Why are High Speep Internet Rates So Much Higher In Japan than US?

[videobread]

Why are high speed internet transfer rates so much higher in Japan than the US?
Japan has rates of up to 100 megabits per second. That is 50 times faster than what most Americans can get. Why??????????????

[budz]

Because the Japanese are so far in advanced than the USA when it comes to high speed internet. There was a article about it a few months ago on how the USA is so far behind Japan.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/28/AR2007082801990.html

http://mountainrunner.us/2007/08/in_the_us_we_dont_have_highspe.html

[edDV]

Also Japan is more densly populated allowing for shorter distance to the switch and cheaper upgrade cost to the telco.

Politically, the US PUC's force telco to invest in lower profit rural and "digital divide" access over urban performance upgrade. Thus we get DSL out to the sticks but fall behind the world at the high end.

[jagabo]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/28/AR2007082801990.html

But better wire is also a legacy of American bombs, which razed much of urban Japan during World War II

Maybe al Qaeda will help the Americans out.

[edDV]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/28/AR2007082801990.html

But better wire is also a legacy of American bombs, which razed much of urban Japan during World War II

Maybe al Qaeda will help the Americans out.

Naw they go for humans with little infrastructure damage.

[guns1inger]

Try living over here. It costs a fortune to get DSL2+ with a decent download allowance, and you have to living in the right location. I can't get higher than 1.5/256 at the moment. All our bandwidth is artificially throttled. Cable TV rollout ceased long ago, so you can get pay TV via dish, but no high-speed internet with it. We pretend we have competition, but 85 - 90% of the infrastructure is owned by a quasi-privatised public service department run by an American with little or no idea about the real world (no offence to any Americans reading this, but do any of your execs live in the same world as real people ?). For a first world country, we have third world internet - thanks Telstra.

[edDV]

Oz has similar issues to interior America (including most Canada). Does government ration bandwidth to the greatest number or stay at the top of the world in the major cities? Here the small rural states have disportionate political power but that isn't all.

Our then monopoly telco AT&T went with early extended distance digital multiplex technology in the 1960's-1980's when most suburban infrastructure was laid. This resulted in wider spaced CO's and fewer copper pairs to the home. Most of Silicon Valley falls into this category and as a result has had much worse wideband telco service than average. A major reactive effort has world class fiber coming online. We've had to suffer for years with poor service plus telco and cable companies digging both sides of major streets to lay fiber.

Unfortuately we don't have Verizon here so we have no FIOS to the home

[Nilfennasion]

For a first world country, we have third world internet - thanks Telstra.

Australia is a first world country? I am sure that will come as news to anyone who needs a doctor for a chronic condition and does not live in Sydney or Melbourne.

And edDV, the situation in Australia has at least one point of commonality in that the small rural areas have political power that is entirely disproportionate to their size. An overwhelming majority of citizens live in urban centres yet have to live with third-world Internet (or in Brisbane's case even third-world level supplies of water in terms of volume) for the benefit of rural idiots who do nothing but whinge endlessly and reason that since they live like incestuous, filth-covered pigs, so should the rest of whatever state they happen to be in.

It's seriously enough to make one wish they lived in the future as depicted in the Privateer video games.