At the other end of the spectrum... Tokyo Broadband

Shinji

Hi all,

Just thought I'd make a quick post about this, partially because it's interesting, partially because it's infuriating to those of us stuck in poor broadband or no broadband territories, and partially because I'd like to see some discussion on when people think Ireland and the UK will realistically reach these levels.

I've spent the past fortnight in Tokyo, and one of the things which jumped out at me during my time here has been the state of internet connectivity. Here, it's almost seen as a basic service such as water or electricity; it's dirt cheap (I suspect it must be subsidised in part by the government) and widely available, and not just ADSL/SDSL - WiFi technology is also miles ahead of anywhere in the British Isles.

DSL:

Walk through any busy shopping district in Tokyo at the moment - Akihabara and Shibuya are the most obvious candidates - and you'll see people in big white Yahoo!BB branded coats trying to hand out large sturdy paper bags. Take a bag (not sure of the cost, but I think it's only a few thousand Yen - about 20 quid maybe) and fill out a form on their table... Then toddle off home, open the bag, plug in the DSL router and microfilter inside, and wait something like 24 hours for them to turn on a 12mbit unmetered DSL service on your phoneline.

Cost? Roughly £14 per month. Oh, and I think you get 8mbit upstream as well, although I was having some trouble working out what the kanji characters for an upstream are, so that may have been indicating that there's an 8mbit connection option as well.

Availability? Most of Tokyo is covered by the 12mbit service - pretty much every built up area has very high speed ADSL. I think once you go out into the mountains you'd have to make do with RADSL type technology, but most people here live in cities anyway.


WiFi:

Aside from the fact that WiFi gear (802.11b mostly, although 802.11g is appearing all over the place) is ludicrously cheap (I paid 15 quid for a PCMCIA 11mbit WLAN card, and just a few quid more for a CF version), it's also stunningly useful. Many payphone booths (which have all had data-capable ISDN ports for years now) have been installed with 802.11 access points, so you can bring a wireless device near one and bosh, you're online at 11mbit.

They've also installed this in a load of train stations and on the Shinkansen bullet trains. I believe its going to be rolled out on the underground and in JR metropolitan service trains soon as well. Lots of net cafes here seem to operate by letting you carry in a laptop and connect to their wireless LAN for free, making their money off selling you coffee and stuff like a normal cafe.

Public Access:

Public net access points haven't taken off massively in Japan, mostly because everyone in the country has an iMode phone capable of accessing webpages and sending/receiving email at about 128kbps. However, I was somewhat pleased to note that my hotel room had a 100mbit LAN socket in it, which hooked me up to a stupidly fast net connect (feels like at least 12mbit) for free. This is apparently a fairly standard feature in hotels - you just walk down to the front desk and ask for a piece of network cable, and you're away.


Have I mentioned that I'm moving here as soon as possible?

zynaps

Lots of net cafes here seem to operate by letting you carry in a laptop and connect to their wireless LAN for free, making their money off selling you coffee and stuff like a normal cafe.

Man, that's amazing... and over here, we're dealing with 3 gig caps and stuff. We really are behind, not just in terms of pricing, availability and such, but in the way we look at it.
It's like in many other countries, broadband internet is just like water, toilets or footpaths. It's there, it's everywhere, take what you need, we're still building more!
Here, you'd think it was jaysus diamonds

Going on social stereotyping, I wouldn't have thought japanese businesses were so nice and free with things. Shows how wrong the Tom Green (whatever his name is) show is, eh!

However, I was somewhat pleased to note that my hotel room had a 100mbit LAN socket in it, which hooked me up to a stupidly fast net connect (feels like at least 12mbit) for free. This is apparently a fairly standard feature in hotels - you just walk down to the front desk and ask for a piece of network cable, and you're away.

... Maybe I'll get my little sister to teach me some japanese and just move out there as soon as possible too

zynaps
bloody denpashogai!

JohnK

Originally posted by Shinji
Have I mentioned that I'm moving here as soon as possible?

Wouldn't mind going there myself

SkepticOne

12 mbit/sec? Sure, wouldn't that be too much information? Would you not get all confused with all the info flying at you.

LFCFan

12 Mbit/s and here's us demanding 512Kbit/s access and having 256Kbit/s access shoved in our faces as a consumer product at a rediculous price. It really does put it in perspective. Tokyo is the most expensive place on the planet yet they still manage to supply dirt cheap broadband. It's enough to make a grown man cry.

pork99

I would just like to take the opportunity to thank the Government, CumRag and Eircom for protecting us from those dirty foreign influences

SkepticOne

Originally posted by pork99
I would just like to take the opportunity to thank the Government, CumRag and Eircom for protecting us from those dirty foreign influences

I'm sticking with the Evening Herald. Thats all the information I need.

scojones

Jaysus... I think that about sums it up..

pork99

I'm sticking with the Evening Herald. Thats all the information I need.

dont know about you but I easily get confused and then I get a headache and nausea

MDR

Technology is fashion in Tokyo ...
In Ireland your da is still struggling to program the video,
in Tokyo your da is first in the queue to get a new watch that can take photos. Different priorities I suppose, the Japanese govt. actively promotes technology, and tries to keep Japan at the forefront of technology ... its very much cultural.

I amn't making excuses for Ireland, Ireland's technological is such a muddle of excellant backbone infrastucture and crappy last mile access. At the end of the day Toyko has had some Ireland has lacked ... competition. Now we can bandy about COMREG and Etains roll in all this till we are blue in the face, but if NTL upgraded their Network, or Esat attempted to compete (they could offer much cheaper BB if they so desired), if Chorus had cash ... so many if's

at the end of it all, there is 230,000 km of unlift fibre in the roads,
WiFi is the way forward, it is IMHO the only way out of this.

SkepticOne

Originally posted by pork99
dont know about you but I easily get confused and then I get a headache and nausea

Consider slowing down your internet connection. 56k can be too fast for a lot of people.

daveirl

This post has been deleted.

scojones

Originally posted by daveirl
Property is far more expensive than here.

There's always the box on the street option. All you need is your laptop and a wireless receiver.

Praetorian

What planet is Tokyo on again? Certainly not the same as Ireland.

Shinji

Tokyo is the most expensive place on the planet yet they still manage to supply dirt cheap broadband.

You know, I'm still utterly failing to see that whole "most expensive place on the planet" thing. It seems to be an urban myth based on property prices alone, and on the experiences of fat Americans trying to order 18oz steaks in downtown Shinjuku. Technology stuff is pitifully cheap here, clothes and so on are about the same price as in Europe, and food/eating out is cheaper by about a factor of four. Buying property is ludicrously expensive (the Japanese yen is based on property prices, not gold like European currencies) but renting is actually relatively cheap compared to London (and probably Dublin these days).

Going OT: That's a pretty big decision! Did you not find it a completely different culture.

Yes - and I've yet to find very many elements of it which I don't prefer to modern western European culture. I made it all sound a little fatuous in that post, suggesting that I'd move here for broadband - that's not true. I want to move here because I think it'd be a better place to live, because I like the people and their culture and their city, and because this is the first country on Earth I've visited and felt so strongly that I've wanted to live here. In contrast, I'd rather chop my own knackers off than live in the USA

LFCFan

Originally posted by Shinji
You know, I'm still utterly failing to see that whole "most expensive place on the planet" thing. It seems to be an urban myth

Everytime there's one of those indexes of how expensive cities are all over the world, Tokyo is always top of the list. I think Vancouver is second and Helsinki third. Dublin is very high up the list too me thinks even though the standard of living is nowhere near as good as these other cities.

BigEejit

I know this is way off topic but when house / apartment prices are compared country to country based on expendable income (i.e. after taxes, etc. etc.) Irelands house prices are in the top five in the world .... but our standard of living is pityful compared to others in that league ... (again Tokyo on top, Hong Kong and New York way up there ... ) ....And all those flipping places have great BB ...

I saw this before and I cant find the flipping article now ... ...

LFCFan

listen lads. We're just gonna have to accept that Ireland will not change in our lifetime and we will always have to put up with mediocre services, high taxes, low standard of living and muppets running the country. We're about 10 years behind the rest of the developed world and probably still behind some developing countries. It's all because of old crappy attitudes in an ever developing world. With the likes of Bertie Ahern in power we are never going to see the kind of advances other countries are seeing in technology.

pork99

We're just gonna have to accept that Ireland will not change in our lifetime

I fear we will have to live through a severe trashing of the economy here before anyone cops on

MDR

LFCFan ... your such a defeatest ... Ireland is what you make it ... you say its not gonna change, then it definitely won't. If IOFFL people had of said , its very possible there wouldn't be FRIACO on the way.

Put up or shut up, that the way I see it.

LFCFan

I agree with you in a way but the way I look at it is this.

IoffL have been campaigning for a good while now for something as trivial(trivial in the sense that it's the norm in most other countries) as decent Internet access. Granted there seems to be some progress at last, it is painfully slow and by the time we do see standards in broadband here that match the current worldwide state, we will be hearing about Joe Bloggs in Swindon with his 40Mbit vDSL line while we're yet again 'campaigning' to get better access 'cause we're lagging behind with 512Kbit access. It just seems that Ireland is constantly trying(or not trying as the case is usually) to catch up on everyone else and it's all down to useless successive governments dragging their heels and taking their backhanders and not encouraging competition. Maybe, if we get a forward thinking, progressive government in power we might see some change but until then it's gonna be like backing your head against a brick wall trying to get anything done in this god awful country. It's a shame because we have the potential to be a great country. I'm not giving up by any means but I'm a realist and I know everything we try to do here is going to be a struggle. I am not defeated and never have been and everything I've put my mind to I've achieved.

MDR

You have very simplistic view of the world,
Everyone is better and Ireland plays catchup,
Your attitude isn't uncommon in Ireland,
I often encounter the 'its crap 'cos its Irish' attitude,
truth is LFCFan, alot of countries that seem utopian,
when on initally examines them, don't bear up well to scrutiny.

I amn't arguing however that countries like
Finland and Norway aren't streets ahead of us.
But other countries like Germany, France and the UK,
when you initally examine them they seem great,
but delve a little deeper and you find their nasty
little secrets. I am offering no apology for Ireland,
all I am saying is that, I have humped around
Europa quite a bit and things don't seem simple to me.

Another Irish-ism to run success down,
in face of the a huge powerful incumbent operator,
and often imputent regulator ... FRIACO is a
big thing. If we can do this, it we can change
this, you can change anything.

Half the time, its the not the govt. thats
the problem .... its the people. Irish people
are the problem and Irish people are the
solution, striving to change hearts and minds
is the only thing that gonna drag us up to
the level of Norway and Finland.

Norway and Finland have quite a history
of social enggineering ... I wonder if there
is a coralation ....

LFCFan

Ray, I agree with you 100%. I know it's the people that are the problem and it's the people that can change things if their attitude is right. The problem is, I can't see a wholesale change in Irish attitudes in our lifetime. It will happen but it's gonna be slow. I've also been all over Europe, America and Canada and the one factor again that makes these countries tick over better than Ireland is the attitude of the people. They don't take ****. All this country has done for me so far is turn me into a cynic, do all sorts of damage to my liver and get me in all sorts of debt. Only for my family I'd have emigrated long ago. Being Irish isn't what it used to be. We're no longer a country of a thousand welcomes but a country of increasing crime, unsocial behaviour and deteriorating services. I'm the most vocal person of all my friends when it comes to getting stuff changed in Ireland and I do my best but when I see their atitudes it makes me wonder why we bother.

MDR

Being Irish isn't what it used to be. We're no longer a country of a thousand welcomes

Where we ever the welcoming, enlightened race we where sold as, I very much doubt it, the Jackie Healy Rae's of this country make me believe that Ireland, has been historically very much a two faced nation.

There is the outward welcoming face, and there is the inward greedy, ignorant, exophobic face.

LFCFan take some heart, the mere fact that IOFFL exists means that the tide is turning. In this forum you are surrounded by peeps who think alot like you.

I do my best but when I see their atitudes it makes me wonder why we bother.

I can especially relate to what you say about you friends, mine are the very, but i can tell over time I am changing mine (wearing them down ... ), to not take crap anymore,

anyway must sign off ...

LFCFan

I'm wearing mine down too but I think I'll be more likely to get a smack in the gob, then for them to change their attitudes :rolleyes:

zynaps

I think the moral of this story is not to predict more and more failure, and trying to map our current patheticness in terms of broadband and other behind tech into the future.
Just because we're way behind in broadband now, doesn't mean we'll be in the same position relative to the rest of the world in a few years.

It's expecting these things and seeing futility in nothing that will by default make it like this.
How about we continue looking for solutions instead of forecasting our defeat?

Getting good broadband in Ireland doesn't mean digging up the whole country, laying cable and burying it again... as we know, we have some very promising infrastructure.
All we need is more people smart enough to exploit it and find a way to distribute it competitively.
Which is why I agree about wireless being the broadband approach of the future, in the sense that it's the easiest to apply right now....

Also, there are a lot of countries that take worse care of its people than Ireland.
Just look at all the 17 year old couples (bernadeh' and anto) with enough money to buy a new pair of nike tracksuit trousers, runners, white caps, cans of bud and hash and still have kids and live unimpoverished in Dublin!
And don't forget college!
*scoffs at americans paying $50000 a year to be educated if they happen to be in a rich family*

zynaps

Slutmonkey57b

The important thing to realise about Japan is that
a) taxes are huge
b) the whole economy is completely propped up by the government.

Internal competition hasn't got Japan where it is today - corruption and loose banking morals have. A lot of the problems faced by the east asian Tiger economies had nothing to do with global recession - they had to do with the collapse of faith in the banking system once the governments were unable to continue writing off bad debts and unprofitable companies. The difference is that in Japan corruption is used to prop up the economy, unlike here where it's used to line the pockets of the few.

And Shinji, just remember: no matter how long you live there,
you'll always be smelly, dirty gai-jin to the natives. Always.

zynaps

Originally posted by Slutmonkey57b
And Shinji, just remember: no matter how long you live there,
you'll always be smelly, dirty gai-jin to the natives. Always.

Unless you're American and have money. Then you become popular!

Apparently a lot of japanese people are scared/have a dislike of black people too, unless they're American and/or have money!
So I hear anyway... weird

alastair

Seoul kicks Tokyo's arse in the affordable/free internet access stakes. DSL is dirt cheap and has a much higher penetration than Tokyo, and there are free internet access points all over the place (most big stores). You just have to put up with dodgy air pollution and nasty pickled cabbage with each meal.

Oh, for anyone who's flying through Narita: There's free wireless intenet access in both terminals. Check your mail on arrival and figure out which train route you need to take into the city.

MDR

I think the moral of this story is not to predict more and more failure, and trying to map our current patheticness in terms of broadband and other behind tech into the future.

... very enlightened stuff ....

SkepticOne

This stuff in Tokyo is a comparitively recent development. Up until recently, internet users, like Ireland, internet users had to pay a fortune for crappy dial-up connections to a greedy monopolistic telco.

If they can do it in Tokyo, they can do it here.

Forget the 12 mbit/sec for a moment. Right now, according to Eircom, 500,000 lines are capable of providing DSL in Ireland. Out of these they have only sold 2,000. They are only selling DSL at the rate of 40 to 50 a week and are clearly uninterested in running DSL as a successful business, most likely because they are raking it in elsewhere and DSL threatens this income. Right now, the equipment is in place to sell 1mb connections to a huge portion of the population. The only thing stopping them is lack of competition (Esat appear to be at the same game) and lack of regulatory action.

The dispersed population probably does mean that in the short run, 12 mbit connections via DSL won't be feasible, but that does not mean that we should not have 1 mbit/sec connections at an affordable price now.

The recent decision on FRIACO makes me more hopeful than ever that some sort of action can be taken on DSL.

There will still be a lot of the population who won't be able to get DSL because they are out of range or their exchange is not upgraded, but pricing DSL out of reach does not help these people anyway. Government investment in wireless and alternative last-mile technologies will still be needed.