A matter of economics
Despite the recognition of broadband as an important issue across the political spectrum, not everyone agrees that it merits federal involvement. Sceptics and fiscal conservatives say the government should not provide funding or tax breaks to develop broadband networks, arguing that such financial incentives are unfair and could disrupt natural competition in the marketplace.
To be sure, much of the push for faster networks comes from high-tech companies that stand to benefit directly from equipment sales. These businesses have lobbied heavily and consistently for greater national investment, particularly since venture capital for telecommunications dried up with the dot-com bust.
At the top of the scale are giants such as Cisco Systems and Nortel Networks, which provide the routers and other technologies that send data across networks. Smaller companies would also benefit, such as OneEighty Networks, which last month helped create a 100-block-wide public Wi-Fi hot spot in its hometown of Spokane or Tropos Networks whose equipment helped Garland create a public safety network based on Wi-Fi.
But economists say the positive effects of broadband will be felt far beyond the networking industry and could add between $300bn and $500bn a year to the US economy. One widely cited study, led by a Brookings Institution researcher, predicts that ubiquitous broadband access could create 1.2 million jobs in the United States.
New employment could come from such companies as Visicu, which provides the equipment that Berg's hospital in Hawaii uses to monitor intensive care unit operations in Guam. Within information technology alone, expanding businesses would range from small companies such as CyberTech Media, which digitises video for presentations inside corporate networks, to industry stalwarts like Intel, which sees broadband wireless components as a new market.
Many economists view broadband as a vital part of the next technology wave that they believe will drive growth and improve productivity. Although no one is predicting anything on the scale of the 1990s high-tech gold rush, broadband could make real many theoretical uses of the Internet touted in the early days of its development as a mainstream medium.
Such prospects have prompted rural development agencies into making plaintive calls for broadband investments, to avoid being left out of another digital economic boom.
"We see broadband as a key, key component for economic development in this region," said Marc DeFalco, who heads the telecommunications programme for the Appalachian Regional Commission, a 13-state economic development agency. "We look on broadband as a means of opening up rural areas to the same opportunities that people would have in urban areas."
Talkback
Perhaps possible in the USA, but unfortunately of little relevance to the UK.
In fact as more users sign-up for broadband in the UK & the contention ratio effect becomes more noticeable, plus the inability of many websites to cope, broadband can of course slow to below dial-up speeds.
A recent report actually cast doubts on the value of the Internet in education, etc.
Perhaps we should be discouraging the use of the Internet, not encouraging the use of it in conjunction with more life critical processes.
Imagine what would happen if the connection 'drops' at a critical point?
100% valid comment,broadband is not sweeping the streets of s.e. u.s.a.,human beings must limit their reliance on technology,life is hardwork,not as easy as the push of a button,technology will never care about us,living like the "jetsons"to me is a scary thought,no flowers,no lawn to mow,a technological "catastrophe"would result in more deaths than any war to date.would every one be scrambling to find an operational computer to survive instead of water,food,shelter.Seems no entity can do without "technology".the fireman,cops,doctor I will be without,if i'm not online?slow down.