Is Google Making the Digital Divide Worse? 259
theodp writes "As Google Fiber forges ahead into new metro areas, Michael Brick reports on worries the fiber project will create a permanent underclass. Building the next generation of information economy infrastructure around current demand, experts say, will deny poor people the physical wiring needed to gain access while the privileged digerati advance at hyperspeed. 'The fiber service deployment means multiplicity of the digital divide, multidimensionality of the digital divide,' says Eun-A Park of the Univ. of New Haven. 'You can see it in Google's trial in Kansas City.' Speed matters, explains Google, 'because a world with universal access and 100 times faster internet could mean 100 times the learning.' Without universal access, as is the case in KC due to pricing that's out of the reach of many of the city's poor, one presumes the outcome could be 100x the learning divide. Another case of the unintended consequences of good intentions?"
So, learning scales linearly with bandwidth? (Score:5, Interesting)
I'd like to hear more about this.
Re:So, learning scales linearly with bandwidth? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes. It's a fascinating idea really. Seems it could really speed things up. Instead of taking 20 hours to finish that course from The Learning Company, I could finish it in only 15 minutes.
Re:So, learning scales linearly with bandwidth? (Score:5, Insightful)
Behind the snark lurks a valid point. If it takes me 20hrs to download the materials, but it takes you 15mins, then yes, you could finish faster and move on to something else.
But if it takes > 20 hours to actually read and understand the material, then your download speed is trivial and not an issue, I believe was his point.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
It maters less than you'd think. The people with fiber will just be streaming the "ultra super duper HD" version of the video.
Honestly though - I have "regular" cable internet. My speeds are 15Mbps - nowhere close to fiber speeds. I STILL stream full 1080p from Youtube just fine and instantly. Before I moved I was on 3Mbps DSL connection and I still was doing 720p just fine.
Don't get me wrong - I know that faster is always better, but I think we're truly getting to a point of diminishing returns for mo
Not only that, but... (Score:2)
Re:Not only that, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
That's true, but I'd say that the economic divide sending some people to Stanford and others who started with equal skill to Chico State is a much larger learning division than 100 Mbps vs 56 kbps. To think that somebody getting 100 Mbps downloads is learning 100x faster than somebody getting 1Mbps is ridiculous. The guys who developed the atomic bomb communicated using their voices, shoes, and chalk boards.
Re: (Score:2)
Very rarely. I live in Los Alamos and am mostly familiar with which studies were happening in parallel in which Tech Areas. Some are 10+ miles from others.
Re: (Score:2)
...about porn.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Especially since I suspect more learning happens when you're at LOWER bandwidth, where you can access text reasonably quickly enough, but as soon as you try to stream videos, or even perhaps load pictures of cats, it chokes out.
Re: (Score:3)
Cut the poor guy some slack. He clearly has been living with a slow internet connection and hasn't quite figured out that bandwidth and learning don't scale linearly together.
Re: (Score:2)
I'd like to hear more about this.
Yeah, I remember getting twice as smart when I upgraded from a 14.4k to a 28.8k modem. Don't you?
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Of course, if your math skill level is around the 8th grade (like most politicians?) x = Ay .....
Re: (Score:2)
That's right you Comcast shill, switch over to damage control.
If only there were a system (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow, if only there were some kind of organized system of, say, i don't know, governance for ensuring that under-represented members of our communities get equal access to economic resources? Like a set of written guidelines or maybe rules that all members of a community need to abide by...
Re: (Score:3)
...complete with regulators that would end up working for the companies they regulate.
And of course, said regulators would raise the price of entry so that the incumbents would have a natural advantage.
What a novel idea!
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Wow, if only there were some kind of organized system of, say, i don't know, governance for ensuring that under-represented members of our communities get equal access to economic resources? Like a set of written guidelines or maybe rules that all members of a community need to abide by...
So you want everyone to be equal? That has been tried, it was called the Soviet Union.
In a free market, some people have more than others. If you don't want that, you'll end up having a Socialist State. And that means that the government steals^W taxes everything you earn above a certain amount, for example like in France [cnn.com].
Most of the people who are considered "poor" (where poor is relative, if you still have a roof, food and clothing) have had the same opportunities as those who are considered working c
Re: (Score:2)
That system is also responsible for why broadband is so slow to deploy in the US. Google Fiber only exists because they've been able to escape the rules that most broadband providers are shackled by.
Am I saying that by unshackling them things will suddenly improve? No, not exactly. But when you have a billion ordinances to live by in addition to corrupt small-time politicians telling you where you can and can't build, you just say to hell with it and not build at all. Local city ordinances are THE number on
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
You might argue that's why it can never work. That's probably true. Good thing, again, that RGreen was not suggesting we do that.
Re:If only there were a system (Score:5, Insightful)
You can only judge something by the actual results. It doesn't matter what kind of excuses you want to make up. Stuff has to make it in the real world rather than some fantasy that only exists in your own head. If all attempts lead to disaster because there is some aspect of human nature you choose to ignore, then perhaps you should acknowledge it's a bad idea.
Re: (Score:2)
> If all attempts lead to disaster because there is some aspect of human nature you choose to ignore, then perhaps you should acknowledge it's a bad idea.
You mean like free-market capitalism? [nudge, nudge, wink, wink]
I would say it's at least an idea we're not ready to implement yet. The central tenet of communism is that the means of production are owned collectively by the populace. All "attempts" at nation-scale communism to date have had the means of production owned by the government. Those two
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Well, that's pretty close to reality, just a minor rephrasing is required to actually capture human nature:
Re: (Score:2)
The main problem I see with the Marxist distribution method: imagine a world where everyone has what he needs, but still there is some left over.
It seems like there would be a few options. Reducing production to meet need (shorter work hours) and keeping the surplus in reserve for leaner times (where appropriate) are two possibilities that come to mind for me.
Re: (Score:3)
What do we do when there's not enough labor that needs doing?
Fire Ben Bernanke and hire Janet Yellen. Or some equally useless political gesture.
Instead we just brainwash our people into filling their homes and lives with the latest BULLSHIT reason to spend more and work
If you care about this, negotiate a contract where you get a pay cut in exchange for fewer hours.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:If only there were a system (Score:4, Insightful)
Cross reference the itemized costs of a routine procedure with hospital administration pay scales. It'll piss you off, guaranteed.
Well, unless you're a hospital administrator, I guess.
Doubtful. (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh, you funny crazy optimistic Google guys. You confused 'learning' with 'pornography and memes'.
Besides that, what about people in rural areas? What about people who still rely on dialup? They're already in existence but because some rich people in certain cities will have stupid fast Internet, there's suddenly an Internet class divide?
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Doubtful. (Score:5, Insightful)
[Google] offer[s] a better service for what seems quite a bit less money.
This.
I don't see how charging a one-time fee of $300 for the initial hookup is "putting broadband out of the reach of the poor" when the competing companies charge upwards of $60 - $100 per month for service. If anything, it's doing the exact opposite.
Is Michael Brick employed by ComCast or something?
Re:Doubtful. (Score:5, Informative)
It's worse than that they could pay $25 a month for 12 months to cover the install cost, and get free internet from then on.
Re: (Score:2)
I think Google has only guaranteed free internet for 7 years. Without adjusting for inflation, that $300 'construction fee' amortized over the guaranteed free period works out to be about $3.57/month.
Re: (Score:2)
Smart people usually figure out how to solve their problems, so I assume not being poor is not very high on the priority list of those in your neighborhood -- and that's fine, but it's their decision.
However, since the state of Washington was guaranteed to vote for Obama (he carried Washington by almost 15% over the incompetent Republican candidate), smart people would have considered sending a message by voting for a third party candidate (perhaps Lib
Re: (Score:2)
Besides that, what about people in rural areas? What about people who still rely on dialup? They're already in existence but because some rich people in certain cities will have stupid fast Internet, there's suddenly an Internet class divide?
Actually there is and getting wider, I've been watching the national telecom statistics here in Norway and the bottom 20% are rather stuck, also known as the people who only have broadband because the government forced the telco to give them a phone line, but who'll never see an upgrade over their crappy ADSL ever without subsidies. Same with mobile data, not enough customers to justify it. Meanwhile the people in central areas are constantly seeing new forms of fiber, cable, xDSL, super-3G, 4G etc. to give
Re: (Score:2)
Besides that, what about people in rural areas? What about people who still rely on dialup?
Don't worry, we've already been giving money to telecoms to help rural people get internet. Really.
This is the most retarded astroturf post ever (Score:5, Insightful)
The only people harmed by Google's high speed access are the CEOs of companies that have sucked down billions in government money for providing high speed internet access while doing nothing to actually provide it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:This is the most retarded astroturf post ever (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
WASHINGTON — Only a few hours had passed after the $45 billion merger between Comcast and Time Warner Cable was announced last week when an early voice emerged endorsing the giant deal.
“Win-win situation for American businesses,” said the statement from the United States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.
It was the start of what Comcast executives acknowledge will be a carefully orchestrated campaign, as the company will seek hundreds of such expressions of support for the deal — from members of Congress, state officials and leaders of nonprofit and minority-led groups — as it tries to nudge federal authorities to approve the merger.
But what the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce did not mention in its statement praising the transaction was that it had collected at least $320,000 over the last five years from Comcast’s charitable foundation, which is run in part by David L. Cohen, the Comcast executive who oversees the corporation’s government affairs operations....
Re:This is the most retarded astroturf post ever (Score:5, Informative)
Amen to that. If you look at the Google Fiber Cities plan at https://fiber.google.com/newci... [google.com] , you can more or less see that Google Fiber is trying to avoid population centers where the internet is already well developed (DC-NYC-BOS corridor, LA, Chicago, Seattle, Houston) and primarily concentrating in "up-n-coming" low-cost southern tech centers, which already typically get lower marks for education.
So if anything, Google Fiber appears to be trying to bring the poors up rather than help the richers widen the gap.
Re: (Score:2)
I think you got that backwards. Atlanta, Charlotte, Raleigh are, and have been, consistently at top of "most wired cities" lists.
http://www.forbes.com/2010/03/... [forbes.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Oh, over on Eastside I have Frontier FiOS (formerly Verizon). It's pretty great.
Journalists love calling out google for everything (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Journalists love calling out google for everyth (Score:4, Insightful)
The idea here is that when a significant portion of the internet population has 100mb/s connections then web site owners will start building services that cater to those people and require that quick of a connection. This will leave the people that are wayyy on the other side of the curve that much further behind. There is not analogous effect in real estate, i.e. if 10% more of the population has larger houses then it doesn't eventually make your small house less functional.
Anyway, I disagree with your argument but not with your point. I think a better analogy would have been car ownership. It's very hard to get around and keep a job (outside of the inner city) without a car. The infrastructure of our society has become so dependent on cars that only the very poor don't have one. However, if anyone seriously tried to argue that making better cars was promoting the class divide they would be laughed at. It misses the point.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Since some people can pay for better houses, should we prohibit such houses because it gives them an unfair advantage?
Well, that's the general "inequality" idea ... I agree that it makes no sense. But everyone from the president on down seems to believe it
Er... (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, the company offering free service if you pay a one-time fee for the hookup (a fairly reasonable one, at that) is totally making the digital divide worse. Clearly.
The pricing of their gigabit offering is fantastic. And while that price is undoubtedly out of the reach of poor people, so is almost everything. If it's really that important to have gigabit internet for the nation's poor, then that's something the government (as well as charitable organizations) needs to subsidize, just like with anything else that is deemed necessary (but too expensive for the poverty-stricken to afford). In no way can Google be reasonably found to be at fault here.
Re:Er... (Score:5, Insightful)
And the free service is 5mbps, more than fast enough for Khan Academy and Coursera.
It's as if Google realized in advance that the lunatics would scream "digital divide" because they were charging -- at a dirt cheap price -- for a superlative Internet service, so they tried to head that criticism off at the pass by offering a lower-speed free service.
But still the lunatics scream "digital divide". And Slashdot editors gave them a platform.
Does make it worse: it adds a tier. (Score:2)
Before you had to choose between crappy cable or crappy dsl and watched as other nations like South Korea were on the lucky side of the digital divide.
Now we have three tiers: Crappy American connection, Awesome South Korean connection, and Fantasy Google connection.
Thanks Google for giving people unrealistic dreams. ... As soon as they announce where they are connecting in Austin, I'm moving.
Adding a tier does not make it worse! (Score:5, Insightful)
Some people having slow connections instead of fast connections is clearly superior to everybody having slow connections.
The fault in causing the digital divide lies not with Google for being fast, but rather with every other ISP for being slow!
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Not only that, but they are willing to let you pay that install fee in monthly installments, over the course of a year, no financing fees involved.
That's $300 up front, or $25/month for one year, after which you have guaranteed 6 more years of free service. If you want to break it down, that's around $3.57 a month of the course of this agreement. AND there were NPO's offering to help people offset even that much.
Yeah, that FREE internet is sure excluding people (Score:3)
From the link they provided, you can get FREE basic internet, and IIRC, they were even waiving the $300 setup fee that the page mentions.
Let's stop tech until everyone can have it (Score:2)
It's 2100, and we only have a few years to go before the last sub-saharan gets a modem and we can turn on the internet!
In other news... (Score:5, Funny)
...Ford is making the transportation gap worse by producing vehicles that the poor can't afford, and I am making the car analogy gap worse by making car analogies people who don't read Slashdot can't see.
Re: (Score:3)
Have you fully considered the multidimensionality of the vehicular divide of which you speak? Oh my gosh, and the multiplicity of the analogy gap!
Highway to hell (Score:4, Insightful)
That's what I call Google fiber: this goddamned company is trying to control anything, from the OS (Android) to carrier to search engine to the entire freaking internet.
Don't you see? It's not the digital divide we should fear, it's the Google monopoly. Once they control everything, they'll dictate what you can do and not do on their internet.
Super-fast internet connectivity attracts internet users like honey the proverbial fly. That's why Google offers it. Once we're stuck in the honey though, we'll be in real trouble...
Re: (Score:3)
Yes you're right: Google is good, really really good. And they're so good that, when customers/users have a choice, they choose Google... until Google is the only provider left, and then you have a monopoly and you're trapped because there's no other service left to switch to.
It's already happened: want to upload Youtube videos? You have to subscribe to Google+ and its invasive TOS. Don't want G+? You have to use Vimeo or Dailymotion or other inferior online video services. And because Google has grown so m
Re:Highway to hell (Score:4, Insightful)
Right now, Google Fiber is available in 3 cities and possibly expanding to 9 more. How do you go from that to "Google will be the only one left"? Even if they do take out the local Big ISP (Read: make it impossible for Comcast to compete because Comcast insists on giving you slower speeds for more per month), how is this any different than the local Big ISP being the only game in town? Right now, my only option for broadband Internet access is Time Warner Cable (possibly soon to be Comcast). TWC really doesn't need to do anything to win over my business because they know it's either pay them what they demand for what they offer me or go back to dial-up. If Google Fiber came to my town, they would provide much needed competition and would spur TWC to improve their offerings.
So upload your videos somewhere else. If you don't like YouTube (or more specifically the TOS you need to agree to), don't use it. Are you suggesting that getting Google Fiber will require you to use YouTube instead of Vimeo, Dailymotion, or some other video service?
And the solution to breaking up the teleco monopolies is to block Google Fiber? Google has repeatedly said that they don't plan on taking Google Fiber nationwide as a major ISP. Obviously, they can change their mind on this at any time, but they aren't planning major rollouts. Right now, all Google Fiber is doing is causing the major ISPs to sweat a bit in a few select markets.
Re: (Score:2)
It's already happened: want to upload Youtube videos? You have to subscribe to Google+ and its invasive TOS. Don't want G+? You have to use Vimeo or Dailymotion or other inferior online video services. And because Google has grown so massive, they have the means to drive Vimeo and Dailymotion out of business for good.
Vimeo isn't inferior, it just has a smaller userbase. It could be argued it has a different purpose as well, as there are certain kinds of videos (video game let's plays, for instance) that they don't allow on their service. Also, if the service is inferior, maybe they should improve their product, making it easier for them to compete with YouTube.
um, no (Score:2)
'because a world with universal access and 100 times faster internet could mean 100 times the learning.'
Yeah, uh, no.
There are so many wrong assumptions there I don't even know where to start.
BTW, I'm still waiting for TV to revolutionize learning like was promised ...
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
What, you don't have your Google neural restructuring implant installed yet? It took me *weeks* to learn everything in the Library of congress over my crappy 2mbps 'net connection, with a gigabit link I could have learned it in mere minutes!
I love my NRI. NRIs are wonderful. You should get an NRI.
Ahem. Sorry, I think I dozed off I dozed off for a moment. What were you saying?
Comcast or Verizon? (Score:5, Informative)
Who is paying this shill?
Re: (Score:3)
In all seriousness, I can't wait til Google rolls out more fiber! I want 1-10 gb/s speeds to challenge the jerks trying to get us to pay more and more for less and less.
Re: (Score:2)
My first thought when I saw this article was: "If Google Fiber is making the digital divide worse, then I hope they make it worse in my town next." I'm not holding my breath though. (Only have TWC - soon to be Comcast - here.)
broadband is there for netflix and youtube (Score:5, Interesting)
the only reason i have 20/2 is for netflix and youtube. the latter being the most educational, but the educational videos can be played on slower speeds
everything else would work with under 10mbps internet
wikipedia doesn't need 1gbps and that's the most educational site there is
there is only one reason for fast internet and that's to make you spend more money buying on impulse. 1gpbs you can buy that movie NOW instead of waiting for the blu ray. or get that PS4 game NOW instead of driving to gamestop or best buy or waiting on amazon
It's more of a case of... (Score:5, Insightful)
...Another case of the unintended consequences of good intentions?...
It is more a case of leaping blindly into unsubstantiated conclusions based upon the cherry-picking of information that suits your intent.
Betteridge's law of headlines (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
What happens if the headline reads: "Does Betteridge's Law of Headlines apply to this headline?"
(If you answer "No", then it does apply so the answer should be "Yes", but if you answer "Yes" then it doesn't apply and you should answer "No".)
Re: (Score:2)
This seems as good a time as any to dust off Betteridge's law of headlines: "Any headline which ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no."
I don't think it needs to be dusted off. It gets used so much, basically in every story with a question, that it's probably polished and shining by now.
Don't Hold Everyone Else Back (Score:4, Informative)
Would you rather have:
Google Fiber allowed: 50% of people have 1000 Mbit internet and 50% of people have 10 Mbit internet
or
Google Fiber is not allowed: 50% of people have 20 Mbit internet and 50% of people have 5 Mbit internet
Forcing equality often just means lowering the standards of living for everyone. Even for people at the bottom.
Re: (Score:2)
Assuming Google fiber will force the competition to lower prices or increase their own bandwidth this is a simplified example of what is happening.
Nah. Increasing bandwidth is expensive; paying shills to write anti-Google articles is much cheaper.
With their $300-installation-then-free plan Google is doing far more to bridge the digital divide than any of their competitors.
Re: (Score:2)
How exactly is this making it worse? (Score:2)
This is complete bullshit. In other markets we're paying the same prices for far slower speeds and those who can't afford the Free that Google is charging for 5/1MBit aren't getting Internet here either.
Internet access needs to be more widely available. Internet access needs to be cheaper. What the fuck does that have to do with Google Fiber specifically?
City's should embrace the infrastructure (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Learning? Who is learning? (Score:2)
First, Do Evil (Score:4, Insightful)
As we all know, Google's charter starts with the phrase "First, Do Evil".
Look, there's literally a 100 GB/second pipe in the building I'm in, and two more just 2 blocks away, and 40 GB/second pipes all over the UW Seattle campus and the UW Tacoma campus.
Almost all top tier US and Canadian research universities have this, and we could easily build this out within a few miles if we actually wanted to fund that as a National Priority, just like we went to the Moon when we wanted to.
There are choices.
We just aren't prepared to fund them as a nation.
Re: (Score:2)
What about places like where my family farms are located? The costs to lay fibre down all those roads would be prohibitive since you maybe would serve .5 homes per mile. Maybe even less. Hell my grandmother didn't have a private line until 1991. I remember going down there in the 1980's and she had a party line still.
Diminishing returns (Score:2)
I bet that the difference between having 50 KB/s connection and having no Internet is greater than between having 50 KB/s and 50 MB/s.
Re: (Score:2)
devices to access the internet can be made in bulk for less than $100
in a couple years that price will probably be below $25. most poor people in USA have TVs after all...
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know about that. Slow Internet invokes rage, hatred, and violent thoughts that most people without internet will never face.
Maybe, depending on your view, but who cares? (Score:5, Interesting)
You can't hold back progress just because not everyone has gotten aboard the train. That train is leaving just as soon as it can make a buck.
Po'boy can't get no youtube lickitysplit on an ol' busted DSL line, but he can still browse wikipedia. And back when he couldn't get wikipedia he could still hit up a library. And I imagine people will complain that the poor unwashed masses with their slow and broken fiber lines won't be able to access the hivemind as quickly as and as comfortably as his rich relatives.
You're bitching that the digital divide is increasing because someone is plowing ahead. The poor will always be playing catchup. It's part of what makes them poor. And sure, that sucks. But would you blame the Wright brothers for keep the poor downtrodden and earthbound while making a device that only the rich could afford? No. So please, kindly, GTFO of the way of progress. CHOO CHOO!
Re: (Score:2)
Po'boy can't get no youtube lickitysplit on an ol' busted DSL line
This sounds like my parents house.
Hunger Games (Score:2)
But Time Warner says speed doesn't matter (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.wired.com/wiredente... [wired.com]
And Google Fiber is already having positive effects on their cable competition:
http://consumerist.com/2013/01... [consumerist.com]
http://www.pcworld.com/article... [pcworld.com]
Google already offers a lower than lifeline option (Score:2)
Google offers a free fiber internet connection with monthly cost guaranteed for 7 years. There is a 300 dollar install fee to cover the cost of the modem, but thats it. Seems pretty damn reasonable.
a right? (Score:2)
First sentence of the article:
"In the future envisioned by Google, Internet access will be a basic human right"
a right?
"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
Replacing cable with fiber isn't going dosn't hurt (Score:2)
Or help the digital divide for that matter.
The real divide is between populated areas and rural areas and giving people in cities another better option isn't going to change that one way or the other.
Poor and XP (Score:2)
Perhaps the problem is that poor people couldn't order it until they can spring for a new computer !!!
That pricing page locked up XP/IE8. Not even the usual reload and/or error, just stuck. Getting them to spring for a new computer AND new internet service might be too much. Exactly what new groundbreaking tech is required to display a price list?
Guess I'll have to find my login here so I can use chrome, tried as AC and um...no.
envy (Score:4, Funny)
An old joke about neighbor envy ...
An angel in disguise visit a peasant's hut and is brought inside. The peasant shares what little food he has, and lets him sleep under his only blanket.
The next morning the angel reveals himself and tells the peasant he will be rewarded, but the catch is, whatever the peasant asks for, his neighbor will get double.
The peasant, agonized, thinks on it all day. Finally he tells the angel "I ask that you put out one of my eyes".
Re:Pricing that's out of reach... (Score:5, Interesting)
Man, wait until he/she finds out that Comcast is charging us $80/month for a fraction of that speed.
Re: (Score:2)
It's the old communist argument - everyone must be equal. That this boils down to is bring everyone to the lowest common denominator. World isn't fair, and good thing because if it was we'd all be on welfare (to be fair to the lazy guy who doesn't want to work, we should all not work to have the same this) - oh wait, who would pay for this welfare for all? I know, the rich guys. Ok, let's see, if we were to spread Bill Gate's fortune across the population of the world, we'd all get what, $10 each? Not to me
Re: (Score:2)
It's not quite so simple. Just because you help everybody, doesn't mean you help everybody equally. And from a social equality perspective anything that disproportionately helps the rich is equivalent to suppressing the poor.
For now at least though I'm not seeing the big deal - I can't think of any serious social advantage bestowed by internet speeds beyond what's necessary for video phones and Khan academy videos. Then again, if gigabit internet becomes the norm among the upper and middle-class such thi
Re: (Score:2)
It used to be you could browse the web just fine over a 14.4kbps modem, and people would berate you if your web page was more than a few dozen kilobytes, images included. Care to guess at the size of the average web page these days, and how that effects what people on dial-up can comfortably do online?