The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) recently published an update to their broadband statistics. They rank broadband statistics by country. Last year the US ranked 12; this year we rank 15. Not such great news – but hardly surprising. Top rankers were:
- Denmark (31.9% broadband subscribers)
- Netherlands (31.8%)
- Iceland (29.7%)
- Korea (29.1%)
- Switzerland (28.5%)
…12. US (19.6%)
Some people seemed to take issue with the research methodology. (Congressman Fred Upton says the methodology understates broadband in the US because they only count businesses with DSL, Cable, FTTP, satellite & wireless. The US Department of State is “concerned about the methodology.)
Some people think the numbers are good but the questions are wrong. (Andrew Schmitt thinks the question should include – who wants broadband and can’t get it?)
Some people think this is impetus to act. (Senator Daniel K. Inouye plans “to introduce two bills shortly. Baller Herbst mentions their National Broadband Strategy.)
Finally some think we should do nothing. (The Citizens Against Government Waste urges the US not to create a policy as the current Internet has grown without one.)
I’m glad that it is at least getting people to think beyond how company A or B can get a larger part of an existing market share. I used to develop e-business curriculum and one of the things we talked about often was how the Internet increased your competition by removing geographic barriers and spurring innovation. Suddenly if you sold books your competition wasn’t just the independent bookshops, or Borders, but Amazon as well. I think it’s time that the US looked at new forms and news places for competition as well or we end up like many closed bookshops.
I love this conference. It’s a great place to see a lot of people I have met online over the year or people who are primarily online buddies. The notion of the online social networks was a big theme this year.