11.2 million British households don't want broadband!

a line failure

Whats all this about!

mike65

If you could use the net with BB without need for a PC and all the attendent horrors (or perceived horrors) then there would be much more enthusiasm.

Most people alive in UK were bought up in the pre-PC era. They don't see the point of having one at home as they view it as a work tool. It needs to feel like a TV, someone (unison?) tried a simple plug-in terminal/keyboard once did'nt they?

Mike.

watty

It doesn't want to feel like a TV... That's a horrid product concept. That's why it's dead.

pre-IBM "PC"s with dialup BBS etc arround from 1976. THIRTY years ago.

TV only widely introduced in early 1950s and by 1970s everyone had it.

My 76 year old dad is very happy using his "all in one" scanner/copier/printer, digital camera, PC, Broadband and MP3 recorder(to record live sessions as he learns acccordian).

The fact is unless all Gov / council services and other stuff is online and easier to use for many people they have no need of Internet.

I've used Internet web browsing since about 1993 and email / dialup services online since 1980. I have no interest in Video or Audio downloads, I buy DVDs and CDs. Better value & Quality.

However ordering my road tax, NCT etc online definately beats queing in an office.

Frankly Windows, Mac, Ubuntu are NOT user friendly to the newcommer. In reality PC usability has not increased much since early 1990s GUIs and first versions of Excel & Word (on Mac as there was no PC windows working).

Newer versions confuse prettyness, gloss, candy and animation with ease of use. The busier interfaces are more distracting and confusing. When you try to do more the newer interfaces may even "hide" features in mistaken ide of ease of use and the user never discovers the "commands" / "features".

Once good suppliers did some configuring for customer as the "out of the box OS" is never right for people. Now the margin on selling is too little and the the administration to change the "desktop" is so much more time consuming this is never done anymore (XP, OSX and Ubuntu equally bad).

I'm not surprised. There is indeed NO reason why everyone should have a PC and Internet, unless paper mail and all government / council/ P.Os / Banks etc offices are closed.

No-one in our house would be without Broadband, but we do stuff that actually NEEDs the Internet.

If someone would never use mailorder or Argos catalog shop, they would like online ordering less.

Dellas

There are plenty of people that just dont want it. My mum doesnt want it and lots of older people just dont need it. Just because you dont want or need BB doesnt mean your alien . Some people dont want 3G mobiles they just prefer simple things. I personally couldnt live without my 3G phone . Sky TV and my laptop but I understand those that can.

netwhizkid

Genie that is surprising, I guess if they were informed of the cheapness of VOIP they would get it rather pronto. I have been on the Internet since 1998 and find it invaluable, I made my first Internet purchase in 2004 and must have spent about 3 grand since, I even used it to find my car in the UK.

Build the network and they will come, there isn't even that here, Many of the big American skyscrapers were empty for ages and they were light up at night to give the perception of fullness. There is even a road bridge in Canada or USA (not sure which??) that was built with an empty lower deck for a Railway, it was utilised over 50yrs after the bridge was built, that was forward planning. Planners here can't see beyond the next election and politics & cronyism is doing wreck.

jimmycrackcorm

The french did something right with Minitel - Perhaps a new paradigm of this is required to push general BB usage.

Freddie59

a line failure wrote:

Whats all this about!

Personnally I'm not surprised. We must remember that most people are only NOW becoming familiar with PCs - let alone Broadband. You can't beat them with a stick to take it. It also amazes me the panic that there is in this country about Broadband.

A very large swathe of all urban areas now have access to several forms of the technology. Does anyone know the take-up levels in these areas, given that they have a wide choice?

The way some groups, and the Government, go on you'd swear it wasn't available ANYWHERE!