Finland First to Make Broadband a Legal Right
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Finland has become the first country to make broadband a legal right.
That's right, you heard me. YLE reports that starting next July, every person in Finland will have the right to a one-megabit broadband connection. What's that? Do I hear some scoffing at the idea of a one-megabit connection? Well how about this, YLE goes on to say that the Finnish Ministry of Transport and Communications are guaranteeing that by 2015, this will be upped to a 100-megabit connection.
With a population of 5.5 million, Finland is the first but definitely won't be the last. Other European countries are expected to follow suit soon, including the United Kingdom.
Imagine being legally entitled to 100-megabit internet … Man, now would that be awesome or what? Now stop imagining, this is America, not Finland.
Source : Tom's Hardware US
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In America, that connection would be capped at 100 megabits a month.
Yes but when you download something that is not allowed no matter what it is what do they call that? censorship of free speech or abuse of internet rights? They will come up with all kinds of garbage laws because of this and there will no longer be any anonymous internet useage for someone who has the right to the internet, will that mean these people will have to get and ID card of some kind to use their connection? The list of stupid things that govts will come up with as a result of this "right" go on and on forever.
Wow, so every year it'll get bumped up by about 20 mbit increments? Must be nice to live in a place without greedy telecoms.
lol in canada, you can get 5megabyte/up/down for 20 bucks with umlimited bandiwth
FCC American Broadband Right Schedule of Bandwidth:
If your annual income is:__Your connection speed will be:
$0-$15,000_________________500Kb/sec
$15,000-$30,000____________1.5Mb/sec
$30,000-$60,000____________3Mb/sec
$60,000-$90,000____________6Mb/sec
$90,000-$175,000___________12Mb/sec
$175,000-$300,000__________18Mb/sec
$300,000 and up____________100Mb/sec
Fear not, that'll be include in Economic Stimulus Part II ;-)
Wish the 100megabit would be enacted in the US right now
Wow, so every year it'll get bumped up by about 20 mbit increments? Must be nice to live in a place without greedy telecoms.
Liquid0h. It has nothing to do with greedy telecomms. You do realize they live in a socialist gov't. They get things handed to them but they also lose 50%+ of their income to taxes to pay for all these programs.
to liquid0h, just think then how nice it is to live in Finland, a non-diverse country, small geographic foot print. Just like Japan getting cell coverage to every inch of the country (err uhh island). Squish America down to 5.5 million people of the same background and the size of a couple of states and you can vote yourself from your pocketbook all the free stuff you want.
I just wish the upload wasn't as limited as it is. Get this I have a 20 mbit download and 512 kbit upload (40:1 ratio). Northstate communications goes up to 1 mbit, but unfortunately I'm right outside their coverage area. I just want to host a small internet server without it bogging down with 2 users on it.
Impressive, atleast it shows they understand the importance of the internet in peoples daily lives. Im sure 100Mbits will become useful in the future, but i have a 400Mbit connection here at school and it never gets to go anywhere near that fast as the servers on the other end just cant keep up. I hope finland plans to drop a ton of cash into some good servers to keep up with it all.
When will people realize that nothing is a right if it is achieved or maintained at the forced expense of others? I.e. if those others aren't there, what happens to your "right?" FAIL
Also in addition to insanely high income taxes, all men are required to perform a minimum tour of duty in the military. I'm not sure we could pull too many "gamers" off their free internet connection for the 6+ months of required service. After all, they need to level up their dwarf monk rogue to raid the dragon king of hoth or whatever bullshit you do in online games these days. Goddamn, on second thought, maybe military service would be better for these kids than having them grow up with mental issues because the worst thing that ever happened to them was mom shutting off their WoW account because they threw a monitor through a window when the intenet connect lagged.
Of course, now that internet is a right, internet addictions of all kinds will now be claimed as disabilities. Of course, with free health care, its not like anyone in Finland will care.
I'd like to see everyone here have to live on the same farm I did when I was growing up. No internet, no computer, almost no time to even play NES...
How far people have fallen from mighty to weak little pinch-faced tools of technology. A paid service is called a privelege, not a right.
LOL, to get 100Mbs in North America you're better start your own ISP with venture capital then to wait after big ISPs. And once they get the capacity, they'll cap you to a ridiculus amount of bandwitdh each month because they to stupid to upgrade the backbone of their network!
Liquid0h. It has nothing to do with greedy telecomms. You do realize they live in a socialist gov't. They get things handed to them but they also lose 50%+ of their income to taxes to pay for all these programs.
No.
Been living in Finland for 5 years now. You do not pay 50%+ in income taxes. As hellwig said, male Finnish citizens have to do mandatory conscription so, you don't get things handed to you here. Anyone who has been to the local unemployment office or Kela knows what I am talking about.
I wish I could even GET a 100Mbit connection. Heck, I wish I could even GET the maximum 8Mbit my provider sells me as it is...
Let alone the crappy upload speeds Cable service has.
I wouldn't mind higher taxes if we could just see the results that come of those taxes. With the way our politicians work, taxpayers would probably wind up paying twice as much for a decent internet connection. There's just way too much overhead here in the states.
How about we go with fewer representatives, say, 1 per state?
Why suddenly everyone is jealous?
Why first of all you need that speed? To support that speed you should have supporting computer…
Why you need that much info if your HDD or CPU cannot handle it?
Step by step, first go and get your SSD drive, then we will talk about 100Mbit internet
wow... the USA sucks when it thumbs up to Finland! (and some people get taxed like crazy in the states)
Of course, now that internet is a right, internet addictions of all kinds will now be claimed as disabilities. Of course, with free health care, its not like anyone in Finland will care.
I bet the Chinese think they're crazy
Canada: $20 for 5Mb both ways, unlimited
Puerto Rico: $70 for 4Mb down, 384Kb up, capped to 40GB a month, pays $15 per each 10GB over that. Not including government taxes and crap.
I feel like I live in the fricken dark ages.
I would like free broadband, but should it be entitled to everyone as a right? I dont think so...
haha...nothing is free. why do you think they pay 50 - 60 percent in taxes...
I guess Nightwish and Lordi are gonna pay disproportionately for that entitlement.
Finland is a great country.They are fierce fighters and if you are into world War 2 stuff like me think Talvisota the winter war.Finland didnot deport their Jews and Jews served in their army and won the same kind of medals that non-jews did.
Finland has great education system and this news doesnot surprise me.The Finns are a smart people.Great news for their country.To bad we won't ever see this happen in the USA.
Gee... I wonder how they pay for all of this?
Question. If you live in Finland what is the point of working hard? The harder you work the more your neighbor gets.
To some of the people commenting here: ignorance is bliss, no?
how would all of this be paid for? I know some of the telecoms are extremely greedy.... We get 3mbps up and 3mbps down @ my office and they charge is $895 + tax per month.... total rape when compared to my 10mbps down 1.5mbps up home connection that costs just $50.
You can't just give everybody internet for free... that would be.... communist !
tayb: and naturally you get less? :>
I'm a dual national of Finland and the U.S., and this just seems ridiculous. Internet connection is not a right... Rights are things that you are born with. For example, you have a right to speak freely, and to protect yourself or others from harm. You have a right to believe or worship in ways that you see fit. These are not things that the government grants you, they are things that governments are supposed to protect.
Governments that increasingly engage in "granting" people rights or entitlements do not understand their limited purpose. This will ultimately lead to more government encroachment on actual rights, such as the right to free speech, or to keep and bear arms. The latter being a right that used to be important to Finns, but is now slowly being eroded by current gun laws in Finland to the point to where using arms for the purpose of self-defense is not even a valid reason to own them anymore. There was a time when owning firearms was like knowing how to live off the land, or without electricity, prized assets of Finnish survival.
Socialist governments, even ones as mild as Finland, place themselves in positions that make their citizens more dependent on them. It's bad, bad, bad... I'd rather be dead than be dependent on the government for everything.
Besides, already Finnish entitlements are un-sustainable, how can they add more entitlements with an ever shrinking demographic of people who actually work? I've never seen as many "professional" students than I have in Finland, who would much rather go to school indefinitely than contribute financially to society. And how about all men who are already dependent on the government owned monopoly that distributes the nation’s drug of choice, alcohol? They do nothing but suck the system dry, because they don't have to work! They are entitled to a fairly comfortable life, including healthcare and income, so why would they do anything but drink and eat makkara and wait for their allowance?
There's no incentive to be self-reliant, and to succeed in such societies. Gone are the Finns of the past... The new era of non-sisu, entitlement mentality, overgrown babies has arisen...
And we want this in America? I don't. I just want to be free to prosper or to fail, because true happiness comes from the righteous exercise of personal agency, not bail-outs and entitled comforts.