great googley-moogley!

(thanks alternet)

in the VERY interesting facts dept...

In the first three years of the Bush administration, the United States dropped from 4th to 13th place in global rankings of broadband Internet usage. [...] [T]he United States has fallen even further behind in mobile-phone-based Internet access. [...] Today, nearly all Japanese have access to "high-speed" broadband, with an average connection speed 16 times faster than in the United States -- for only about $22 a month. Even faster "ultra-high-speed" broadband, which runs through fiber-optic cable, is scheduled to be available throughout the country for $30 to $40 a month by the end of 2005. [...] Thanks to the government's competitive framework, the speed of the DSL service offered also rose dramatically, from 8 megabits per second in 2001 to 12, 26, and 40 megabits today. (The typical U.S. broadband connection, whether DSL or cable, is still only 1.5 megabits per second or slower.) Meanwhile, the price of monthly subscriptions remained stable, even for 26-megabit access speeds, at about $22 per month -- by far the lowest price in the world. [...] By mid-2004, ultra-high-speed broadband (up to 100 megabits per second) was available to more than 80 percent of Japan's citizens.

what can you do with ultra-high speed broadband...?

Such connections permit real-time video telephoning and video conferencing, telecommuting, and rich multimedia options such as digital high-definition television, interactive games, and five-minute movie downloads (instead of the short, jerky video streaming that Americans are used to).

DAMN...!

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