Akamai’s released its quarterly “State of the Internet” report last Wednesday. I’m sure it comes as no surprise to anyone who knows anything about the Internet in South Korea that South Korea topped the list of with an average connection speed of 14.6 Mbps. This is a quarterly increase of 29 percent and an annual increase of 16 percent.
However, last year South Korea announced its goal to have Internet speeds up to 1 GBps by 2012. In 2009 South Korea immediately got started to reach that goal.
Therefore, the steep jump between the second quarter and the third quarter probably has a lot to do with them beginning to install the infrastructure to be required for that increase in speed
During the third quarter of 2009, most countries in the top-10 for Internet performance averaged an 18 percent increase in speed from the second quarter. Ireland came in second for the most improved. They had a 26 percent increase to 5.3 Mbps.
Due to the significant increase of mobile devices, the report also talked about the mobile market it its report.
The report also ranked countries on the number of cyber attacks. On that list, China was in the top-10 ranking fourth behind Russia, Brazil and the United States.
Source: CNET – Akamai: World’s Net connection speeds rising
How long till the US catches up? Did not realize Brazil was so far a head in the game.
Um, Brazil is far ahead in terms of cyber attacks not Internet speed. ;) However, I lived in Korea for 8 years and the USA hasn't caught up yet, I'm not holding my breath.
I'm pretty sure that the speed will increase continuously. I'm living in South Korea, and IT people here are trying to boost up the speed in mobile field too, especially focusing on our own tech Mobile WiMAX (called WiBro here) to meet increasing use of smart phones and mobile wifi devices. Yes, I think that's a matter of infrastructure. KT, one of the biggest ISPs and telecom carriers, has invested huge amount of resources to build up its infrastructure, such as burying bunch of fiber optic cables under major ground here. :)
I think it's time to rethink what we're after here.
Internet speed? I think it's high enough. For the first time I can copy media from the internet faster than from the laptop in my LAN.
The main 2 problems still left are callback time (I still get 200-300ms responses from many many resources) and security (confidentiality, activity filtering to protect kids from playing on webcam with some pedophile)
Oh, and the US won't catch up soon.
Korea is small, very urbanized. The US is large, with a lot of small towns. To conduct communications through optic fiber it would cost a fortune, so most of the US still uses DSL, Dial-up, cable, satellite.
Looking at the difference between South korea and the next closest competition and the speed is doubled! Envious here in the states… it takes forever to upload videos on to youtube sometimes
How much does 14.6 mbps cost in S Korea, in US Dollars, per month?
just looked it up at KT’s internet service (there are other internet companies), but there’s only a 50mbps max option and a 100mbps max option. The 50mbps is 38000 won (about $40) a month without any contract and 28500 won (about $30) for a 4 yr contract. (there are other contracts too) 100mbps is not that more expensive with 42000 won (about $45) without contract and 31800 won for 4 yr contract
I just got back from Romania and in this country you can have a 100 mbps with only EUR25/month! Ilink is the name of the ISP that offers this incredible speed with this low cost!
I’ve been MIA, but so glad to see this discussion is still going. ;)
I think there are a few countries, including the USA, that are trying to catch up. I’m glad to read that Romania is onboard with a fast ISP. I think it should be a priority for all nations because then their citizens get all this information that is virtually at their finger tips.