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Comment by madushan1000 | Hacker News Reader

I'm from a third world country(Sri Lanka) and we already have really cheap LTE access, the connection I'm using right now(on my phone) gives me something like 1GB/1.5USD at average 4MBPS. What sucks is the speed and reliability, speed always fluctuate and even though most of the island is now covered by 3G, LTE is not a given. It has been improving a lot though because we have relatively good competition between mobile ISPs(something like 10 providers all island) and more than a quarter of the population has smartphones and demanding bandwidth.

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I was visiting a friend in Sri Lanka in 2004 and he was checking cricket scores on his phone in the middle of the jungle. I still can’t get a signal the whole way between KC and Omaha. We Americans sometimes ave a distorted view of the world.

It's funny you mention that route, it's about 185 miles which is about how wide Sri Lanka is. Living in the US also gives us a distorted view of how large the typical nation is.

For reference for Americans that's about the distance from Providence to New York City. Or San Diego to Oxnard for left coasters. Drives that people wouldn't think anything about, and where you would probably have cell service for the vast majority of the drive.

Can confirm. My Cambodian wife’s family lives in the jungle and have 4G and she has perfect skype video calls with them. It costs them $1 a month and they get 5GB for that.

These developing countries are going all-in on mobile and it’s a good thing. They really don’t need these sattelites, but for Americans apparently it’s good for leveling the ISP playing field.

As someone who works through mobile phone based internet services in Africa and South Asia I agree that in many parts of the world, what you describe is happening, which is great. But there is a huge difference between countries. Just as an example:

Sri Lanka coverage: http://www.airtel.lk/coverage-map.html Bamako (capital of Mali) coverage: https://www.orange.com/en/Group/Orange-in-the-world/countrie...

The uncovered area of Mali is probably 5-8 times the size of Sri Lanka.

I'm from a third world country(Germany) and we don't have cheap LTE access. I pay more than 40€/month (about 50 USD) for 4GB of LTE and I got my contract for half of what it would normally cost. The reception is very poor and I barely ever see the LTE popping up on my phone, most times it's just 3G. And that's in the ex-capitol of Germany. If I visit my parents, which live barely a 45 minute drive outside of the city, I got no phone reception at all (not even emergency calls). My provider (Vodafone) claims to have the best coverage of Germany. Wired internet is very spotty, too. There are still a lot of parts within the cities, where you barely get a downstream of 1 Mbit/s. So yes, when I say that Germany is a "third world country", I mean it (at least regarding the internet coverage). I'm a web developer (my wife is an admin) and when we searched for a new home, we've had to turn down a lot of offers, because the houses/flats didn't have a proper internet connection. Now we're getting our internet though cable but because the cables are to old, we can't get TV over cable at the same time.

Sorry, needed to get that out. I'm a little frustrated here, because I have been in several poor countries (Africa, Thailand, Moldowa) and they've all had a way better internet coverage than Germany.

I feel your pain. Germany is a bit of an anomaly in the 'West'. Even mobile contracts are stupidly hard to get out of.

I lived in Germany for about 5 years. Half of that the last 300m of connection to my house were over the thinnest legally allowable copper wire. 3.2mbps max speed down on a very very good day (usually sub 2mbps), about a tenth or slightly more up.

My in-laws previous house was semi-detached and the neighbours house have fiber, but theirs didn't. Same actual building but KabelDeutschland wouldn't run an extension just 2 meters to the wall on my in-laws actual house.

And I mean 'won't' not "couldn't". They scoped the cost and agreed to pay for it to be done, even at the overinflated price, and KD actually said they didn't want to do it.

my sister lives in germany and i go there sometimes, internet in germany is just so weird, thank god for no roaming in eu now, so i can at least use my sim there.

Fellow German here. I know this issues. But I think the Bayerns strategy worked. They subsidied all the fiber from Telekom, and now we have in the south of Bayern incredible internet speeds at acceptable price : 110Mbit/35Mbit for about 40 euros. I can double that for extra 10 euros.

LTE is everywhere and in my home town I get 20Mbs/5Mbs rates over Vodafone. There is only one place, literally in the middle of a dense forest ( part of a Wandertour ) where there is no signal at all. The highways are well covered, I normally skype and other VoIP apps work flawless.

So while we are talking about Germany, let's not forget this is a federal state and each state can individually influence the development. Not sure if USA is the same.

>I'm from a third world country(Germany)

I was under the impression that "third world" was supposed to be defined as "a country that was not on the axis or allied side during all of World War 2." Your use of the term directly contradicts this definition.

I was under the impression that it was irony. ;)

Also it was the Cold War, not WWII. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World

>The term "Third World" arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either NATO or the Communist Bloc.

I don’t know if I would call that cheap. Right now I consume 300GB per month on aversge, and that’s just my home use. I get 150Mbps for $98 per month. St your rates, that 300GB would cost $450 per month, though I do realize I would consume less on a slower connection.

He is talking about the mobile LTE price and there is an FTTH package at 100mbps for 425GB(170 peak & 255 off peak) for about $58 per month.

Sri Lanka is only the 51st "best country in the world" according to US News[1]. That's really not bad and not really 3rd world at this point.

[1] https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/sri-lanka

That list is a bit weird though (looking at the top 10 overall)

The list looks about right. What do you find weird?

The term third world is often used incorrectly. It was created during the cold war to refer to countries that we're not in alliance with one of the dominant super powers (USA, USSR). [1]

People often use when they want to say "backwards" countries.

The correct term is developing world, which just means rapidly improving and doesn't cloudy the convo with connotations about the cold war.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_World

Sorry, but the term "third world" has long been co-opted like "hacker".

The term is not being used incorrectly.

The primary definition is now "underdeveloped countries" - because language changes over time.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/third%20world

It has gotten considerably faster in last few years. I'm using SLT 4G with an average speed of 30Mbps.

It doesn’t seem cheap given the 1GB limit. With some YouTube videos you are over 1GB.

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