in the 80~90's) and other countries are clearly catching up.
What stands out in my eyes is NTT's 1-Tbit to 10-Tbit expansion compared with AT&T's 40 to 100G-bit 2010 backbone upgrade (a 100 fold difference!). Granted NTT is 2~3 times larger than AT&T and offers much higher speeds to their customers.
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