Broadband users signing up at slower rate
So many Americans have already moved from slower to high-speed Internet connections on their home computers that the growth rate of new high-speed customers is tapering off, a new report says.
The Pew Research Center found that from December 2004 to May 2005 the number increased only 3 percent -- a statistically insignificant rise. By contrast, from November 2003 to May 2004, the number of adults with high-speed Internet at home rose 20 percent, according to the study released Wednesday.
Adults who use an older and slower connection -- a dial-up phone number -- to gain access to the Internet expressed far less desire to switch to a high-speed connection -- available from their phone or cable companies -- in 2005 compared with 2002. The findings suggest the adoption of high-speed Internet service in America has gone from rapidly climbing to approaching a plateau.
``There are fewer people hankering for high speed now and that means less pent-up demand for broadband,'' said John B. Horrigan, the report's author.
Dial-up customers who were frustrated by their connection speeds three years ago have probably already upgraded, and remaining dial-up customers are not likely to make the switch because they don't go online that often, according to the report.
``Today's dial-up users are older, less educated and with lower income than their counterparts in 2002, all factors associated with tepid Internet use,'' Horrigan said. ``With fewer new Internet users coming online these days, the stock of potential broadband subscribers is not being replenished.''
Creative Strategies analyst Tim Bajarin, who reviewed the Pew study, said it do ents a bona fide lull in the growth of high-speed Internet services, but said the lull is only temporary.
``As content becomes richer and more compelling, and as prices go down, I have to believe we'll see it take off again,'' he said.
Telecommunications and cable companies are investing huge amounts of money into technology -- such as fiber optics -- that will deliver video and television to devices over the Internet, he said. And when those services are offered to mainstream consumers in about three years, more people will sign up for high-speed Internet access.
``It's inevitable that it'll go up again,'' Bajarin said. ``The cable guys are counting on that. If you're Verizon, you're not pouring millions into a fiber-optic network if you're not expecting that to rise.''
Pew surveyed about 2,000 Americans twice a year from 2002 to 2005 for the report. As of this spring, 66 million Americans had high-speed Internet connections at home, the study found.
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Personally, I made the switch a month after I bought my computer three years ago and have never looked back. I can't imagine ever going back to dial up.
DSL is a rip off because the baby bells won't pull fiber... they want to keep you on cheap untwisted unshielded copper... they even tried to SUE Time Warner to keep them from offering data and phone on the Fiber that the cable companies PURCHSED brand new and pulled everwhere...
I.E. they just want to send you the bill with no fiber...
As long as people buy DSL they will just sit on there ass.. if everyone demanded fiber or NO CASH then they would have go get past WWII copper line technology...
I don't have DSL anyway...I have cable as well as the digital phone.
I am supposed to get DSL from the local telephone Co-op in the next few months (they just laid the cable).
Even out in the country we are getting some higher-speed internets.
There are some pulling the proper wire... as long as it's not on the analog wire... it can be a proper copper backbone.. but ya know not phone lines.. they bleed to much and the resistance is way to high because of how long they are.
The VCR makers need our help also
bump
JIMCS needs your help DUFF
i shot milk out of my nose...nice one.
I have Yahoo SBC DSL. It has been working good but the past 2 days, its been ing up. My broadband link on my thing has been going from orange to green and so on. It'll do that for awhile then stop.
I dunno something just tells me you would not talk so much if you were in face to face with ole boy. Punks like you look funny getting knocked the out for dumb like that. Laying on the floor with your arm in the air counting birds, I can see it know.
I would be so ashamed to start a thread on this forum If I owed someone $800 dollars.
I have TWC cable modem & digital phone ... I rarely have any problems, but the phone and the internet run off the same modem....so if I have internet problems I can't call and at them.
Has Anybody Heard Of The New Tgx Wires
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