Report shows U.S. high speed Internet deployment still lags behind

A new study on high speed Internet deployment around the world once again shows the United States failing to get its people connected.

The second quarterly State of the Internet report by Akamai Technologies, whose servers power a huge portion of global Internet traffic, looked at the percentage of each country's population with access to Internet connections with speeds of at least 5 Mbps. It found the U.S. comes in sixth place, with only 26 percent of Americans able to connect at these speeds.

It's important to note that this study used a different measure in its rankings. Our Speed Matters Internet speed report measured the median download speeds of 230,000 people who visited the speedmatters.org site. In contrast, the Akamai report ranked states based on the number of people in that state who connected to the Internet at a speed greater than 5 mbps.

Akamai's findings that only a quarter of our population able to reap the benefits of high speed Internet make it clear that we have a long way to go. In South Korea, for example, 64 percent of the population reaches speeds of at least 5 Mbps. While this is partly due to greater population density, Akamai's David Belson notes that the nation's government played a major role in expanding access:

Likewise, its government has taken a proactive stance on rolling out high-speed connectivity. Whether the winner of the upcoming presidential elections in the U.S. will push for similar proliferation -- supporting much-discussed efforts like wiring rural communities -- remains uncertain, he added.

In the United States, where the vast majority of rural residents are missing out on this technology, it will take even greater government involvement to get us closer to South Korea's level of high speed deployment. As Belson said,

"Does the new leadership of the Unites States have the opportunity to put some money where their mouth is?" Belson said. "Absolutely. Will they fund rural broadband? Unlikely."

It's therefore up to us to put as much pressure on our government to connect everyone in the nation, no matter where they live.

U.S. Bounds Ahead on Broadband Proliferation (Internetnews.com)

Akamai Report: State of the Internet, 2nd Quarter 2008 (Akamai Technologies)

2008 Report on Internet Speeds in All 50 States (Speed Matters)