Although it may lead the world in many technological respects, a new country-wide study of Internet speeds has revealed that certain states in the US are contributing to a national lag that could well leave the country trailing other nations when it comes to assessing download performance and commercial opportunities.
The study in question, which has been published by the Communications Workers of America union, has been derived from performance statistics gathered via the Speed Matters Web site, which openly invited its traffic to engage in an assessment test designed to reveal the actual speed (or lack thereof) of their individual Internet connections.
More than 80,000 visitors from across the United States took the Speed Matters evaluation, which duly revealed the states offering Internet speeds above the relatively unimpressive national average of 1.97 megabits, and, more pointedly, also those falling some way below it.
As a result of the study's findings, the Communications Workers of America union has warned that notably slow Internet speeds could well damage America's potential business prowess when compared to Web performance speeds attributed to other competing nations in the world of commerce.
Sen. John Unger, co-chairman of the West Virginia Legislature's select committee on broadband access, said his state can only improve itself by broadening high-speed services and creating more demand for faster access. According to the study results, West Virginia falls significantly below the national average, offering its residents a mere speed of 1.12 megabits.
"You can have all the nice roads and welcome signs you want, but if you don't have the infrastructure and the demand for high-speed Internet, we can't do business," said Unger in an Associated Press article, before outlining that there was no excuse for doing otherwise considering today's economy.
However, Mark Polen, executive director of the West Virginia Cable Telecommunications Association, suggests that poor Internet speeds connected to the state are more likely to be a result of poor demand rather than poor supply, offering that higher Internet speeds generally require higher costing.
In the case of West Virginia, it is ranked 49th overall in terms of average household income, and has around 35 percent of its households subscribed to broadband Internet whereas the national average is around 50 percent.
Rhode Island emerges as the top state for Internet speed, boasting 5.01 megabits, while Kansas follows close behind with 4.17 megabits. The top five is rounded out by New Jersey with a speed of 3.68, New York with 3.44, and Massachusetts, which offers up a solid 3.00 megabits.
The worst offenders when it comes to dropping beneath the 1.97 megabits average are Alaska, which musters an unsurprising 0.55 megabits, while West Virginia ranks second from bottom with 1.12 megabits. The bottom five is rounded out by Wyoming at 1.25 megabits, Iowa at 1.26 megabits, and North Dakota at 1.31 megabits.
jim jerksonJun 27th, 2007 - 17:16:08
It looks like the average internet speed for a state is strongly related to the percentage of the population living in cities. In that case, the problem with WVa and Alaska is just that it's only feasible to supply ubiquitous high speed internet in big cities. Supplying the countryside of WVa with high speed isn't going to help the state beyond boasting-power. Fixing WVa is going to take more than high speed.
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