Despite the US being a first world country, it is still lacking fast broadband as seen by the likes of South Korea, Japan or Finland. Of course, those countries are smaller so it’s easier to deploy faster Internet more quickly than it is in the US.

Even Canada has faster Internet, averaging 7 Mbps. We can’t let that continue, now can we? The Communications Workers of America released a 59 page report detailing speeds in other countries and compared speeds within several US states. The fastest speed was in Rhode Island at 5 Mbps.

Marcus Courtney, representing the Seattle tech labor group WashTech said, “We can’t have a 21st-century economy on a 20th-century backbone.” Most Americans in the workforce depend on Internet access to do at least part of their job.

He added “we are falling behind,” referencing the slower broadband speeds.

It’s not all bad news. Some states have laid down a lot of fiber optic cable and there seems to be a surplus of “dark fiber” (cable that is not in use) which Google seems to be very interested in.

Some think that the states with fiber optic cabling and the infrastructure should not wait to hit the on switch; it is just sitting there waiting to be turned on. I don’t think those areas should wait for the rest of us either, though, keep in mind that they would still have to pass through some slower copper cabling a good deal of the time.

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Entry was posted on Wednesday, June 27th, 2007 at 10:09 am under Internet, Technology.

Read more entries by Jonathan Schlaffer.
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