Might be part of the reason that Health IT is dragging as well....BD
NEW YORK - The United States is starting to look like a slowpoke on the Internet. Examples abound of countries that have faster and cheaper broadband connections, and more of their population connected to them. Part of the problem may be that people don't see fast Internet access as an essential part of modern life, and may need more of a push to get on.
What's less clear is how badly the country that gave birth to the Internet is doing, and whether the government needs to step in and do something about it. The Bush administration has tried to foster broadband adoption with a hands-off approach. If that's seen as a failure by the next administration, the policy may change. In a move to get a clearer picture of where the U.S. stands, the House Energy and Commerce Committee on Tuesday approved legislation that would develop an annual inventory of existing broadband services including the types, advertised speeds and actual number of subscribers available to households and businesses across the nation.
"In the 1930s, we recognized that electricity was essential. We're not quite at that level in broadband," Correa said.
Several of the European countries that are doing well have forced telephone companies to rent their lines to Internet service providers for low fees. The ISPs use them to run broadband Digital Subscriber Lines, or DSL, often at speeds much higher than those available in the U.S.
In Paris, a "triple play" of TV, phone and broadband service costs less than half of what it does in the U.S.
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