Bad Reasoning: We Don't Need More High Speed Internet Because People Don't Use Fast Internet Now
from the the-point-is-way-over-yonder dept
There's been a lot of discussion lately about how far the US has fallen behind other countries when it comes to high speed broadband. And many are taking it for granted that high speed broadband is important to economic growth and viability. Yet Tim Worstall, over at Forbes, argues that "High Speed Broadband Doesn't Matter A Darn" because a UK study showed that people don't use super high speeds. He quotes a report (pdf) from Booz & Co.But speed in itself is not enough to encourage usage. Ofcom (an independent regulatory authority for U.K. communications industries) has noted that in 2011 superfast coverage of the U.K. was at 60 percent, but only 6.6 percent of all connections were taking advantage of the top speeds. This suggests that focusing on availability is no guarantee of deriving full benefit from the investment.Worstall then uses this to argue that speed isn't an issue and we shouldn't invest in faster broadband:
As should be obvious, it’s not the speed of the internet that produces the economic growth. It’s the people using the internet that does. And if only 6.6% of the traffic is using the speeds we already have then there really isn’t much of a case for throwing billions at making it all faster. So that, presumably, only 6.6% of the traffic will use that higher speed.This reasoning is faulty on many, many levels. First off, if you look at the full Booz report, almost every conclusion is exactly the opposite of what Worstall suggests. He seems to take that one paragraph out of context, and assume that because only a small percentage of people were taking advantage of "top speeds" it means that there's no real demand for it and no economic benefit.
In fact, given the low numbers even bothering to use current speeds I’d say this is a very good argument for not spending a lot of money to roll out high speed broadband everywhere. The most important reason quite possibly being that I rather doubt that broadband is going to be the technology of choice for much longer.
That's making a big assumption. He's right that "it's not the speed of the internet that produces the economic growth," and that it's the people, but he ignores that part of what brings in those people are the services online -- and new, better and more useful services are quite frequently enabled by higher speeds. It's almost hard to imagine how much more can be done online as speeds pick up. A decade ago, the idea of so much video online was crazy. And yet, here we are.
Second, the fact that only a small percentage of people are using full broadband capabilities is meaningless. That's a snapshot, not a look at the trend. What happens is that as more services offer up useful features that increase the number of things you can do with broadband, more people will use it. The last thing you want to do is get caught waiting -- and then suddenly have all your users pissed off that the broadband can't handle the latest and greatest applications and use cases.
Faster broadband doesn't immediately get soaked up, but it does lead to greater investment in bandwidth-intensive services, and that will increase usage and expand the economy. Taking one quote out of context and then looking at a snapshot rather than a trend is not a particularly compelling reason to pull out on key infrastructure investment at a time when it's needed most.
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Filed Under: broadband, innovation, trends, usage
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So 2 HD videos and a online game will not max out a rather weak "high speed" and he is talking about much faster connection.
Now having said that, I think this guy is a moron for trying to say we shouldn't put money into high speed. The faster the internet becomes the more useful it becomes. As the story pointed out, streaming video used to be just crazy. In fact, it was not that long ago sending a picture was considered a massive waste of bandwidth. Now days we do not even think twice about the load time of an image.
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So. Yes--even if we don't need it right now--we will need higher bandwidth to the home to get the next generation video streaming services off the ground. This is why Google is starting to roll out their 1Gbs fiber Internet, they have realized that you're going to need a giant pipe into the home to get these services off the ground, and those services are where the profits are going to be in the future--not in providing the pipe.
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Or, even more unbelievably, only 6.6% of the Interwebs watches porn...
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So much for learning from the past
'It's useless to pave so many roads, as less than X percent of people do any significant amount of driving. And the idea of interstate highways in particular are better off ignored, given how rarely people travel out of state.'
Seriously though, who keeps hiring these idiots who are so incapable of looking forward to what could be, and most likely will be, and instead choose to only focus on the past and what has been?
Even worse, despite always looking to the past, they seem to constantly miss the fact that technologies change and grow, so only focusing on the state they are now isn't going to do you any good long term.
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Re: So much for learning from the past
- indoor toilets
- domestic electricity supplies
- mobile phones, hell even home telephones
- literacy
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Re: So much for learning from the past
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Re: So much for learning from the past
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...because they can afford the higher speeds.
The rest of us? We get mailers every month our bill comes in to drop another $75 for faster "up to" speeds (translation: as long as you're online during the time all other customers are, you'll be paying $75 a month for the same speed you have now).
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UBB
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Re: UBB
That, is where the argument this article talks about truly falls apart.
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Re: UBB
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a) sensible pricing by ISPs
b) access to more services
c) less intrusion by governments
d) less intrusion by companies
e) less restrictions by the entertainment industries and their fucking obsolete gate keepers
f) sensible pricing by the entertainment industries
g) the right for customers to format and time shift, as i believe is now available in Canada (hush my mouth) and should be available worldwide!
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1) Higher definition porn
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Heard it Before
"Why would I use the telephone to talk to a friend? If I want to talk to him, I'll go to his house and have a chat."
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And This
What exactly does he think is going to happen to it?
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Re: And This
I will one up you...
No one will ever need more that 640k memory...
Pages say Bill Gates said it but I don't think he actually did. It was someone else.
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Re: And This
The article doesn't say this, so I'm just speculating, but he might be expecting LTE and other wireless technologies to supplant traditional broadband.
This is the strategic plan of the Verizon/Comcast cartel. They've stopped building out their fiber optic network so they can focus on selling high speed wireless access at MUCH higher margins.
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let's show just how bad this is
on building roads (capacity/infrastructure):
"people don't use the roads enough now, so we shouldn't build for more".
At what point does that even remotely make sense? I could point to the entirety of the US roads infrastructure where in some instances they do have that viewpoint, and if you ask any traffic engineer worth the title they will tell you that it's 100% the wrong view to have and represents why US road infrastructure *sucks*. It's not the only reason, but absolutely a part of it.
Additionally, if they really want to see people use high speed internet, they should start by *LETTING THEM*. UK caps on internet usage are abysmal, to say the least. They're as bad as US mobile internet cap usages in plenty of instances. Is it then a surprise people hoard the crap out of it?
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Masnick's nutty notion logically means we need jet-cars.
To propose spending billions for some unknown future potential need is typical of Mike and his technocrat class who don't worry about "sunk (or fixed) costs": those are for someone else to pay; Mike was born to only get benefits without considering the limits of reasonable. -- And bet your last cent that Mike doesn't want Google and other huge traffic-users to be taxed to pay for it.
All hail Mike "Streisand Effect" Masnick!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect
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Re: Masnick's nutty notion logically means we need jet-cars.
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Re: Masnick's nutty notion logically means we need jet-cars.
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Re: Re: Masnick's nutty notion logically means we need jet-cars.
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Re: Masnick's nutty notion logically means we need jet-cars.
I assume you're referring that Google doesn't want to pay for traffic of people who have already paid for their own traffic.
Google pays for their own bandwidth.
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Re: Re: Masnick's nutty notion logically means we need jet-cars.
Yeah they do. Over a million dollars a day and that estimate was from 2009. Probably at least over 2 million a day by now, if not more.
http://www.inquisitr.com/24740/youtube-costs-google-2-million-per-day/
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Re: Re: Re: Masnick's nutty notion logically means we need jet-cars.
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I use high speed every day
Sure, maybe the everyday use of super high-speeds wouldn't be apparent, but 15 years ago everyone was saving software installers on their hard disks in case they needed them again. Today we just redownload the latest thing. Did anyone envision that 15 years ago?
What will we be doing with our computers in 5 or 10 years that we can't begin to envision today? We need to continue to support those innovations with infrastructure.
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Re: *correction*
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As connection speeds increase, the internet grows to fill in around the new standard speeds. As the internet grows, the connection speeds need to be increased. As they are increased, the internet grows.
You only need to look at what the internet was in the early 90s and what it is today.
When we had slow dialup modems, websites were mostly like Geocities. Pictures were smaller, lower resolution because nobody wanted to spend 2 minutes downloading a full page jpeg. Streaming music was in low end midi format.
As our speeds increased, so did our consumption. Webpages blew up, images blew up, music blew up, the dawn of streaming video came upon us.
Who knows what the future of the internet holds? We'll never know if we don't invest in improving our connection speed or if we try to lock it down with rules and regulations.
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Break the cycle, upgrade sidewalks today!
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FULL of Mike's wrong assertions.
"And many are taking it for granted that high speed broadband is important to economic growth and viability." -- Well, it ain't, as the prior two hundred years show, along with the last ten years or so in which the economy is actually shrinking. -- Just today, say goodbye to your Twinkies: 18,000 jobs are ending at Hostess. Don't blame the union, blame management with a package of two Twinkies selling for over a buck locally!
"Faster broadband doesn't immediately get soaked up, but it does lead to greater investment in bandwidth-intensive services, and that will increase usage and expand the economy." -- Nope. Nearly everything that can happen over the internet is re-distributive, zero-sum game, not actually productive. Games and movies and music don't actually produce anything, as any economist knows.
All hail Mike "Streisand Effect" Masnick!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Streisand_effect
[BTW this once I'll that I merely copy the link Mike put up yesterday, assume he wants "his" one glorious innovation trumpeted but is too modest to mention it more than twice in the last month that I've noticed...]
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Re: FULL of Mike's wrong assertions.
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Re: FULL of Mike's wrong assertions.
We must immediately pass a bill that makes it so Hostess can charge people for Twinkies licensing and live performance and distribution and mechanical and reproduction rights.
It wouldn't hurt to have timed and region releases either, to create artificial scarcity and increase profits.
Oh dear if ONLY they had some sort of lobbying organization to champion the Twinkies worker's rights. Won't you think of the dear workers! Slaving away making Twinkies for everyone to consume.
If people don't want to purchase Twinkies legally, then we must tax them for it. In fact, let's make Google pay Twinkies for everyone someone searches for Twinkies related information.
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Re: Re: FULL of Mike's wrong assertions.
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Re: FULL of Mike's wrong assertions.
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Re: FULL of Mike's wrong assertions.
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http://www.dslreports.com/shownews/Game-Industry-Broadband-is-Holding-us-Back-121831
Thi s is just holding the system hostage until they can figure out how to double/triple+ dip again.
This is holding other industries hostage is what common carrier laws were trying to prevent.
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I wish Verizon would actually do what it said it would and start laying fiber for the rest of the US.
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Two points
More seriously, as other have pointed out, it is impossible for most people to use a significant fraction of the bandwidth available to them because they'll hit their usage caps very quickly. I suspect usage would be higher if if people weren't penalized for using what they're paying for.
Also, the percentage of users that use all available bandwidth is not even remotely an indicator of the economic value of the bandwidth. Which users are doing so, and what they're using it for, is much more relevant than the absolute percentage of the population.
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I always remember this quote when it comes to tech
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If you build it...
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Where Would Jesus Download?
"Jesus LOVES file-sharing. The bible has long been shared for free. The pope has warned governments to lay off copyright enforcement against file-sharers. Jesus copied fish and bread for the poor knowing full well that He would later be crucified for it. The bible quotes Jesus, speaking of charity, saying that when you share with each other, you are sharing with Jesus. He says there is no greater way to serve Him. Seeding will put you on a fast track to salvation. In fact, right before posting this I prayed and Jesus confirmed that He is currently running a seedbox out of South Korea. I asked him 'why South Korea?' and He replied, simply, 'better bandwidth'. I also asked Him why I should capitalize words like 'he' and 'him' when it's not grammatically correct and that’s when He stopped answering Me."
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Faulty Reasoning or Non Reasoning?
Around two decades ago after I noticed that everything I saw on the news relating to anything military, an area where I have considerable experience and expertise, was not only wrong, but space-case wrong. By "space-case wrong" I mean it wasn't only inaccurate, it was breath-taking stupid. Then I read an article that claimed EVERYONE with any expertise in a given area thought the same thing about the news coverage of that subject--but thought the rest of the coverage was okay.
Hmmm. I interpreted that to mean all news in all areas was stupid, but we could only recognize that stupidity if we happened to have some expertise in the area. I stopped watching the news after that... and I think that alone left me better informed.
If the same thing is true about senior officials and the subjects covered here, I'm not sure what I can quit doing.
I suppose in this case it's better to keep an eye on them than to just roll my eyes and shake my head. Maybe alcohol abuse would help. I'd pretend it was fiction, but it isn't believable enough for fiction.
This is HARD.
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Napster
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Re: Napster
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Broadband
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which logical fallacy is this?
People don't use what doesn't yet exist, therefore it's not necessary.
For no good reason, this reminds me of an anecdote I once heard from science fiction author Barry B. Longyear. Longyear was talking about how a publisher had printed a relatively small run for one of his novels, something like 10,000 copies (I have the number wrong, but it will serve). Once these copies got into bookstores, Longyear soon noticed that they sold all 10,000 quickly. He called his publisher and pointed out that all 10,000 copies were sold. "Good thing we didn't print more," answered the publisher. "We only sold 10,000."
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High-Speed Broadband....
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That sort of sounds like going back to 2005 and saying Facebook isn't a useful service because only a very small part of the population uses it. (of course there are those who still argue Facebook isn't a useful service, but that is a different matter.
Or maybe a better analogy might be going back to when AOL was still pay by the minute/hour and saying they didn't need to increase load capacity before offering an unlimited flat rate plan because not everyone was using the network all the time.
You know, today people are carrying around phones that are more powerful computers than the actual computer I had ten years ago. Ask the American steel industry what not planning ahead for the future gets you.
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Also the very top end of anything can only be afforded by a minority until price comes down (by then it no longer is the top end, and just replaces the lower level offerings). So rather than thinking "only 6.6% of brits have the fastest offered, so it means the others cannot get it for one reason or another" he takes it as "the majority doesn't need or want it, thus not worth the effort to try and offer it"
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iCloud and the Like
Look at what happens when your wife or kid flick iCloud on and their 5Gb of pictures start synching to the net? Other than your residential Internet services sucking (worse than usual) for the next 3 days while you push 5Gb at 1mbps. Consumption will increase dramatically as applications centralize in the Internet/cloud.
Competition will set us free. The FCC rolled over long ago.
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shills
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"We Don't Need More High Speed Internet Because People Don't Use Fast Internet Now?"
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