Something you'll probably never see in the U.S. in your lifetime . . . .

Swede shows off 40 Gig broadband connection

Think you've got fast broadband? Think again.

Over the last couple of years - thanks to a bit of market pressure and greater consumer awareness - high speed internet access has become the norm around the UK. But we still argue about what constitutes "high speed". Get a bunch of geeks around the table in a pub and somebody is bound to mention how fast: it's the webby equivalent of "My Dad's bigger than your Dad".

Whatever your download speed, though, it surely pales in comparison to that owned by Swedish pensioner Sigbritt Löthberg... who boasts a 40 gig internet connection.

Yes, that's right - 40 Gigabits per second. According to the Local:
Sigbritt will now be able to enjoy 1,500 high definition HDTV channels simultaneously. Or, if there is nothing worth watching there, she will be able to download a full high definition DVD in just two seconds.

The extraordinary speeds are no coincidence - Sigbritt's son is "Swedish internet legend" Peter Löthberg, who advises companies like Cisco on what they should be doing.

Me? I'm still smarting as a result of downgrading from a 10+ Meg connection to a maximum of 2 Megs when I moved out of London. The idea of 40GB is enough to make me faint.



And some of the comments are interesting . . . .
"You guys are lucky I'm still trying to get above 2kb per sec here in America and I have "high speed" internet almost makes me want to move to get that kind of speed."

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"I live less than 100 miles from the USA Capitol Washington D.C, also living less than 50 miles outside the state capitol, Richmond. The average user here is still on dial-up speeds, around 33k.

DSL is not possible in rural areas.

Cable which has a defacto monopoly in the state of virginia, per county, - they wired the high profit, densely populated areas, leaving the rest of the counties with no options because no one will wire the remaining areas for the limited profit available, hence you have one provider, meaning you play by their rules, and take what they are willing to give you. - A defacto monopoly.

Virginia is a GOP-Big business owned state where the golden rule applies: them whats got de gold makes de rules.

Cable stopped 2 miles from us fourteen years ago, and has not expanded since, and has no plans to expand. They admit they can make a profit by wiring this area, just not as big a profit as they desire - see us when you have 30 customers per mile is their motto."

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There are others too that say much about the state of North America's broadband infrastructure.


More to come later!