Steve Lohr, NY Times
9/12/2010
In today’s world time, in terms of speed, has become an increasingly important and some-what manageable factor in our daily lives. It is nonnegotiable that high-speed internet has become the holy of holy’s in our never-ending race to have more time. Surprisingly enough, the average broadband speed in America lags far behind the newest technological competition. Only a few cities around the world have begun to offer the highest-speed service that has the capabilities of up to one gigabit per second. That equals to being a whopping 200 times faster than our old broadband. EPB, Chattanooga, Tennessee’s city-owned electric utility, has announced that they plan to offer their customers with this ultra-high-speed internet service by the end of the year. This will make Chattanooga the first city in the United States to offer such digital capabilities. Since the technology is so new, the service will be offered at the seemingly steep price of $350 a month. Given the price range, EPB does not expect to have a large demand for their one-gigabit-per-second service; rather, EPB believes in offering it simply because they can do so at minimal additional expenses to their company. EPB has the capabilities of offering the service in part because of their smart-grid network, which requires fiber optic cables running to every household and computerized meters in homes. Doctors in Chattanooga are already excited about acquiring the service; knowing that when they do they will be able to upload/download medical images at a much faster rate than before.
Even though the initial price to consumers has been set at a largely higher rate than current internet prices, I think it is great that Chattanooga and EPB have taken the initiative to begin the United States fight in modernization of technologies. I believe it is essential that the United States, the founders of the Internet itself, should remain in high standing with the latest technologies. Not to mention that doing so will allow us to further our economic development through Internet based products and services, and could potentially revolutionize the way our health system manages and interprets our medical records. Overall, kudos to Chattanooga for wanting to become a leader in the world’s fastest Internet; hopefully the rest of the U.S. can catch up soon!
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