Eye Current: What’s Estonia?

Thursday, July 12, 2007

What’s Estonia?

Whether Al Gore made it or not, the internet maybe one of the only unadulterated pinnacles in America, right? Well according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) the US ranks 24^th worldwide in “broadband penetration”. Right behind Estonia, the country to the west of Russia, yeah that’s the one. The OECD describes “broadband penetration” as the percentage of homes connected. However, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) measures this problem in a very peculiar way: as long as a single building in the ZIP code- a school, church, private business- has a broadband connection, then everyone in the area gets counted as having access. The FCC’s definition of “broadband” is a little iffy as well. Anything over 200 Kbps is considered to be “broadband”. Other parts of the world blaze through the web at speeds up to 10 times faster. Some say that the lack of competition is the real problem. With only two real companies offering cable and broadband connections: AT&T and Verizon, it’s no wonder Americans have grown complacent to paying $40/month for 4Mbps while in Japan they $30/month for 50Mbps. Yeah that’s right 50Mbps. Despite all of this overwhelming evidence that the US is lagging in the broadband area FCC chairman Kevin Martin stated, “I think our polices are a success”. So hats off to Estonia.