4 ms·

Europeans really barely understand the US. Yes, of course, we understand how investing in communities makes a society work. What Europeans don’t understand is j

Europeans really barely understand the US. Yes, of course, we understand how investing in communities makes a society work. What Europeans don’t understand is just how fucking huge the US is and how low-density huge swaths of the country are. Farmers might live 500 miles from a metro of 100,000 people. It’s a huge challenge to give everyone fiber without the 1% of hyper rural America doubling costs for everyone else.

ohgodplsno 6y ago
Yes, yes, all of Europe fits into Texas, and even Texas fits into Texas, and that's just one state. We get how mind-bogglingly huge the US is. It's been said over and over again by every single american whenever the subject of your subpar infrastructure comes up. Europe is just as big. Not as dense, maybe. But your telcos were given hundreds of billions to do something (that should have been the job of the government), and simply pocketed them, with your government doing nothing about it. So, if that money was properly invested, instead of polluting low orbit, that'd be nice.
- syshum 6y ago
  I have zero intrest in having the government control my access to information, no thank you That the biggest thing Europeans do not understand about the US, many of us hate our government, distrust our government, and the only thing we desire from government is for them to leave us alone.. The US is a individualist nation, not a collectivist nation, though many are trying very hard to change that.
  - pedrocr 6y ago
    You have it backwards. Almost none of the telecom infrastructure in Europe is state owned. As the comment you are replying to explained it's in the US where huge government incentives were paid out to telecom companies for broadband deployment who then proceeded to pocket that money and sit on their hands.
  - ohgodplsno 6y ago
    >I have zero intrest in having the government control my access to information, no thank you They kind of already do. NSA splitters are common knowledge by now, and PRISM was yet another proof that they have access to most of your data. Make no mistake, if the US government wants to find you or what you've been doing, it won't be hard for them. You're either dealing with Mossad or Not Mossad: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/08/mickens_on_secu.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/08/mickens_on_se...
- thehappypm 6y ago
  You're dismissing the very valid geographic argument completely by being snobby.
pedrocr 6y ago
This argument shows up in all these discussions and is way way overused. The EU only has ~2-3x the population density of the USA. It's not even a single order of magnitude and people have already given examples of how very remote places in Europe have very reasonable infrastructure. If you already have telephone and/or electricity poles to somewhere running fiber is definitely an easy problem to tackle for what is supposed to be the world's most advanced economy. Capture by telco special interests is a much more likely explanation.
- thehappypm 6y ago
  3x population density is a lot, no? That means for every person that can access, say, a fiber line in the US, 3 people could access it in Europe. That would seriously change the economics. Further, the US's population density is very varied. About a third of the country (the non-coastal West) is very, very sparsely populated, punctuated by only a few semi-large cities like Denver and Phoenix. If you live on the coasts or the Great Lakes, density is a lot like Europe and the services are similar. In between, it's really, really sparsely populated. https://www.census.gov/dmd/www/pdf/512popdn.pdf https://www.census.gov/dmd/www/pdf/512popdn.pdf

ohgodplsno 6y ago

Yes, yes, all of Europe fits into Texas, and even Texas fits into Texas, and that's just one state. We get how mind-bogglingly huge the US is. It's been said over and over again by every single american whenever the subject of your subpar infrastructure comes up. Europe is just as big. Not as dense, maybe. But your telcos were given hundreds of billions to do something (that should have been the job of the government), and simply pocketed them, with your government doing nothing about it. So, if that money was properly invested, instead of polluting low orbit, that'd be nice.

syshum 6y ago
I have zero intrest in having the government control my access to information, no thank you That the biggest thing Europeans do not understand about the US, many of us hate our government, distrust our government, and the only thing we desire from government is for them to leave us alone.. The US is a individualist nation, not a collectivist nation, though many are trying very hard to change that.
- pedrocr 6y ago
  You have it backwards. Almost none of the telecom infrastructure in Europe is state owned. As the comment you are replying to explained it's in the US where huge government incentives were paid out to telecom companies for broadband deployment who then proceeded to pocket that money and sit on their hands.
- ohgodplsno 6y ago
  >I have zero intrest in having the government control my access to information, no thank you They kind of already do. NSA splitters are common knowledge by now, and PRISM was yet another proof that they have access to most of your data. Make no mistake, if the US government wants to find you or what you've been doing, it won't be hard for them. You're either dealing with Mossad or Not Mossad: https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/08/mickens_on_secu.html https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2015/08/mickens_on_se...
thehappypm 6y ago
You're dismissing the very valid geographic argument completely by being snobby.

pedrocr 6y ago

This argument shows up in all these discussions and is way way overused. The EU only has ~2-3x the population density of the USA. It's not even a single order of magnitude and people have already given examples of how very remote places in Europe have very reasonable infrastructure. If you already have telephone and/or electricity poles to somewhere running fiber is definitely an easy problem to tackle for what is supposed to be the world's most advanced economy. Capture by telco special interests is a much more likely explanation.

thehappypm 6y ago
3x population density is a lot, no? That means for every person that can access, say, a fiber line in the US, 3 people could access it in Europe. That would seriously change the economics. Further, the US's population density is very varied. About a third of the country (the non-coastal West) is very, very sparsely populated, punctuated by only a few semi-large cities like Denver and Phoenix. If you live on the coasts or the Great Lakes, density is a lot like Europe and the services are similar. In between, it's really, really sparsely populated. https://www.census.gov/dmd/www/pdf/512popdn.pdf https://www.census.gov/dmd/www/pdf/512popdn.pdf