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[Bazza]

I can only speak for the UK but when we hear you US folk complaining about your internet you don't know how good you have it. On average our speeds over here are poor, overpriced and constantly locked down with bandwidth caps. We're slowly seeing fibre rolled out, but until then I'm stuck paying £40 per month for 13meg speeds and a 300gb cap.

Do you live in some kind of isolated cave or in the past perhaps, those prices and speeds were common around 5 years ago. I don't know anyone who pays anywhere near £40 for a 13MB connection anymore.

Most BB company's seem to offer 20-40MBS for around £20 a month with unlimited bandwidth these days.

 

[Oersted]

Great work Funky Papa. Googling Christopher Yoo alone gives some funny results

http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/t...conflict-for-penn-men-at-the-comcast-hearing/

 

[Funky Papa]

They forgot the part where the majority of europe no longer has bandwidth caps or insane prices for internet access

well ok the UK does but they are known as the mini me of 'mericuh for a reason

Most of Europe never had any caps. Ever. In some countries they are forbidden by law. UK is kind of the crazy exception as it usually is. The EU's policy is not accomodating to caps at all. We've seen it with the end of roaming fees and we'll probably see it also applied to fixed internet lines once our net neutrality legislation is fully set.

America's broadband situation is very interesting, in the way that the US utterly obliterated the EU for many years due to early high cable adoption, which was never popular in Europe. It was the lack of oversight what allowed American corporations to engage in cartel tactics, which in turn ruined the market at the time when DSL (and now FIOS) were exploding all over Europe.

I wonder if the same situation will repeat with LTE connections; telecoms sure hate the shit out of net neutrality and the changes it could bring to the market.

Great work Funky Papa. Googling Christopher Yoo alone gives some funny results

http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/t...conflict-for-penn-men-at-the-comcast-hearing/

Another researcher almost surely in Comcast's payroll. WHO WOULD HAVE GUESSED.

 

[Broder Salsa]

Oh, Jesus Christ, this study was FUNDED BY BROADBAND FOR AMERICA.

For those who don't know, Broadband for America is a gross, gross, gross lobbying/astroturfing organization devoted to railing against net neutrality and protecting ISPs.

 

[frankie_baby]

I can only speak for the UK but when we hear you US folk complaining about your internet you don't know how good you have it. On average our speeds over here are poor, overpriced and constantly locked down with bandwidth caps. We're slowly seeing fibre rolled out, but until then I'm stuck paying £40 per month for 13meg speeds and a 300gb cap.

What kind of service are you having to pay that much for?

 

[Romez]

I can only speak for the UK but when we hear you US folk complaining about your internet you don't know how good you have it. On average our speeds over here are poor, overpriced and constantly locked down with bandwidth caps. We're slowly seeing fibre rolled out, but until then I'm stuck paying £40 per month for 13meg speeds and a 300gb cap.

You must live in a small town or the countryside because there's no way you should be paying that much for that specially with a cap. I pay less than that and it's unlimited.

 

[frankie_baby]

They forgot the part where the majority of europe no longer has bandwidth caps or insane prices for internet access

well ok the UK does but they are known as the mini me of 'mericuh for a reason

It's easy enough to get unlimited though

 

[frankie_baby]

You must live in a small town or the countryside because there's no way you should be paying that much for that specially with a cap. I pay less than that and it's unlimited.

I know I was thinking it's ridiculous, I live in a very very small rural town and I only pay about 25 quid for unlimited (and get about 20 meg though living next door to the exchange helps lol)

 

[Atrophis]

I pay less than £40 for 150 uncapped. After being on 8mb for years it was quite the jump.

 

[Guerrillas in the Mist]

You must live in a small town or the countryside because there's no way you should be paying that much for that specially with a cap. I pay less than that and it's unlimited.

I live in the UK, and I can't remember the last time I had capped broadband. Rural areas do get the shaft though, as my parents can attest.

 

[DUFFMCWALIN]

Has to be wrong. US isn't allowed to be better than Europe at anything but gun ownership and obesity.

Seriously. This is really good news.
Edit: looks like it might be bullshit.

 

[slit]

I'm a bit disappointed, I expected more European salty tears in this thread.

 

[ramparter]

Has to be wrong. US isn't allowed to be better than Europe at anything but gun ownership and obesity.

Internet helps you buy guns and get food delivered

 

[RoadHazard]

Individual EU countries have quite different levels of internet infrastructure. Some, like here in Scandinavia, are significantly better (and cheaper) than the US, other countries haven't gotten as far yet.

 

[Gentleman Jack]

Oh, Jesus Christ, this study was FUNDED BY BROADBAND FOR AMERICA.

For those who don't know, Broadband for America is a gross, gross, gross lobbying/astroturfing organization devoted to railing against net neutrality and protecting ISPs.

And there it is...thanks for digging it up.

 

[Arksy]

Oh, Jesus Christ, this study was FUNDED BY BROADBAND FOR AMERICA.

For those who don't know, Broadband for America is a gross, gross, gross lobbying/astroturfing organization devoted to railing against net neutrality and protecting ISPs.

Attacking the source and not the arguments isn't a particularly valid way of proving a point. That said that article is fairly interesting...

 

[Photolysis]

They forgot the part where the majority of europe no longer has bandwidth caps or insane prices for internet access

well ok the UK does but they are known as the mini me of 'mericuh for a reason

What are you talking about? It's very easy to get an unlimited package, and unless you're after a dirt cheap connection, almost all ISPs will readily give you one. The main exception to this would be if you're still stuck on a legacy package, since not every ISP will upgrade you to a newer one.

As for "insane prices", I don't see how ~£20 a month for high speed internet and unlimited access is insane. Hell you can get 76Mbps FTTC for ~£23-26 (~$39-44) a month.

We've also got a very large and ongoing rollout of fibre in the UK, with very high coverage looking like a reasonable target (which if anyone knows anything about the UK infrastructure, this is hard to achieve due to many rural areas, and existing infrastructure posing challenges).

Have you actually looked at the internet situation in the UK sometime in the past 10 years?

I can only speak for the UK but when we hear you US folk complaining about your internet you don't know how good you have it. On average our speeds over here are poor, overpriced and constantly locked down with bandwidth caps. We're slowly seeing fibre rolled out, but until then I'm stuck paying £40 per month for 13meg speeds and a 300gb cap.

My comment above stands here too. How are you "stuck", exactly?

 

[Beermeister]

I pay €11 for unlimited (uncapped) 1 Gbit/s (1000 Mbit/s) up/down. You can't beat that, America.

 

[PdotMichael]

mh.. I get internet (100mbit without data cap), phone flat rate and TV for 30€ (~$40).

I think that's pretty okay.

 

[CyclopsRock]

When my girlfriend moved to Spain, the internet there was fucking atrocious. There was only one supplier and it was (is) far slower and far more expensive than in a similarly urban part of the UK. And this area is pretty new, too. So I think it varies a lot, including within each country as others have said. We aren't all Sweden!

 

[Phoenician_Viking]

Attacking the source and not the arguments isn't a particularly valid way of proving a point. That said that article is fairly interesting...

Of course it is. It shows the motives of these articles, and the special interest that back it.

 

[gcubed]

This is my issue, too. Comparing an entire continent to a single country? Why don't we compare the entirety of North America, then? Including the frozen, caribou infested wastelands of Northern Canada.

I don't know, maybe because the other way is equally as useless? A country thats equivalent to a state in the US compared to the entire us?

 

[Arjen]

I don't know, maybe because the other way is equally as useless? A country thats equivalent to a state in the US compared to the entire us?

Does every state have different ISP's and rules on Internet?

 

[SomethingInTheSea]

It seems like it's only fair to lump all of Europe together when it makes Europe look better in comparisons with the US.

But telecoms are regulated by the same organisation across the United States, whereas in Europe your looking at each country handling it themselves. So in this case we shouldn't be comparing the US with the EU as it makes the regulatory regime look much better than it really is.

 

[Funky Papa]

Attacking the source and not the arguments isn't a particularly valid way of proving a point. That said that article is fairly interesting...

I already addressed the part in which the study uses old data (2011 to 2012, to be precise) to evaluate an incredibly dynamic market that right now is exploding in Europe. Broadband speeds have quadrupled in some European markets since 2012. Pricing is another point that made me raise my eyebrows:

I'm going to ignore all but the top tier speeds for the sake of the argument: >30 Mbps connections were expensive as fuck in Europe due to the lack of cable penetration, as most connections were DSL lines and FIOS was almost unheard of in 2012. Oddly enough, FIOS and other high speed lines exploded right about then. As a result, 50 Mbps connections and over (or 60 Mbps VDSL lines) are now cheap and readily available. The same is true for rural broadband.

In my particular case (which applies for most highly populated cities in Spain), I went from having some crummy 3 Mbps DSL line in 2012 to a 50 FIOS connection for the same price. Now I could ask for a 200 Mbps one for even less money than that, including free landline to landline calls and more free landline/mobile to mobile calls per month that I could ever use.

Everything about this study smells funny.

Edit: Checking the sources of the study, the European prices are derived from February 2012. Using data that old to reflect the current situation of the broadband market as defined by "next gen access" is an awful, awful thing to do and reinforces my suspicions of using cherry picked information to create a narrative.

When my girlfriend moved to Spain, the internet there was fucking atrocious. There was only one supplier and it was (is) far slower and far more expensive than in a similarly urban part of the UK. And this area is pretty new, too. So I think it varies a lot, including within each country as others have said. We aren't all Sweden!

Could you name the place? One of the particular problems of Spain is that some areas are only covered by one provider and things can be kind of shitty until the competition moves in (which is happening a lot faster these days).

 

[CyclopsRock]

Of course it is. It shows the motives of these articles, and the special interest that back it.

That someone has an incentive to do something doesn't speak to whether that thing Is a good thing or not, nor does it prove that's the reason a person supports something - unless you think all poor people vote left wing purely to increase their welfare cheques.

 

[jorma]

Regardless of what this study says I'm still running 40 megabits/unlimited bandwidth @ €40 a month here in the Netherlands. I don't know about other EU countries, but by comparison the US situation looks pretty godawful.

that's pretty expensive, mang. 100mbit/15 euro here!

anyway, the genereal rule of internet quality seems to be:
state owned internet structure (with private actors renting access to it) = awesome and cheap broadband

That's why the Swedish mobile internet sucks in comparison, and is riddled with caps and astronomical roaming fees - it's privately owned.

"let us build roads with the help of private investors and let them charge the public for usage, it would be awesome!" - said noone ever.
Funny how anyone expects internet structrue to work differently from all the other infrastructures.

 

[AndyD]

Isn't the problem not just speeds but cost?

RIght. Who cares if 87% of Americans can get LTE broadband if very few can afford it?

 

[Oersted]

Attacking the source and not the arguments isn't a particularly valid way of proving a point. That said that article is fairly interesting...

We need the study for that. Has it been anywhere published?

 

[Deleted member 13876]

Attacking the source and not the arguments isn't a particularly valid way of proving a point. That said that article is fairly interesting...

Not in an age where more money equals more speech and money determines the words that come out of people's mouths.

 

[Hoo-doo]

Europe has huge diversity from country to country, each with individual internet infrastructure.

Most of western Europe? Naw, our internet rules.

 

[Sanjay]

I already addressed the part in which the study uses old data (2011 to 2012, to be precise) to evaluate an incredibly dynamic market that right now is exploding in Europe.

I had like 10/20mb in 2011, now I have 100mb for the same price. £30.

 

[KillerMan91]

Don't you still have data caps in some parts of US? We never had that shit even back in early 00s here in Finland.

 

[Josh7289]

Fuck. That lobbying.

 

[Sir_Crocodile]

I can only speak for the UK but when we hear you US folk complaining about your internet you don't know how good you have it. On average our speeds over here are poor, overpriced and constantly locked down with bandwidth caps. We're slowly seeing fibre rolled out, but until then I'm stuck paying £40 per month for 13meg speeds and a 300gb cap.

Speak for yourself, I don't know anyone who has a deal that bad. Are you out in a hyper rural area or something

 

[poppabk]

I can only speak for the UK but when we hear you US folk complaining about your internet you don't know how good you have it. On average our speeds over here are poor, overpriced and constantly locked down with bandwidth caps. We're slowly seeing fibre rolled out, but until then I'm stuck paying £40 per month for 13meg speeds and a 300gb cap.

Which isn't that far off comcasts standard $50 a month for 6 Mbps down speed with a 250GB cap. And that's if you can get cable in your area, my mother in law had to pay $1000 up front to get Comcast into her neighborhood, before that it was satellite Internet which is just terrible.

 

[diehard]

Which isn't that far off comcasts standard $50 a month for 6 Mbps down speed with a 250GB cap. And that's if you can get cable in your area, my mother in law had to pay $1000 up front to get Comcast into her neighborhood, before that it was satellite Internet which is just terrible.

Wait, where the hell does Comcast only get 6mb down? That's close to their $10 a month plan.

That 250GB hasnt been used in a long time (although they say it could be coming back).

 

[BajiBoxer]

No cap, but my parents are paying $40/month for 3mbps service from at&t. It's fucking ridiculous.

 

[rrs]

No cap, but my parents are paying $40/month for 3mbps service from at&t. It's fucking ridiculous.

Get 6 Mbps through AT&T, only get 5-4.5 Mbps most of his time and there's a 150 GB cap (good luck reaching it)

 

[Keasar]

I have a hard time believing this stu~

Oh, Jesus Christ, this study was FUNDED BY BROADBAND FOR AMERICA.

For those who don't know, Broadband for America is a gross, gross, gross lobbying/astroturfing organization devoted to railing against net neutrality and protecting ISPs.

There it is.

 

[Bluemercury]

I have optical fiber directly to the router, with 50 meg Internet, oh and i live in Portugal.....

 

[rrs]

The idea of a data cap is scary to me. But yeah, Internet in the Netherlands is pretty good. Lots of competition, pretty decent prices.

What's the monthly cost to get, say, 60 mb/s in the US?

I have optical fiber directly to the router, with 50 meg Internet, oh and i live in Portugal.....

I can only dream of getting fiber, but AT&T sure thinks we have it

 

[diehard]

I have optical fiber directly to the router, with 50 meg Internet, oh and i live in Portugal.....

and here in Utah we have gigabit internet with no caps.

Anecdotal evidence is useless.

 

[Makai]

Attacking the source and not the arguments isn't a particularly valid way of proving a point. That said that article is fairly interesting...

Here's the next step of his argument: this study is not peer reviewed

 

[PorllM]

I thought individual countries in the EU are responsible for their own infrastructure.

They are which is why this comparison is completely irrelevant and pretty weird. In the UK you can get much faster than that everywhere, whereas in countries like Estonia I imagine the standard is a bit different. Compare countries to countries and continents to continents, US vs EU makes no sense.

 

[Sloane]

mh.. I get internet (100mbit without data cap), phone flat rate and TV for 30€ (~$40).

I think that's pretty okay.

Same here in Spain.

Then again, 25 MBit is quite a benchmark, 54 percent in Europe would seem about right. 82 percent in the US might be a bit of a stretch though?

 

[diehard]

They are which is why this comparison is completely irrelevant and pretty weird. In the UK you can get much faster than that everywhere, whereas in countries like Estonia I imagine the standard is a bit different. Compare countries to countries and continents to continents, US vs EU makes no sense.

So comparing a country of 3.8 million square miles to a country of say 95,000 square miles is fair?

 

[CadetMahoney]

US vs EU makes no sense.

Individual EU countries have quite different levels of internet infrastructure. Some, like here in Scandinavia, are significantly better (and cheaper) than the US, other countries haven't gotten as far yet.

It's kinda silly to lump all of Europe together like that.

All this.

 

[Funky Papa]

So comparing a country of 3.8 million square miles to a country of say 95,000 square miles is fair?

Population density is probably much more important (in which case the Nordics still beat the shit out of everybody else in this world), but barring micronations, a country per country comparison is probably a lot better than comparing America to 28 different states with their own regulatory agencies and telecom policies. In this particular case, at least.

That said, I think the old X vs Y debate is worthless, specially in light of the numbers and the apparent intent of the study. The study is not research, but ISP propaganda, plain and simple.

 

[Mr. Wedgewood]

As a man who travels often, I knew this. We're also 1000% ahead in hotels.

European hotels leave a lot to be desired.

I used to work for a company that provided the hotel internet internal infrastructure (USA). The big problem at hotels were the circuit leaving the hotel. It's up to the hotel what kind and how much they want to spend for the circuit, which is provided by an ISP (local telco, Time Warner Telcom, AT&T, Verizon, etc).

For example, all the rooms are wired with cable modems or DSL modems and they connect to a central server on premises. The central server is the one that is connected to the ISP circuit. The circuit can be slow as a T-1 line, imagine a 1.544Mbps feeding a 600 room hotel. The reason why some hotels still have a slow circuit is the system was installed in early days of high speed internet, ( T-1 would be sufficient enough to feed all those rooms) but they failed to keep up with the times. Some hotels are really reluctant to upgrade there circuits even when we would strongly advise it. A 50Mbps circuit can be in the grands because they can claim it as commercial/business service and jack up prices.

Back in the day High Speed internet in hotels was advertised as "faster than dial-up." and it was before all the streaming services came into play.