Who’s number one in broadband?
A lot of people would answer that it certainly isn’t the US. I have read countless articles and posts bemoaning the fact that America has fallen behind in the quality and use of broadband Internet. Not true, says one study that places the US at the top of the ranking. It’s from Leonard Waverman, the dean of the Haskayne School of Business at the University of Calgary. The New York Times reports:
Even after deducting the untold unproductive hours spent on Facebook and YouTube, the United States comes out on top in Mr. Waverman’s ranking of 25 developed countries. The biggest reason is that business in the United States has made extensive use of computers and the Internet and it has a technically skilled workforce.
What about all those Americans who do not have broadband? The Times says:
A separate paper based on the survey research of the Pew Internet and American Life project also undercut the idea that Americans are starving for broadband.
First of all, Pew found that 57 percent of people in the country now have access to broadband, compared to only 9 percent who have dial-up Internet access. Another 9 percent of people use the Internet at work or at a library but not at home.
That leaves 25 percent of the population that doesn’t use the Internet at all. When Pew looked at the reasons why people didn’t use broadband (combining dial-up users with those that don’t have Internet access at all), it found that by far the most common reason was that people said that going online was not relevant to their lives. Some 51 percent of people surveyed in these groups said things like they weren’t interested in the Internet or they were too busy.
Did you enjoy this post? Why not leave a comment below and continue the conversation, or subscribe to my feed and get articles like this delivered automatically to your feed reader.
Comments
No comments yet.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.