FCC Moves Slowly To Update Definition Of Broadband To Something Still Pathetic::For decades, the FCC has maintained an arguably pathetic definition of “broadband,” allowing the telecom industry to under-deliver substandard access. And despite some new rhetoric from the agency under Biden, that doesn’t appear to be changing anytime soon. Broadband was originally defined as any 200 kbps connection. In 2010, that pathetic definition was changed to…
TL;DR 100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up, because cable pushed back on 100 symmetrical.
This is just so people can’t self host media, right? Why else would they obsessively cap upload speeds?
DOCSIS (AKA internet service over coaxial cable) deals in some number of bonded channels, meaning portions of the total available bandwidth on the wire. They asymmetrically allocate channels to download speeds to overcome the limitations of the older copper wire technology. 100Mbps symmetrical is beyond what most of their existing “Broadband” infrastructure can support in rural and underserved areas, so they complained about it being unreasonable. 100Mbps symmetrical is certainly possible over DOCSIS, but speeds are only as fast as the weakest link… And there are a helluva lot of weak links outside of high population density areas.
