Just call me a thief

I flat out stole today's Non-News News Story, from Tamara.  Other than distracting me from the Wisconsin Senatorial Brouhaha, it's pretty much a waste of paper. 

One-Third of U.S. Households Lack Broadband Web Access

Most of the article is stats and hooey and mismatched stats about how not all Americans are able to sit in their houses or on street corners in every neighborhood and stream video of a guy getting hit in the junk with a wiffle-ball on youtube.  A new study by the National Telecommunication and Information Administration says that about 1/3rd of American households lack broadband internet access.  Reflected in that 1/3rd is 5-10% of the U.S. Population that:

only have access to internet services that are too slow to even support a basic set of online functions, such as downloading Web pages, photos or video.

Oh, the horror!  They might have to call Domino's or Papa Johns ON THE PHONE to order pizza, instead of going to their web-page.  Hmmm....maybe I should be more concerned...they probably can't find my blog either.  It would explain my poor readership numbers.

Let's see...rest of the article is blah, blah, blah...oh...here is something new:  It's turns out that sometimes you don't actually get the speeds that are advertised!!!!!  Really? 

Then we get to the end of the article, and I am not sure my response would be any better than Tamara's, which follows in red.  

It might also be interesting to consider the implications of local demographics, which can easily be explored via The New York Times' interactive map of U.S. Census data. In some cases, there are interesting correlations between the broadband options available in an area and the race, income or education level of the people who live there.

In other words, neighborhoods full of unemployed, non-English-speaking, high-school dropouts, the ones most likely to want to watch streaming reruns of American Idol on their smartphones, are the ones least likely to be able to do so. In an unrelated economic factoid, these very same neighborhoods are also underserved by Whole Foods stores and Mercedes Benz dealerships. It's obviously a conspiracy.

Strange, you mean a whole industry(not just one greedy corporation!) feels that they might not see an immediate profit developing a service in an area where the inhabitants of that area are unable to afford said service...

But of course, the Government thinks it can do better.

For definitions and examples of the COST of the Governments 'Better' please see: Amtrak and U.S. Postal Service.

Not sure what upsets me more...the implication that it's some huge conspiracy against the poor and down-trodden, or that I was totally unaware there was a National Telecommunication and Information Administration prior to reading this article.