There was a point not that many years ago that the United States lead the pack when it came to technology. Nowadays we are the followers rather than in the lead. Just take a look at South Korea, they now have cable that operates at 100mb/s and they have had FTTH (fiber to the home) running at those speeds for months if not years. This is just one country that is sitting at these speeds, there are many others that are just like it.
Another example where the US is far behind, cell phones. We are at
least a year and a half behind Europe and Japan. The networks are not
being upgraded nearly fast enough. The ability to play video over the
phone has been around for long while, but just recently in the States.
How can the US just sit back and stay on the 5 meg internet
connections and even slower cell networks of yesteryear? It is almost
2007 and our connection speeds are almost identical to what they were
in 2000. One theory is that the government is not pushing to upgrade
the speeds. Another is that the telecom companies are not fulfilling
their promises made in the past.
Let me first talk about the FCC
and the US government in general. The people who make the laws for
telecommunications do not know what they are talking about. Yes, they
probably have a staff who do, but when you have a Senator who calls the
internet a “Series of tubes”
it is hard to believe that this person has any control over our
internet. Not to mention the fact that the average age of Congress is 60.
How many 60 year olds do you know that are technically advanced, or are
even able to do more on a computer than some basic tasks? These people
are following the lead of the RIAA’s thinking that if the internet was faster there would be more pirating. This is another story though.
The
other theory, which might be the same in the end, is that the telecom
companies are not fulfilling their promises to upgrade their networks.
At the moment most telecom companies around the country are stagnant,
at least when it comes to home services. These companies are not
upgrading because they do not have the competition to force them ahead.
It also helps them that they have most people in Washington D.C. in
their back pockets.
Without the US Government forcing the
telecom companies to upgrade their network they will not do so. This
will not happen until we get some people in D.C. who are technology
advanced. I do not see how the same people control telecom laws are the
same as the ones who control abortion. There is the FCC, but they
really only control the laws that are passed by the Senate and House.
To
get the US back on track there needs to be an uprising of citizens.
People need to realize that we are falling behind fast. If we are not
careful we will still be on the same slow connections while the rest of
the world runs at gigabit speeds.
