Falling Behind

Why can't we get this (now available in the UK):

For £24 a month customers of broadband provider Be are being offered a download speed of up to 24 megabits, three times that available from closest rivals UK Online, Bulldog and Homechoice and 12 times that on offer from BT and Wannadoo. The bandwidth offered by the new service will be enough to allow consumers to stream two high definition TV channels through their computer simultaneously, while they surf their internet or make voice calls.

This isn't even on the horizon for US consumers. It's amazing how badly deregulation has worked in the US. From the airlines to telecommunications, we continually get less for more. Where is our Ryanair with flights less than $50 (for example: London to Hamburg for 24 GBP)? Where is bandwidth of even 8 megabits let alone 24 megabits?

Comments

[Prasenjeet Dutta]

I'm not sure about Mass. but overall the UK is definitely worse off than the US bandwidth-wise. This service is currently offered to a few London exchanges (with more providers and exchanges coming soon as the local loop is unbundled), however we still see nothing like this in this country: http://photomatt.net/2005/06/07/this-is-real-broadband/

And the fact that BT is the only last-mile provider for practically all of the country does not help at all.

[b]

Just for comparison:

Germany 6kbit ADSL is technically available for about 60% of population, 2 kbit ADSL available for about 90%.

6k flat rate is €50, with my local provider I added a €10 national phone flat rate (flat phone for all Europe would have been another €10). (Flat phone rates do not include calls to mobile phones - €0.2o/min for caller, no charge for being called mobile.)

[dennis]

Is deregulation really the problem for broadband? Or is it that current law requires anyone who builds infrastructure to share it with competitors?