Finland makes 1Mb broadband access a legal right

ucdperson

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10374831-2.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

Finland's Ministry of Transport and Communications has made 1-megabit broadband Web access a legal right, YLE, the country's national broadcasting company, reported on Wednesday.

According to the report, every person in Finland (a little over 5 million people, according to a 2009 estimate) will have the right of access to a 1Mb broadband connection starting in July. And they may ultimately gain the right to a 100Mb broadband connection.

Just more than a year ago, Finland said it would make a 100Mb broadband connection a legal right by the end of 2015. Wednesday's announcement is considered an intermediate step.

France, one of a few countries that has made Internet access a human right, did so earlier this year. France's Constitutional Council ruled that Internet access is a basic human right. That said, it stopped short of making "broadband access" a legal right. Finland says that it's the first country to make broadband access a legal right.

But Finland's definition of "access" to broadband is a little fuzzy. According to the Helsinki Times when it reported the 100Mb target last year, the Finnish government said that no household "would be farther than 2 kilometers from a connection capable of delivering broadband Internet with a capacity of at least 100 megabits of data a second." It did say, though, that "about 2,000 (households) in far-flung corners of the country" wouldn't be included. Ostensibly, Finland plans to keep that same distribution when its 1Mb broadband access is implemented.

Finland has long been a tech-industry leader that has done a fine job investing in technology, more than many of its European counterparts. It's also home to Nokia, among other tech firms.

Sponge Bob

The Finns don't **** about with Universal Availablility , that's why . Nor do they prioritise Fibre to the Fishes instead of Fibre to the Home

When the Finns were nearly switched to all Digital TV in 2007 and turning off analogue they found that the coverage was rather patchy . This is understandable in a country that is 5 times the size of Ireland with nearly the same population.

They decided they needed another 48 transmitters to do the job properly and they built the LOT in 6 or 9 Months .

By contrast Ireland has built 10 Digital TV transmitters in the two years since the Finns decided to build 48 and did it in 6 or 9 months.

SEE

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055123954&referrerid=59211

Futhermore remote in Finland often means 10 -20 miles from anybody else AND living above the Artic circle.

Finally they allocated some of the analogue spectrum to wireless BB at 450mhz and this is the coverage they have achieved in the four years since they started building it .

http://www.450laajakaista.fi/karttapalvelu/

The EU had the following observation to make 6 months ago.

http://ec.europa.eu/information_society/policy/ecomm/doc/implementation_enforcement/annualreports/14threport/fi.pdf

Finland is the EU Member State with the fourth highest broadband penetration. In addition mobile broadband subscriptions have increased significantly in 2008. Competition in the mobile market has catered for intense usage of mobile communications as well as increasing
fixed-to-mobile substitution. The switch-over to digital broadcasting has been completed.

On the regulatory side, the NRA continued to address competition issues proactively. The second round of market analyses in the most substantial markets is finished, and the third round is ongoing. A significant development in 2008 was the development of the national
broadband strategy, which was adopted by the Finnish Government at the end of 2008.

REGULATORY ENVIRONMENT
Main regulatory developments
A national Broadband Action Plan for 2009-2015 was adopted by the Finnish Government in December 2008. It mainly aims to ensure comprehensive broadband provision throughout the
country. According to this plan, connections of on average 1 Mbps would be part of the universal service as of 2010, and very high speed (100 Mbps) should be available throughout the country from 2015.

Finland switched to all-digital television transmissions in March 2008, and thereby became one of the first European countries to switch over to all-digital television viewing including cable. In June 2008 the Finnish Government decided that the frequencies freed up — the
digital dividend — will be used for the provision of mobile broadband services and new television channels.

Several important policy initiatives regarding e.g. high-speed broadband, the availability of basic electronic communications services, and market-based frequency management have followed on from studies carried out at the initiative of the Minister of Communications
appointed in 2007.

also

By the end of the year 2008, Finland had a total of 1 625 745 fixed broadband access
lines.

cgarvey

Is that legal right as watertigth as our own USO? I.e. just short of a "best-effort" basis by having some very lax controls in there? 28k8 dialup isn't a legal right in this country, for example.

trekkypj

The answer would seem to be for us to introduce a USO which requires that broadband of at least 4Mbps should be available on all fixed line services by Jan 1, 2012.

Any operator which doesn't comply should be fined heavily on a scale based on the number of lines it has failed to bring in line with the USO. Or in the case of refusal to implement the USO, the possibility of forfeiture of its licenses to operate telecoms services.

There should also be a USO requirement in relation to contention ratios IMHO, especially for 3g mobile internet.

watty

trekkypj wrote: »

There should also be a USO requirement in relation to contention ratios IMHO, especially for 3g mobile internet.

It's not physically possible on ANY mobile system. You can't control where the Modems are used.

bk

watty wrote: »

It's not physically possible on ANY mobile system. You can't control where the Modems are used.

You could however force them to meet certain averages. e.g 95% of time it isn't more then 24:1.

Sponge Bob

Yeah but that can only really be done by denying service to new devices in a cell after a threshold is reached .

oscarBravo

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Yeah but that can only really be done by denying service to new devices in a cell after a threshold is reached .

Which completely destroys the real point of mobile data services: to be able to access Internet content on a mobile phone when required.

watty

oscarBravo wrote: »

Which completely destroys the real point of mobile data services: to be able to access Internet content on a mobile phone when required.

Exactly.
I calculate the percentage of fixed users makes it much more likely in Ireland that A Mobile user will get 1/4 speed or no connection compared with countries with decent fixed Internet Provision.

We NEED a decent Mobile Data netwok. But it can only be that if the 80% that are fixed data users get Fixed Broadband.

Sponge Bob

watty wrote: »

We NEED a decent Mobile Data netwok. But it can only be that if the 80% that are fixed data users get Fixed Broadband.

I take it that you mean primary or exclusive users of mobile products who use it at home ...because it is cheap .

There is another cohort who use it in addition to a fixed product...as they are on the move a lot or commute by train for example .

The chief executive of 3 Ireland calculates the split as 50:50 on his network .

I remember doing a crude calculation by dividing user bases among sectors .

On the assumption based on information I sought early this year, that 3 have 900 cells , each with 3 sectors , they have around 160,000 3g subscribers spread across 2700 sectors .

That is 60 users per sector . 30 use it as a fixed substutute and 30 for when they need connectivity on the go .

Overature

thank God somebody is doing something right in the world today

watty

Lets assume that 3 are very honest and have software that says 50% of users are always on the same mast.

We won't enquire how many of the "Mobile" 50% are not really mobile, but occasionally so because they can rather than need.

Real mobile users use from about 150Mbyte a month to 600Mbyte on Smart phones. About 2Gbyte would be a very heavy Mobile user. Fixed users use from 1Gbyte to over 120Gbyte ( <20%) or even 1000Gbyte + if you let the 5% of maniacs loose with no cap.

In any case the 3 Cap is 15Gbyte. Fixed users inherently spend a lot more time online than Mobile users and more inclined to do heavy data usage. Not everyone is a heavy video watchers and torrenter. Fixed users maybe an average usage of 4Gbyte a month. We don't watch video or torrent at home, but actually use about 10G a month. Never mind the howls of folk here that claim 30Gbyte is too small a cap, for a moment.

So even if 3's estimate of 50/50 is true, which as I explained probably overstates "real" Mobile users that actually need mobile, half the users take maybe 4/5ths of the data or more. This means without the fixed users, people that really MUST have mobile would have maybe on average 5 times better service.

In the USA simply adding the iPhone on the Network quadrupled the data traffic, to 600Mbyte a month per person on average.

A graph of how much of the time a "supposed" Mobile user is on "home" base vs other bases would be interesting. Given availability and correct price points Fixed and Mobile are complimentary, and the more Mobile users that have fixed BB at home/office/student digs / during week digs/ the much better the Mobile performace is and the more Productive Everyone is.