I got some news for you about Australia then.

Where the hell are you getting 10Gbps for $50/mo? I'm paying $95/mo for 1Gbps

That sounds like a coax network instead of fiber.

Yeah Australia still hasn't quite caught up to the internet speeds some other countries had 15 years ago. It's kinda sad. I'm still sad the original (good) NBN got replaced by the janky NBN that's taken years to fix.

The other weird thing in Australia is that even the expensive fibre plans are asymmetric. Most countries that have fibre have a 1Gbps symmetric plan (meaning upload and download are both 1Gbps) whereas the 1Gbps NBN plan has a ridiculously low ~50Mbps upload speed.

I moved from Australia to the USA in 2013. Back then, I had ~9Mbps ADSL2+ in Australia, compared to 600Mbps in the USA. Huge difference. Now I've got 10Gbps symmetric in the USA for $50/month through a local ISP.

Relevant xkcd

It sure does, but AFAIK it was only available to houses that use fiber (FTTP - fiber to the premises) until recently. My mum could only get 250Mbps max over the coax network before (Aussies refer to it as "HFC" - hybrid fiber and coax).

They do have a 1000/250 plan but it's ridiculously expensive compared to the "standard" 1000/50 (called "NBN 1000" - NBN is the National Broadband Network)

ranked by Speedtest.net data

I have no other ideas to collect that data better but i'm sure that does not give a good generic view of the reality. Every tech I know in Sweden uses bredbandskollen. Even if an end-users is asked if they did test speed and delay, the site was bredbandskollen in nearly 100% of the cases if they had done so. Therefore I dare say speedtest is missing data and that list has no statistical relevance outside the scope of the speedtest user population.

Also, measuring speedtest result tells us about the subscription users took out. It does not tell anything about availability. I can get Gbit here, but subscribed to 100/100 because my average is low

This is yet another thing the Republicans have been attacking (funding for rural broadband providers). Our rural areas are actually extremely well covered. Most of the midwest is fibered up. My local co-op’s minimum offered speed is 350x350.

I'm still sad the original (good) NBN got replaced by the janky NBN that's taken years to fix.

Malcolm Turnbull is the one I blame most for that. It was his party's policy, but it was his charisma and perceived technology knowledge that sold it.

And he did it for the chance of being PM, not because it was the correct course of action for the betterment of the people he was supposed to be representing.

Imagine selling out an entire country's future for a promotion. What a cockhead.

If it's like here in Finland, coverage means there's a fibre running under the street in front (or close enough nearby) but because it costs quite a lot to connect a building to it, especially if you want higher speeds and have to start retrofitting every apartment, many haven't done it.

For example our house officially has fibre coverage, but the street-to-house connection costs ~1800€ which is why we still run a VDSL while the apartment building down the street has 10Gbit to every apartment.

I'm in a rural place and I just have DSL for my house and LTE for my phone. Lived here 20 years and that's the worst thing about it.

And yet, developers still build sites that load 500kb of JS just to display 5kb of text.

We don’t need faster speeds, we need more reasonable and thoughtful site design. Most sites are ridiculously overengineered, and don’t need a lot of what has been stuffed into them.

My ISP used to advertise about fiber because their backend is fiber but residential connections are coax with DOCSIS whatever. One of the downsides is assymetric up/download speeds. Upload gets reduced to favour download and you get these whack ratios.

You know we use the internet to transfer way more than most websites right?

over 1,120 miles (1,802 kilometers).

This is the most American thing ever. Taking an official number (1,808km), converting it to customary units (1,123mi) rounding it (1,120mi) then converting it back again with rounding error.

I also have to laugh when someone takes a very rough estimate (around a hundred miles) and converts it to metric with 4 significant figures (160.9 km). Even 160 is too precise when talking about a distance of 80-120 miles. If the original number has 1 sigfig, the conversion should too, even if that feels way off.

And yet, developers still build sites that load 500kb of JS just to display 5kb of text.

We don’t need faster speeds, we need more reasonable and thoughtful site design. Most sites are ridiculously overengineered, and don’t need a lot of what has been stuffed into them.