In addition to articles about broadband being relatively slow in America, I also read that in some other countries it is significantly cheaper and available to more of the population.
An article written on September 5, by Matt Lake, CNET Reviews, in an article titled, "Who's investing in broadband?" notes that in "England, for example, has almost universally available DSL at 2.3Mbps to 8Mbps for the equivalent of $28.45 per month, taxes included. How does your service stack up to that?"
He also provides information about how "the billions of dollars in the Universal Service Fund (USF) could have helped." And, he concludes, "As far as I can see, it was incredibly poor management of the USF (a problem with government) and short-sightedness on the part of the broadband providers (a problem among corporations). The result is that we, the consumers, are stuck with spottily available broadband at underpowered data rates." He ends the article with a comment that the DSL providers and FCC should "Quit bickering; start serving"
Quite obvious to all citizens of this country is the fact that Corporations are successful at lobbying for favors that will provide the greatest profit to them. We citizens have to get better at lobbying for actions that will provide the greatest public service at the best cost to us as individuals and social groups. I hope the new Social Networking opportunities will stimulate more of us to organize our efforts to communicate with our elected representatives on these issues.
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