Ask HN: Why does broadband still suck in 2009? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Why does broadband still suck in 2009?

5 pointsdnsworks3 comments

Is it me, or are providers just completely missing the boat? Does anybody except bittorrent addicts really care about the difference of 10Mbps down versus 50Mbps down?

Personally I want: - FAST uplink - low latency - Even faster uplink

Those of us with high-end Digital SLRs know the pain of staring blankly at our laptops slowed to a crawl while uploading many gigabytes of RAW files to flickr (or other photo sharing sites). Forget about video, I drive to the datacenter and do a local network copy for that.

As for latency, ISPs seem more concerned with limiting torrents than making sure they have even semi-decent peering arrangements. Video chat from SF to Seattle is a jittery, high latency nightmare, because my ISP is more concerned about rolling out and cashing in on VOIP features than running a stable network.

From my experiences, this is endemic. American broadband infrastructure SUCKS. I would expect it to be awful in the country, suburbs, or small cities.. But why don't we have fat uplinks to highly peered ISPs in dense urban areas like San Francisco?

1) Why did Verizon lobby broadband competition out of my area?

2) Why do I have to pay Verizon (oligopoly with Comcast in my area) $100 to get a static IP address?

3) Why does the fine print way down in my Verizon FIOS license agreement forbid me to hook any kind of server to their network?

4) Isn't the Internet supposed to be a MULTIWAY communication channel -- not just some kind of enhanced television network?

5) Look at how much Verizon invests in lobbying to understand how much they hate real competition and how little they care about providing the kind of service we'd really like to see.

I am guessing economies of scale make it hard to compete with local cable monopolies. Next time I move I'm thinking of ditching cable and just getting faster ADSL for a bit less money, since I do not much care for TV. I entirely agree about the lack of choice for upload speeds.

Would love to hear from those with ISP experience about the logistics involved in setting this up. There must be a better way.

Some interesting background information on stimulus $ for rural broadband: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iK8SjjFiVf...

I suspect people with high-end digital DLRs uploading RAW files on a regular basis constitute a small portion of your ISP's customer base, so it probably is just you.

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