Why American Internet SUCKS

If you are a person existing in this society and on KZbin then you know that the Internet is basically a necessity for our modern world to function. We’ve built an entire civilization on the Internet, and yet somehow Americans are still dealing with overpriced, cruddy service - if they even have Internet at all. How did we get here?
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Script: Holly Maley
Editor: Reid Valaitis
Lead Editor: Kirsten Stanley
Project Manager: Lurana McClure Rodríguez
Host: Levi Hildebrand
Want to work with Future Proof? Suggestions? Hate mail? Get in touch with the project manager, Lu: [e-mail]

[@Takosaga]

still blows my mind i have unlimited data from my phone here in Latvia for 15 bucks a month. it even works in the forest. Cycling in Texas I would get 3g or just no service in parts of the state

[@HiItsOKK]

Yeah. Latvians are kind a blessed with their internet. At least one thing is right with that place.

[@FacePlant1324]

Yes it is kinda ridiculous I live in the USA. With Cox communications. We pay 160 a month because we have to pay them for our speeds and then unlimited data. Phone plans are not much better it is 45 per person for slow speeds that are kinda disgustingly slow and less reliable than my Internet provider

[@nietur]

you're comparing city and rural

[@bionic850]

the fact that Texas is 10 times larger than Latvia makes a big difference

[@Distress.]

Did you have a US SIM though? I went to Australia and only had 4G but I'm not sure if that was just my international plan.

[@benjamin3044]

Hey, a Future Proof topic I am actually qualified to chime in on. I'm a network engineer in the States and have my masters degree in IT and my thesis was on public broadband in the US! Long story short - its complicated. A big part of the problem like you stated was incumbent providers (cable TV) had a significant advantage when it came to deploying network infrastructure this allowed them to leverage said infrastructure and squash any upcoming competition. Another part was lack of regulator involvement when it came to subsidizing network infrastructure projects. Providers took LOADS of money from governments/grants etc and didn't follow-up on any of the promised infrastructure. Also the continued allowance of what I would consider monopolies for cable and ISPs to merge also is insanely anti-consumer. A lot of that comes from the super cool thing called "regulatory capture". Also a lot of it stems from policymakers not having a comprehensive understanding of computers and networks. Don't even get me started of FCC reporting, it is LAUGHABLE at how bad it is. To be honest, we really truly do not understand the full scope of "broadband" access in the US. The standard definition for broadband in the US is significantly dated and does not reflect realistic or useful speeds for modern day use. It gets better, if one home or building within a census block (yes census block for population counting) has access to what the FCC considers "broadband speeds" then ISPs count/report all of the homes/population within that block as having that speed. Even if its only that singular home with access. Its absurd. The Chattanooga example is always touted as the gold standard but that's hard to replicate. Most of the backbone infrastructure was built out to support connectivity to powerplants within the region and the city leveraged that for their build out. Its obviously more complicated than that and this is a condensed KZbin comment but I have found other "models" to be more effective than Chattanooga's approach. I am not sure if nationalizations is the correct answer. I also do not think waiting on "big tech" companies to come and save us is the answer either. I think continued investment in locally owned and operated community or municipal run ISPs would be a much better solution that allows for more local flexibility and ownership. There have been fantastic examples of local communities rising to meet the challenge and having better performance and lower costs when compared to commercial offerings. All in all, super nice video. Well done! You can read more about it all here! www.ifc.org/content/dam/ifc/doc/mgrt/em-compass-note-107-municipal-broadband-networks-for-web.pdf www.bbcmag.com/pub/doc/BBC_May16_SevenModels.pdf ilsr.org/cooperative-fiber-brings-high-speed-internet-access-to-rural-ohio/ www.fairlawngig.net/ For the super bold - startyourownisp.com/

[@megan2349]

I learned more from this comment than I’ve learned in whole KZbin videos from other channels. Thank you for taking the time to succinctly sum up the crux of the issue.

[@benjamin3044]

@@megan2349 glad you enjoyed it!

[@MegaLokopo]

A massive part is also the government has effectively banned competition. You couldn't just start an isp even if you had the money and wanted to.

[@TheMonDon1721]

really good comment, thanks for the insight.

[@handlemonium]

Municipal Fiber has been slowly gaining ground here in Oregon. Sandy, Sherwood, and Ashland has had it for almost a decade and now Hillsboro is building it out too!

[@Jim-Stick]

I work for a small ISP based in Canada. It is quite amazing our company managed to survive attempts to get squashed out by the other big ones. They really REALLY tried.

[@mason96575]

A fellow small ISP employee! The big guys can never crush us if we band together;

[@robertoXCX]

I think American internet would be a whole WHOLE lot better if it was operated as a utility like electricity, and if there was simply more providers. The fact that Spectrum, AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast practically hold monopolies in their respective operating regions means they get to suck up money for doing the absolute barest minimum. Give people options and suddenly you have to start making your service actually worth it!

[@ChandlerScarborough]

I agree with your sentiment, but I doubt that would make things much better. In Virginia, our primary electric utility pretty much gets anything that it wants in the state legislature. They lobby it hard for a bill several years ago that would supposedly save all of its customers money by freezing rates for several years. "Why would they need the state to pass a law preventing them from raising rates?" You might ask. Because buried in the bill was also language that enabled them to keep any extra profits over the statutory limit, if their costs went down during that period. And of course they did massively. So a bill that was theoretically about saving customers money was really a bill about allowing them to keep excess profits.

[@MoonLiteNite]

The people of flint michigan agree with you

[@shadowspire]

In my county there’s literally 1 electricity provider. Only because it’s a subsidiary of an even bigger utility company, they lobby to let them have pretty much total control. While internet, we have much more providers. The utility company has been continuously raising their prices, I pay nearly 175usd per month for electricity and gas, while internet I pay 25 because there’s spectrum, cox, Comcast, Verizon etc, all competing

[@Chris_at_Home]

We have a cooperative where I live where were the customers own the phone company. We have fiber to our house in a rural area. The company has their own fiber between Alaska and the lower 48. Our electric company is also a cooperative. We have great wireless with AT&T. I worked on fiber, digital microwave and satellite communications delivering bandwidth for many customers among other things. I retired from “T”.

[@whiteerdydude]

More probiders doesn't help in the long run. These need to be public infrastructure with no focus on profits. Just a focus on providing the best infrastructure it can. Wether it is nationalization or local co-ope is irrelevant to me, simply that it is not a private entity. Private ownership is incompatible with necessities.

[@MegaLokopo]

I'm surprised you didn't mention the biggest problem with creating a new competitor which is network exit points. There are very few places where you can actually connect your network you just built to the rest of the internet without having to pay your competition.

[@memathews]

When you finally got to the Chattanooga portion I was able to breathe again. I worked at a large tech company during the Internet expansion in they late '90s and early 2000's, our biggest problem was intransigent telecom companies that locked states to prevent high speed bandwidth adoption through ridiculous laws. A few states avoided making dumb laws, but those states were-and still are!-hampered by the laws developed by telecom lobbyists. Everybody loves a free market except for business people.

[@lostincyberspaceIII]

Even business people love the free market when it is not in their industry.

[@AikoBonsai]

I think the only part or aspect of the topic that wasn't covered and would've liked to be was expanding on how chummy the IPs and governments are. Specifically with reporting your activities online and storing your data.

[@LeviHildebrandYT]

yeah that's a really good point!

[@blackknight467]

Seriously. The amount of bad info the IPs are reporting to the FCC is such a huge problem. So many decisions and funding are made off that data it's actively harming people.

[@deltasyn7434]

It's a fair point, but I generally assume the government spies on all of our internet activity regardless.

[@Mantikal]

You know how the mob handles a rat - don't you?

[@AikoBonsai]

@@deltasyn7434 that's kind of the point

[@bipin82]

We are very lucky here in India where we have really affordable data and also wired broadband in all major towns and cities. The service has also improved vastly over a couple of years.

[@yuwenywh]

I still remember when I came to Canada in 2016, I could choose a phone plan from no data, 256mb, 512mb, or 1GB. It blew my mind that I could get unlimited internet for $20 in Taiwan at the same time but only got a no data plan in Canada. Another unbelievable thing is that there was no signal nor wifi on the Toronto subways 😅 you were basically disappeared from the network when taking the subway

[@KnHighmer_Dos]

Different realms different rules

[@vladimirperovic1703]

Salary in Taiwan is not equal as the salary in the states. Yes you should pay 1000 times more because your salary is a 1000 times higher. Quit bitchin'! Yeah i know, bitches will be bitchin' 🤷🏼‍♂️ no matter what

[@danielzhang1916]

we've had unlimited data etc. for more than 10 years already, surprising that Canada was so behind on that

[@creeper6530]

In Czechia all the phone providers teamed up to cover the subway in antennas, but the cost of data plans is unbelievable compared to other EU countries

[@kevykevTPA]

You're underground. What do you expect??

[@noodles.dumplings.kimchi2878]

I feel so validated with this video. I get roasted so hard by my extended family due to my internet and they never believe it is as cruddy as I describe. Now I can send them this video as an explanation.

[@LeviHildebrandYT]

hahaha "see! it's not my fault!!!"

[@UkeShrum]

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”2

[@scpatl4now]

Being from Chattanooga, I can tell you that the reason Chattanooga was able to do this was that much of the fiber optic backbone was already there. The EPB (electric power board) was wiring fiber to smart meters they were installing to better monitor usage and deal with outages in a much quicker manor. So, it wasn't a big stretch to just light that up for TV and Internet. Once it was settled in court and got built out...and (and its a big one) was wildly popular, The state really couldn't put the genie back in the bottle. What they did do, however, was pass a law to make sure no one else did it (written by AT&T and Comcast), and people like Rep Marsha Blackburn before she was in the senate, pushed to make sure that Chattanooga's fiber internet was not allowed to expand past the EPB footprint. So, even though the dark fiber exists, people in Bradley Co. just outside the footprint can get little better than dial up, and the incumbents have no incentive now to make it any better for them.

[@logans3365]

Our capitalist overlords are relentless in there pursuit to crush any spark of freedom, it’s time we start doing the crushing around here

[@Sahwin]

Hi Future Proof! I live in Northen Colorado and actually had the pleasure of voting for municipal fiber optic internet several years ago--and it passed! Not only does my city, Fort Collins, offer this service, but so do several nearby cities (such as Loveland, Estes Park, and Longmont), and it is expanding. What is better is that the cities are working together through intergovernmental agreements. Our NoCo municipal fiber departments are collaborating! And its amazing. We have some of the fastest internet services in the country, at very affordable prices (basically $70 for symmetrical 1gig), and very accessible customer and tech support. I am a little biased because I actually work for one of those municipal fiber departments, but I am also an extremely satisfied customer. Chattanooga's story is great; Northern Colorado's is wonderful.

[@fettuccinealraver]

I was a contractor for an ISP that served rural communities in the states and it was a mixed bag. Half of the people (retirees) were absolutely over the moon to have internet that’s functional. The other half of the people (“power users” as they called them) said that the internet dropped out on them during video calls and jeopardized the success of their businesses (for example, losing connection during a sales call and not getting back up for hours if not days). My concern is that the rural US is getting ‘good enough’ internet but not good internet. This puts a massive block on these communities while ISPs get to say they’re getting the job done. Yes starlink is a massive competitor for them and yes they aren’t doing what they need to do to actually compete with starlink.

[@TheCrazyCapMaster]

They’re probably gonna regret that in the next 10 years or so 😅 the more Starlink satellites Musk puts up, the more wide-reaching and (most critically) reliable Starlink’s connection will be, and thus their prices will be able to drop as they reach a wider and more stable customer base. Amazon getting involved will affect that process too. Once the high speeds and improving reliability makes up for the inevitably-higher ping of Starlink, there’s gonna be a decent flood of customers leaving the rural ISPs.

[@fettuccinealraver]

@@TheCrazyCapMaster 100%

[@alfaeco15]

​@@TheCrazyCapMasterThis rural ISPs are the best promoters of Starlink, and Elon Musk is getting that promotion without paying a dime 😅

[@Blox117]

starlink is a scam, like all musk projects

[@Nurse_Xochitl]

I don't even get good internet. I live in a rural area. During covid, the government shutdown everything. Lots of people lost jobs as they weren't deemed "essential" workers (at least I didn't lose my job since I'm a nurse). But some people were able to continue to work as their jobs went to remote work... however if they happened to live in a rural area (where previously perhaps they were driving to the city for work prior to covid), they weren't able to work because of bad internet (or the lack thereof) and lost their jobs. This also affects students in school.

[@henriklovold]

It's so fun to listen to this from a North American perspective. I live in Norway, and up until recently I didn't even know there was such a thing as capping data on cable internet. I have fiber internet in my house for $5 a month, and my unlimited (speed and amount wise) 5G mobile subscription costs me like $20 a month. There's also 4G/5G coverage pretty much everywhere you go, and 3G is being removed right now as it is obsolete.

[@AJ213Probably]

I thought $35 a month for internet and phone was good here in the US... Though it's with Xfinity so that is $20 a month in physical and mental pain

[@sneakycactus8815]

what an idea. you can actually afford to live over there! everything about american society sucks us dry

[@deepspacecow2644]

The thing I never understand is how anyone can stay in business while offering service that cheap. I have done some planning to start my own isp and just 1gb of backend bandwisth would be around $1k a month. The cable also needs to be put in the ground.

[@henriklovold]

@@deepspacecow2644 The main tele provider over here called Telenor is partially state owned. Infrastructure to the rural (and pretty mountainous) parts of Norway is often subsidised over the state budget to ensure that the entire population has access to high speed internet regardless of where they live. We have a mixed-market capitalist economic system here, with more governmental intervenience than in the US. It has its upsides and downsides, but free healthcare for all and examples such as telecom infrastructure outweighs the disadvantages in my opinion at least.

[@TwoBassed]

My fibre network in the U.K is £40 a month!

[@omenvii242]

All my friends in Korea and China love to make fun of how crappy and slow the Internet in the USA is.

[@qjtvaddict]

DAMN those countries have stronger density but still

[@seanpalmer8472]

Here in Utah, we have UTOPIA, a municipally-owned fiber network that is open to any ISP (even Comcast could be a provider...but they never would be). It's pretty cheap. I can get 10 gigabit symmetrical if I wanted to...but I don't because that would be ridiculously overkill for my needs. Snazzy Labs has a good explained video about it.

[@aldude999]

We have something similar in Oklahoma City, the main parts of the city (like Downtown) doesn't have it because of a contract I think, but a bunch of the rural and suburban areas around it now have co-op fiber. When I moved it was one of my prerequisites, and it felt great to tell the local cable company I'd no longer need their crappy asymmetrical service. I now have unlimited gigabit for half the price and couldn't be happier.

[@realkevintaylor]

If you’re watching this in the United States, I can sum up the video for you in two words that 100% of us Americans will understand spectrum, Xfinity!

[@LeviHildebrandYT]

🤦‍♂🤦‍♂

[@leifshantz4547]

In Canada, we have mostly 2 internet options in many communities. Luckily, where I live, we have SaskTel, a Crown corporation. (Provincial government owned) And their rates are reasonable. Except our government in SK is trying to sabotage SaskTel by increasing contracted workers, company debt and rates, slowly privatizing some aspects of the company, with the eventual goal of selling (privatization) to the Big Three. 😢

[@ArgoYonda]

Having worked in the management of fiber optic installation, I am well acquainted with the costs and challenges associated with it. However, in reality, despite Italy (where I live) lagging behind in many aspects, it has structured the deployment of fiber optics not only to private companies but also to individual municipalities. This was made possible with assistance from European and state funds, enabling the construction of an infrastructure that is then leased to various companies responsible for its operation and maintenance. That being said, not all rural areas are covered, and Starlink is a viable alternative. Another advantage we have is the widespread availability of 4G and 5G networks, even in more remote areas. This availability largely depends on the service provider, but there are also economically accessible flat-rate solutions where there are no data usage limits at a fairly reasonable price. Of course, Italy is a small country compared to the United States, but some of these options could also be considered!

[@lowstringc]

Rural PA mountains here: only one option (no cellular for tens of miles), which is Frontier dsl. Frontier won’t even deal with fallen trees on their lines (more than 25 visible from the road right near me, some stretching the wires to the ground. They’ve been there for over 5 years….). 6mbs plan costs $80 a month and it drops all the time, as well as clocking around 2mbs normally. It truly is robbery.

[@arthursoares610]

I was planning to travel to Canada and was shocked how pricy are Mobile internet plans there. I couldn't believe when I saw that some plans offered only 3G.

[@JumpyKaput]

@dakrawnik4208if you can pry your head outta your ass you’d know that’s a scam lmao

[@quantisedspace7047]

​@dakrawnik4208One gig is piddling for a month.

[@danielargabright5591]

I find it concerning how far we are behind and Internet speeds worldwide. However, this is just part of the whole trend of us being behind in a lot of areas. Academics, healthcare, access to healthcare, prescription, drug prices, cost of college and housing. They’re all holding us back, the question is who and why are they working to hold us back so much? even a lot of our food is unhealthy. I had to go on a bland diet due to an ulcer recently(I know this is not exactly related, but I’m just saying it to prove my point) and the headaches that I have had since I was a child have magically disappeared. I cannot eat spicy food, acidic food, coffee, tea, Kool-Aid, soda, dairy, except for yogurt, tomato anything, white bread, processed foods like pastries, cookies, cake, anything fried, no ketchup, no mustard, no fruit juice. Now normally I don’t think dairy is bad for you and neither is some fruit juices but too much of anything is bad and fruit juices very acidic. I am even losing weight now. But I think cutting out a lot of these foods has helped me considerably. I begged doctors for years to help me figure out what was causing my headaches and no one could tell me. I did not believe my diet was bad by any Measure because I don’t drink sodas but once or twice a month as a treat and I don’t eat a lot of pastries or cake or ice cream or anything like that just very rarely, I also don’t eat a ton of pasta and a ton of fruit juices. Big thing I was doing, though, was downing a lot of caffeine to help stay awake at my job. However, caffeine of any sort can irritate the lining of the stomach and intestines and I cannot afford that pain again. It was the worst pain of my life . Anyways, cutting out all those things plus the caffeine I found that I was able to stay awake without it. As long as I got adequate sleep. Also,my sleep has much improved. my point is cutting out all those things that we are told is safe for us and OK to drink and eat has made me feel a lot better and healthier so we need to be cautious and we need to let it be known as a society that these things may seem safe but too much of anything is bad and you’re having health problems. There is a good chance that they could somehow be related to your diet but you don’t think it is because you think that all this stuff is safe because it’s FDA approved and all that. My ulcer was caused by the pain medication. I was taking for my headaches, which was apparently caused by my diet and caffeine consumption which I did not realize was the cause of my headaches. I know this is not related to the video, but my point is there are people high up in society, controlling things, and holding us back in many ways, including Internet, speeds, and health for some reason.

[@JackAllpikeMusic]

I live in Australia and it's almost comforting to see that it's not only us that have truly awful internet. I feel like Australia may still have worse internet overall, but I wish governments could just get their act together and fix it.

[@SL4RK]

Welcome to Russia, if you live in a small town, you have one monopoly to choose from, (and horrible mobile internet with speeds of 25mbit at best)... who will deny you a connection for 15 years... and keep anyone else out of the market, I was first in line for a dsl connection. then I was in line for Fiber, I ended up with a new provider in my town....

[@SL4RK]

I can't even imagine what could be worse than constant 3g/4g interruptions and ping jumps from 100 to 1000-5000ms every 5 minutes with packet loss of 5-10%, all this was about 10 years ago, my nervous system has not recovered since then and is unlikely to do so. ps at the moment it is still impossible to use mobile internet for realtime activity, constantly losing packets and jumps ping, the promise to put a few more towers 10 years ago is still not fulfilled!

[@dearyvettetn4489]

As a Chattanoogan preparing to move away in a couple of years our EPB internet service is high on my list of things that I’ll miss terribly when I go. And it’s sad that elected officials in this state can see an example like Chattanooga’s and bend over backwards to pass laws to prevent the state from benefiting from it. This selfishness and shortsightedness is one of the reasons I just can’t stay here.

[@zoomzabba452]

The POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service) companies have been payed BILLIONS of tax dollars over the decades to upgrade their telecommunication networks, but haven't. They could have already supplied fiber to the neighborhood, if not fiber to the home for the majority of Americans as a replacement of the 100+ year old copper infrastructure. This would have preempted the cable company stranglehold.

[@ryanbrown982]

The European model is better. They separated the infrastructure from the service provider. So the cable gets laid once, then the service providers lease from them and resell to end consumers. This forces competition (assuming the leasing fees aren't problematic.) Incidentally, there's a European company called Open Infra that's trying the same thing here in the US. Coincidentally, they recently ran fiber to my home and I'm loving the 20x speed increase over what I had before them for the exact same monthly price.

[@annonomuzhooman]

I am writing this comment solely to use the undersea cables.

[@chillaxter13]

IMHO, corporate lobbying is one of the worst, most pervasive problems the US (and Canada) currently face. It ensures that life can never improve for the average person, and wealth always flows 1 way.

[@Nanhabby123]

Ukraine actually has been using starlink during the war. It has helped them immensely especially after their internet access was corrupted by Russians. This is a double edge sword, though, because Starlink stopped offering internet to Ukraine during an important counter attack of theirs. It’s important to note that these corporations have the ultimate say in who gets what, when.

[@benduncan4027]

Starlinks are helpful not only in the places where otherwise there would be no connection but helped a lot during blackouts as they were connected to generators and provided internet when the telecom grid and local internet providers didn’t have any power.

[@fredsasse9973]

The only place Starlink is blocked is in Crimea as it is considered (temporarily, I hope) Russian territory. As such the US and international sanctions in effect there and Starlink is included in the sanctions.

[@benduncan4027]

@@fredsasse9973 This is partially true. The whole story is that Ukrainian Armed Forces were doing an attack on Crimea with naval drones and those naval drones had Starlink onboard to control them and right at the moment of the attack Musk turned the Starlinks off and Ukrainian soldiers lost control of drones and the attack was unsuccessful. As later discovered and confirmed by Musk he did this for personal reasons and now actually the Pentagon controls the work of Starlinks in Ukraine to prevent such situations in the future. You might ask why Musk gave up the control of Starlinks in Ukraine and the explanation is that he has too much subsidies and contracts from the US government including those for the military and he didn’t want to lose all of that.

[@bugsygoo]

​@@fredsasse9973ah, no, sorry. Starlink is not available in China. Teslas are though. In fact, they make them here. I wonder if there's a connection? (No pun intended!)

[@Devit42]

I started to find trends in USA problems: Big companies openly lobbying and no laws agaist lobbying. basicly legalized corruption in politics

[@theguywithaname4432]

I did a research project in college on the effects of launching satellites into space both internet and military and the effects of it. (I’m an astrophysics major) and all my professors say they hate how not having any regulation in this effects any form or ground based research

[@Blox117]

*affects

[@theguywithaname4432]

@@Blox117 damn 💀💀 no way I missed that.

[@vdruskas]

Can you do one on cell phone providers?

[@LeviHildebrandYT]

let's see how this one does first 👀 but it's definitely an interesting one!

[@NotSazuki]

I think cellphone providers mirror what was discussed in this video. They kinda all are bad.

[@Juan-rd5jf]

⁠@@LeviHildebrandYT me on my way to watch and like this video on 5,000,000 alt accounts so this video does well:

[@vdruskas]

yea, was thinking the same, unfortunately@@NotSazuki

[@thekbob6369]

@@LeviHildebrandYT dig into the hidden cost of text messaging that we grew up with, that's even more fun. Hint, the character limit was originally due to piggybacking off "free space" on the signal that kept your phone synced to towers. And the cost per text message trend of the 90s and 00s was just ridiculously free profits from the major telecoms; data plans are what killed cost per text message... funny how we aren't asked to pay for them anymore, huh? Phone data is the dumbest, most expensive data we consume due to natural monopolies thanks to the limitations of the electromagnetic spectrum. Would make for a great video!

[@ricardoludwig4787]

whenever there is something that becomes a natural monopoly, a rational society would always either have it outright nationalized or at least make it a public utility

[@chinguunerdenebadrakh7022]

Dunno, my country has like 3 national providers and we have pretty good internet while having GDP per capita like 15 times smaller than the US. I think it isn't just the fact that it's a private venture that's the problem in the US.

[@doujinflip]

Right, we once did this with previously private electricity companies which have the same physical reach constraints.

[@fordprefect859]

At the very least, a rational society would do something about companies committing fraud left and right (Comcast).

[@srikrishna2561]

@@chinguunerdenebadrakh7022 Which country it is ?

[@KittehFox]

I mean, the average person would probably want that, but unfortunately, things are run by the corrupt people being paid by the monopolies, and the average person doesn't have enough time in their day to worry about ousting those individuals when they're having issues paying for their rent or groceries.

[@stephen7938]

A random start up that started sending out flyers for they're 10Gb/s Internet for $75 a month and randomly att who is the incumbent in the area started offering 2,5,&10Gb/s Internet over night showing they could've done it all the time but couldn't be bothered with providing such nice things for the peasants.

[@evrypixelcounts]

In the US we could use a Right to Information amendment. Something that makes internet a utility, and prevents government and corporate abuse of people's information, and the prevention of aggressive restrictions. Do I think I'll see something like this in my lifetime? No, but it's nice thought lol.

[@TheRealXidious]

As far as internet goes were slowly becomming a laughing stock, this is America WE NEED AN UPGRADE on our internet at some point the gov needs to upgrade us SOMEHOW.

[@SvetielkoVTme]

The difference to europe is staggering. I know that the Netherlands is a much more densely populated country but it still has some pretty rural parts. But Dutch government said that everyone should has access to 1gigabit internet by 2030 and if market doesn't do it, they will pay for it. Can't even compare it to just *not* having internet in this day and age

[@AntonioSS22]

AT&T spent more money lobbying to government about not needing to update their infrastructure than they would have spent actually updating their infrastructure.

[@kevinmcqueenie7420]

The fact that the only question seems to be "how much money will it make?" is the most savage indictment of our moment in history. In my opinion. Allegedly.

[@mukkaar]

This is why cables/infrastucture like these, should just be public. Just like most roads. Obviously you should privately run cable to some new development, but I think government should be one to offer the framework. And I specified all of it because otherwise private business would just take all the profitable bits, while government would have to fork out obscene amount of money for more rural communities. Competition is only good for products where it makes sense.

[@Sacto1654]

In much of Asia and Europe, the Internet infrastructure were built up by government owned telco monopolies like British Telecom in the UK, Deutsche Telekom in then-West Germany, Korea Telecom in South Korea and Nippon Telephone & Telegraph (NTT) in Japan. Here in the USA, most of the infrastructure was built up by private companies such as the "Baby Bells" in the 1980's and cable companies about the same time. As such, the American view of the Internet is different than much of the world.

[@JCRandall]

You completely forgot about fixed wireless internet service providers. As the owner of a small internet service provider I find the largest problem being the customer's lack of willing to look and educate themselves about all ISPs. I cannot tell you how many times where I had good coverage to deliver fantastic internet service to a customer and they kept coming back with cable or telephone solutions and could not understand fixed wireless broadband.

[@scittw22]

I live in a rural Missouri town and until a few months ago I was stuck with 10 Mbps DSL and one bar of cell service on a good day. My job requires home internet access and call availability so it was a major issue. Thankfully a rural fiber internet provider came into town and it's been a game changer.

[@wispiwispi1889]

Chattanooga, Tennessee, USA, EPB is no joke. In 7 years, it has only gone down 3 times. First was an expected outage with upgrades being performed on the system. Second was a piece of equipment at EPB failed and was replaced quickly. The third time it went out, I went up two floors in my condo building to check on the EPB internet there and it was working, so I knew it was just my place. So, I went back downstairs to go to my condo to call EPB. As I approached my door, a guy from EPB was coming down the hall and asked me if my internet was down. I said yes and he fixed it. I asked him how he knew I had an issue and he said it registered there at EPB that I had an issue and he was already in the area. Now that is service!

[@BlueHourProductions]

This is something that has always bugged me. We have lived in Italy for 6 years now and we pay way less for internet and phone service that is much better on average every day. Makes me sad, cause I love America.

[@ttopero]

I was surprised you didn’t mention the “5G” options that cellular companies offer as someone who experienced being an actual “cord cutter” for a year. I’m a “true” cord cutter as I only use my hotspot on my phone as my internet connection. I typically use Wi-Fi at work and/or friends when I don’t stream. But streaming from an iPhone onto an external monitor/screen has its own issues. Video idea: why are so many streaming apps blocking a (often paid) user from being able to cast onto a larger screen?! Amazon, HBO, KZbin at times, Paramount+, Peacock, Showtime, Cinemax, CW, Fox, ABC all prevent showing the video via the HDMI adapter from the iPhone, which would allow data speeds & amount based on phone usage rather than the much more limited hotspot data.

[@pasta-and-heroin]

I think you know the answer to your own question my friend 😅 that would be a consumer-friendly option, and there is no fucking way in hell that they’re willing to do that 😂 actually, here’s my prediction: in 3 years time Netflix will sell subscription additions & for an extra $9 a month it’ll work 😂

[@ttopero]

@@pasta-and-heroin no journalist has taken up the request so I’m looking at other avenues to understand the movement, not just to accept being as DONE TO. And of course I know capitalism’s forces!

[@scwirpeo]

DMCA is arguably the only reason. A good number of the shows or movies you would want to watch get caught by standards in your HDMI protocols or devices.

[@BlownMacTruck]

Being a cord cutter by removing physical internet connectivity and relying on wireless is pointless in the US. It’s a shared medium with far less reliability that is missing a huge number of important features and generally costs far more. Cord cutting is primarily done to free yourself from oppressive and limited offerings, and you’re actively pursuing that either it’s nonsensical.

[@Blox117]

@@ttopero you must be a grandma playing solitaire if you think a phone is acceptable internet service

[@jimmyngo2191]

So sad, I live in Vietnam and can use broadband internet up to 250Mps (30Mb/s) with the price of 10 dollars a month... The government and the people decided how they run their country and now paid the ultimate price for those policies.

[@xbox1445]

I won't stand for this misinformation! Mexico City not only has a bundle of phone lines on every pole, but it is phones, power, cable AND internet! 😂😂😂 Also us single kids don't get our parents things but even sometimes other family members things! Expected more from the FP Team! 😂😂😂 Love the video as always guys, hopefully we can transition in many parts of the world to reliable wireless service without having more space trash and human trash with companies like starlink 😅

[@edeon]

You forgot about the tennis shoes, a lot of those.

[@ChrisGBusby]

Living in the UK I pay £20 a month for unlimited data/calls/messages and £20 a month for unlimited home internet at 300Mb up/300Mb down. Meanwhile, the USA is money/me-me-me, with providers acting like AOL of old.

[@mbutch4480]

My weekly dose of reality

[@LeviHildebrandYT]

what we all need 😅

[@travelingman45]

Reality is kinda terrible… I like the show, I just wish it was like what the differences between two great options because there are no bad options instead

[@perotross]

I work for a small ISP in Minnesota and we are fortunate to have "Border-to-Border Broadband Development Grant Program" that helps support covering the state with broadband internet. Building a fast, reliable (fiber) network costs a lot of money. Everyone wants cheap, fast internet, but the reality is, burying fiber (especially in a rural) area costs a lot of money. So how does an ISP provide reliable high speed service at an affordable rate? The fact is, you can't. With Minnesota chipping in, it definitely helps the ISP's to be able to invest in infrastructure and hopefully be profitable, or at least break even, in a reasonable amount of time. Cooperatives (not for profit) can provide services that for profit companies would otherwise overlook because it doesn't pad their pockets and Minnesota has a large area covered by Cooperatives. Competition is difficult when infrastructure is so expensive and the end customer is looking for a value priced product. We have to leave the "made in China" mindset behind and realize that this is a Made in the USA product, and this quality product costs money to provide.

[@fredoswego]

Corporate greed and political corruption. Those 2 are reasons for just about any American shortcoming. Also, read "The Master Switch" by Tim Wu. This monopoly process has moved through newspapers, telegraph, telephone, cable and now internet. History repeats itself at every technological shift.

[@brentfisher902]

All time since 1492 was a mistake...

[@historyofapple]

Dear my state, please provide internet with high upload speeds as well. (It’s honestly ridiculous on my end, it takes 3 days to upload 120GB of data over Ethernet)

[@merlumili]

Very much agree that internet access is a human right. Coming from a country where 7 out of 10 times, the Internet is completely shit and even when its working its super slow, yeah....

[@BrianOblivionB]

So you are owed the labor of another? Interesting.

[@merlumili]

@@BrianOblivionB for something I consider a human right? Yes. We all are. Why are you acting like it would be unpaid labor.

[@BrianOblivionB]

@@merlumili I don't recall saying that it would be unpaid. That being said, you are not owed the labor of others. Positive freedoms are a lie, and that is what this is.

[@adityadubey177]

I live in India and I have access to affordable and fast internet services. For my cellular internet, I pay only 4000 rupees (50 US dollars) per year and I get unlimited 5G data. For my broadband connection, I pay 12000 rupees (150 US dollars) per year and I get 150 Mbps speed. I think this is a great deal compared to other countries.

[@RealShaktimaan]

Cost of living and population density. The USA is massive and way lower density than India.

[@MAGAIVER]

If internet service providing was made by workers for workers without the profit motive everyone would get better internet. But hey that's socialism and socialism = bad, because reasons. The necessity to profit ruins everything for everyone but those at the very top getting insanely rich from those profits.

[@zachschwartz8780]

Regardless of being a "natural" monopoly, it's still a monopoly. It should still be illegal.

[@SourRaccoon]

The US government has already forwarded a lot of money toward getting better internet speeds for the whole country. There are many new telecoms opening throughout the nation because of this. There's a draftsmen shortage, and a shortage of a lot of fiber optic supplies because of all the money being poured into upgrading the US internet. In my neighborhood alone, we went from 5mbps download top speed a few years back to a new telecom company showing up and offering 1gbps download. As long as funding continues, this is going to continue until it's nationwide.

[@willia3r]

The problem is these monopoly/oligopoly Internet Service Providers, typically in many states there 2, maybe 3 ISPs at best for a given metropolitan area and they charge exorbitant monthly rates for mediocre internet access🤨

[@SourRaccoon]

That's changing quickly.@@willia3r

[@deepspacecow2644]

@@willia3r Well, they are getting paid to run new cable. Its free customers for them, our crappy DSL provider literally cut the DSL lines in town and ran fiber. Only in town though, farther out there is only DSL

[@crinklyonion1410]

My internet barely functions on a good day, so it sucks when all my homework is completely online.

[@Hykkkkkkkmmmmm]

Europe here 10bucks for 1Gb/s fiber and excellent 4G/5G cellular network for like 8bucks

[@hunterlg13]

Dayum. I think my family pays like 40 usd for trash net.

[@gad3iii532]

First, the internet is not a basic human right, second, it only sucks for some people, mine is great (because I don't live in the middle of nowhere), third, the internet is about money, no one is going to spend billions if they can't make back more billions, except governments, but that is usually for 10 billion dollar high speed trains that go nowhere.

[@LEWISHIMLTON]

I love this channel, imma definitely get the patreon.

[@LeviHildebrandYT]

Thanks for the support here!

[@Gamer23-s6n]

Like how every cable company is selling "1 gig per second" service but it doesn't even exist, even in the NSA. But they're still happy to charge you for it and just blatantly lie even though you can perform a speed test in front of them and their mom and PROVE you're only getting 2% of that (maybe). I mean I've NEVER had over 9 mb per second download ANYWHERE in the US and I've lived in 11 states, and tested it in every major city including Chicago, Miami, Phoenix, Tucson, Dallas, Portland, Seattle, San Fran and on and on. Internet sucks everywhere.

[@meganhamlyn1694]

Living in rural New Brunswick, Canada, we had terrible internet and had to go with Starlink.

[@Skormm]

Even Starlink is ridiculously better in Europe and even some countries in Africa than it is in the us and Canada

[@scofab]

I live in rural Japan and the fiber optic cable runs straight into my router. My wifi is faster than a lot of USA hardwired hookups... bonus, it's cheap. VOIP included. Thanks again and regards.

[@luckyday_5510]

I'm surprised you never mentioned 5G Home internet. It practically solves the "it's too expensive to give internet to the rural population" problem. 1 tower can provide a gig+ connection to a huge radius of land

[@laurelsporter]

No, it doesn't. 5G extended range stops several miles before where I live, while 4G coverage is quite good on Tmo and VZW, and tolerable on AT&T (reliable, but low bars, and thus poor standby battery life on a phone). Meanwhile, I can get 2Gbps symmetrical fiber. The 500-700MHz 4G bands are far better at getting out into thesticks, and from time sticks back to the towers, than 5G on those bands, and it's not economically feasible to add the needed 5G towers, to fix that (5G was not designed to supplant 4G, as 4G was for 3G).

[@moej6014]

Our Verizon tower is oversaturated and I get less than 1Mbps download on a normal day in the evening. The city will not allow more towers to be built. I'm looking at switching our service to ATT. I did a speedtest on my moms phone when she was over once and her speed was fine.

[@drabberfrog]

I live in Florida and I'm so lucky that my house has 3 options for internet. My spectrum Internet sucked and was overpriced so I had leverage but they still couldn't match Frontier's speed and price. Don't let anyone fool you, ISP consolidation does not lower prices! Competition lowers prices. I more than doubled my download speed with frontier and no joke, increased upload speeds by 4,500%. 45 TIMES THE UPLOAD SPEED!! I feel bad for people like my grandma who live in apartment buildings and have an internet monopoly. While she doesn't need particularly high speeds since she just uses it for TV, it's still wrong.

[@Jthewoods153]

Actually the 2 MB upload speed is 2 mega bits, or about 0.5 MB upload speed

[@killingtimeitself]

it should be roughly about 1/8th the original stated speed, because a byte is 8 bits. gigabit is roughly 125 MB/s

[@saxman112]

Yeah, where I am here in Minnesota, some more options have started springing up in recent years, but in some parts, you’re still stuck with mainly 1 provider That provider being the evil that many have come to know in Comcast/Xfinity For many here in the Twin Cities metro here in Minnesota, Comcast/Xfinity more often than not is the only option for some Like I just said though, it’s been getting a little bit better though in recent years as over on the Minneapolis side of the metro there is this one local fiber internet company called US Internet, and elsewhere, there is fiber service available through both Quantum Fiber (a subsidiary of CenturyLink/Lumen) as well as another local company that seems to be focusing on the east/St. Paul side of the metro in another local company called Gateway Fiber

[@Kraze7997]

You also have to take into account how large the US is. It’s much easier to supply a country with internet when it’s the size of a state. But with that said, the US does have monopoly issues everywhere. And that’s what causes most of our consumer issues

[@killingtimeitself]

I hate when people say this because its sort of true, but also not fully true. Because if the issue is literally just the scale, you could just approach it from a state level and that solves literally every problem here. Thats why state exist after all. It's also worth considering the US is the most prominent figure in the world economy at the moment, it's hard to say that we're strapped for cash. It also doesn't excuse anything, it literally just explains the main complaint of the ISPs for the last thirty years, and does nothing to justify its existence. Yet somehow, whether its public transport, internet access, utilities, whatever, the number one most common response is "it's too big, it wont work"

[@Distress.]

​@@killingtimeitselfyou're right that we can scale up but the density is the bigger problem. There's so many empty places where it would be such a big cost for some few people. Wiring up Florida is way different than wyoming

[@killingtimeitself]

@@Distress. yeah you can say that, but then again we also managed to electrify, and to this day maintain the grid around the entirety of rural america. With a little bit of planning, and running some code in order to optimize wiring layouts, you could pretty easily run and install a new backhaul, and almost certainly make money back on it long term with how easy it is to do. Fiber isn't expensive nor complicated, unless someonw digs up an existing cable and damages it somehow its basically impossible for it to fail. Not all rural customers want or need gigabit, making it even cheaper, It's absolutely doable we just pretend that it isn't because its more convenient short term.

[@Distress.]

@@killingtimeitself true I think we can and should do it, just a little more complex than in europe. Canada and Australia are ein the same boat.

[@killingtimeitself]

@@Distress. the main problem with australia is that the entire current government is corrupt, and corpos definitely aren't worried about scamming customers.

[@Peachcreekmedia]

The price of internet in the US is a scam, a ripoff, slow, and unstable...

[@miguemesch]

Each time that I watch a new video of Future Proof I realize how lucky we are in Europe

[@stephendeo1]

Thanks for this video! I literally was having internet issues and boom! Your video came up! Naturally I liked and subscribed.

[@teddyfurstman1997]

I agree that the Internet is a Human Right.

[@LeviHildebrandYT]

basically impossible to get ahead in the current world we live in without it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[@swagmuffin9000]

Yea, just try applying to jobs without it now. You used to be able to walk into any place and just apply, but no one wants to do that anymore. That and, if you do manage to secure one, everything like schedules or communication is also done online.

[@Dtgray12]

I hate that I have to do promotions to keep my internet service cheap. The cheap options for me is still about $80+ month. I've had to do contracts to keep my bill under $50 and even when it ends I have to jump on another deal just to keep it cheap.

[@JohnyArt]

Place for a future joke

[@nonjaninja4904]

They should have fixed the shitty internet situation in the early 2000s. This country is hopeless. It should be fiber optic everywhere and cost like 20 bucks at this point. Taxes go to everything except anything useful like laying fiber optic cable. It should be a right at this point, regardless of the initial cost. It's monopoly money anyways.

[@yagogabriell]

Here in my state, in Brazil, the The state government created a neutral optical fiber so that any provider can use it and provide internet in every part of every city.The result is surprising, we are the state with the highest speed in Brazil.Prices are low and everyone has the possibility of connecting to high-speed internet. Unfortunately, other parts are related to people's finances. But it is already possible to see people leaving big cities to settle in small towns that have these great internet speeds with the advent of home office.

[@vsznry]

Natural Monopoly is what happened to legal #cannabis . Its kinda been a disaster since CA state legalization . & we got news anchors confidently spewing "Feds wont ever legalize marijuana" (When she herself likely did cocaine in fuckin '89). BUT THE INDUSTRY NEEDS RESEARCH & BANKING, & low barriers to entry.

[@federicofabulli5030]

It would be interesting to see if this lack of access is a factor behind the growth of things like Tik tok, or shorts, or instagram reels. Short video that don’t need a lot of bandwidth to be watched, or uploaded

[@basspig]

The problem with cable companies is the asymmetrical speeds oftentimes the download is 300 times faster than the upload which is at a useless speed. I was so glad when symmetrical fiber came to my area now I enjoy a 1 gigabit connection and that's upstream and downstream.

[@ArheIy]

I'm from Russia. Not from a big city, which is important. And I have an unlimited internet with max speed 8 mbites/sec... For 1000₽\10$ a month. I've never really thought about how much should the connection cost, but after hearing about USA prices it seems unbeliveably cheap. Or, rather, in USA it's unbeliveably expensive.

In France a company called «free » created in 2012 an unlimited data plan for just 15€ a month ! And also a tiny for 2€ !!

[@michaelcooper634]

One thing I wanted to say that I feel like the cellular companies like Verizon T-Mobile are starting to pull into the home Internet market and shake things up as well.

[@setaindustries]

I live in Hungary and my ISP basically upgraded my apartment to fiber optic for FREE. They even offered Gigabit internet plus 30 GB of mobile data for $20. Shit's great.

[@livingkiss]

My family's home in rural Mississippi didn't have access to anything besides extremely crappy satellite internet (very slow, 30-50GB/mo cap, drops with a hint of cloud cover) until 2019. Near the end of 2019, AT&T finished building a cell tower about 3 miles away, which allowed us to get 4G and eventually 5G LTE. It was life changing for the community. I'm so happy and grateful for the new service; we've been able to get AT&T wireless internet that is so much faster than satellite, costs about half of what we were paying, and is capped at 150GB (with reasonable options to add on more data if needed.) It's not as fast or reliable as wired internet, but a huge upgrade from satellite. There are still many other places in the US that still don't have access.

[@270Winchester]

I live in a rural parish of Louisiana and the parish spent millions getting fiber cables added to the electrical poles nearly 3 years ago. But even with miles of fiber laying around no one is able to get fiber internet since the fiber has never been hooked up to any backhaul. Im just lucky that I was able to get Tmobile home internet before it ran out of spots. Now im paying 55 a month for 250 mbps down and 15 up instead of 130 for 5 down and 2 up. Theres also a small local company that started offering wireless internet and everyones been switching to that so I got their lowest plan for 60 a month for the lower ping for playing games and I keep Tmobile for downloads and movies.

[@juantelle1]

I lived in mexico my whole life having 4G coverage pretty much everywhere in urban areas (paying ~$20). First month living here, entering into buildings or dense areas - no coverage at all (I use Verizon btw)

[@63saruman]

I live in Mexico City: when I visit my partner in Virginia I'm amazed how slow the internet is. Yes, we are very spoiled.

[@WhiteWulfe]

We need better options. Yup, and meanwhile the Canadian government was perfectly fine with Roger's gobbling up Shaw...

[@stifledmind]

I live 35 minutes outside of Atlanta on a street where everyone has 3.5 acres of land and thankfully I have 2+ 1 Gb options. ATT Fiber and Xfinity.

[@_ian69]

Where I live it’s a big fking racket for service providers. We get the semi local astound(garbage) broadband and the only other option is frontier. I’m out in the country but can’t wait for comcast or any other provider to eventually get out here.

[@kb9liq]

around here so many crews are running fiber in just about every town around. One county seat north of here had some many crews working and hitting so much in the ground that made them all stop work until they can figure out how to keep them from hitting so many gas, water, sewer and electric lines. Not sure where their issue is because I know one of the crews up there is really good an doing their job and not hitting stuff. Guessing it is the locating company and the maps they have.

[@DBJohnson2k]

Chattanooga was the first to bring out 1gb internet, it did force Comcast and ATT to drop there price on internet for sure. And Comcast fight hard to stop EPB from putting internet in everyone homes. then to make matter worst, EPB gave all the schools and public parks and areas Free internet. and even put free wifi internet all thou downtown chatt and in some neighborhood. then the bus company added wifi wifi on there buses. so you can pretty much get free internet anywhere around the city.

[@spiralpython1989]

In Australia we complain about broadband speeds, but we have a Government business (NBN) that maintains and slowly, continually, upgrades broadband to all residential and business locations. And they also maintain satellite internet to remote areas (of which there is a lot in Australia). One of the major reasons is that our fixed line telephony was never privately owned, (the now privatised national telecommunications agency, Telstra, actually owns the lines and rents out access to isps) and we did not have ‘cable’ until decades after USA, and by that time, most new homes had cable connections as part of their fixed line telephone connection (which is a required utility in new build town residential areas), so having a non competitive system from the start might mean slower access for some, but it does mean adequate access for all…

[@Lorentari]

Future Proof writers be like: "They have succeeded in every country in Northern Europe to secure cheap high-speed internet, so they obviously made it work even though there are several providers operating in each individual country - But let's completely ignore that"

[@juddy953]

If you think American internet sucks you should see the Australian internet, we are 56th in the world it it's $100/month for 90-100mbps speed. Higher speeds cost 1.5x or even 2x more

[@64A64B2WEST]

Me & my wife traveled India last month and we both were shocked to see there 5g speed of 1 company was 1.2-2 gbps, i forgot the company name it’s very famous there, in my home town Texas speed is just what ok but plans are way to expensive.

[@elizabethhedgspeth]

We moved to a little town outside of Nashville, far enough out to be considered rural. The county has municipal internet and it has been the best internet we have ever had. We have gigabit, and customer service because we are dealing with people who live here has been incredible.

[@thetruth1446]

Im in Knoxville and get 1000gs ip and down from KUB/Utility company. They just put it in but AT&T rents it and charges $30 more

[@ryanhall3689]

I do like your content but I find it funny that you base all your content on the US and talk down about a lot of the ways we do things while you live in Canada. Can't imagine you guys are perfect up there

[@yuviaro3511]

I live downtown in an apartment in the Netherlands. I pay 40 a month for a 1MB upload and 100MB download, while apartment blocks next to me have optic fibre. Real monopolies are a bitch