If it’s infrastructure that keeps people from being able to use full-internet, then how are these people able to watch TV? Cable modems attach to the same cable that TVs use to attach to.
So, to anyone who is old enough to remember…
Are the same places that lack internet today also lack tv service back in the 20th century?
The places where broadband internet is unavailable don’t have cable TV. People in those places have to have a dish or an antenna if they want live television.
There is such a thing as satellite internet, but it sucks and is not broadband.
You can have both cable TV and dialup internet. Dialup uses your telephone landline. People who have dialup often choose it because it’s low cost, even though they have a choice of cable broadband or DSL available to them. You could usually get it for about $9.95 a month, but often you could find free dialup.
Cable is available at my mom’s house, but she only ever watches TV anyway when someone she knows is going to be on the local news, so she’s never bothered to get it. And she used dial-up because, for a long time, it was the cheapest option that met her needs.
There’s no reason why broadband internet should cost more than $5 a month, but the ISPs are monopolies or nearly so, so they can get away with charging much more.
There’s also the option of DSL in some places, which transmits over the same copper wires that are used for landlines. However, the DSL signal has a limited range over these wires, and if you live far enough away from the nearest multiplexer, then the telephone company will just say “sorry, DSL isn’t available in your area.”
Unfortunately, without some kind of government mandate, it seems unlikely that these locations will ever get broadband/wired internet service. My impression is that communications companies stopped deploying new DSL hardware some years ago, and are now focusing on upgrading existing copper wires to fiber-optic cables. So if you already have internet, it’ll get better, but if you don’t, you’re SOL. I believe there are some government incentives for “rural internetification” (along the lines of the Rural Electrification Act), but progress has been slow.
Yep, that’s me. The satellite TV works great. Internet, not so much. We are upgrading to Hughes ‘5G’ soon. Should be able to get about 30mbps which will be blindingly fast compared to my .2mbps that I get now (yes, POINT 2).
Cable modems are attached to the same type of co-axial cable as your TV, but that does not mean that they get the same signals.
To put a cable signal on a line requires a certain set of equipment at the head end, at the repeaters, and near the tap. To put an internet connection on requires a different set of equipment at the head end, at the repeaters, and near the tap.
Old style cable was pretty much a one way connection, even current cable only uses the reverse for limited communication. Internet, obviously, requires much more reverse communication than just authorizing pay per view charges.
In areas where they still don’t have digital cable, and everything is still run analog, you can get away with using the 50+ year old lines, and get a signal that is perfectly acceptable. Using those lines to run a modem may be problematic, and quite a bit of the current infrastructure would need to be replaced.
When I was young I had dial-up. A couple of years before that the TV had an aerial on the top of it, and you had to tune it to the right channel by literally adjusting a dial.
When we bought our computer in 2002, it came with a free year of AOL. We had digital cable from Comcast, but only for TV. They had broadband internet, but we didn’t bother to get it, because hey, free AOL. After that, I found some dialup providers for $5.95 a month. We didn’t see a need for high speed internet, because in the early 2000s there was no Hulu, or YouTube, or Netflix. Our streaming TV was On Demand from Comcast.
Yes, cable was originally designed for one-way transmission, while phone lines have always been for two-way transmission. So it originally seemed more natural to connect to the internet (or something similar, like CompuServe or AOL) via phone lines. I don’t know when cable companies started offering internet, but they certainly didn’t back in the days when cable TV was first available.
Also, I feel compelled to point out that broadcast TV still exists, so it’s possible to watch TV without any kind of connection. Though I don’t know how many areas there still are that have good reception of broadcast channels but no cable internet available.
There are places in metropolitan St. Louis no more than 25 miles from downtown where cable TV is not available because of the hilly and rugged terrain. People who live in those areas rely on dialup internet and either satellite dishes or very tall TV antennas.
Indeed. There are multiple possible reasons why old Cable-TV lines would need to be replaced to enable a broadband offering. A subscriber might live too far from the branching point. The topology (how and where the cable branches) might be inconvenient for broadband, while perfectly fine for TV. Or the cable might be shitty and insufficiently shielded.
A buddy of mine still uses dial up but that is changing soon. The provider announced a few months ago they are doing away with dial up because of the lack of customers, less than 400 dial up users for their 50,000 or so phone customers. This same company has seen the number of phone customers drop recently because of internet companies offering phone service. He also uses an antenna for his TV and he is fighting the county over hooking up to the sewer system, he says his septic tank is still working fine.
I hope it works out well for you, but IME satellite can download pretty fast for a minute or two, then hits a brick wall as they throttle your speed way down.
Ten million people is about 3% of the US population. Except it says that 15% of the population use no internet at all so it’s closer to 4% of the internet-using population.
Given how large the US is geographically with many places difficult to reach with infrastructure (or companies unwilling to run lines way out to some rural Great Plains town of 150 people), 4% actually sounds a little low to me.
Back when I had DSL, the service came with free dial-up access as a bonus. Is it possible they are counting DSL users with bundled dial-up as part of the dial-up percentage?
I’m still using DSL because of a vastly superior local ISP providing it (Sonic), rather than dealing with the cable company (Xfinity, AKA Comcast). What they are providing is ADSL2+ connecting to their own equipment in the CO (they lease the copper from AT&T, and you don’t need to pay for a phone line), which can theoretically get up to 20 mb depending on distance. I’m getting about 5-6. However, it’s a really dependable 5-6, and enough for my use - I DO stream TV over it. If I really felt the need for a faster connection I’d probably reluctantly go to AT&T UVerse. Sonic may eventually get their fiber service to my area anyway, although I’m not holding my breath.
As for TV connection, rabbit ears and rooftop antennas are enjoying something of a renaissance due to cord cutting - you get the cable channel fare via streaming, and local broadcasts via the antenna. Of course, that’s a pool of people with internet, and no cable or dish service, not people with TV and no internet.
Another option for some people who can’t get cable or dsl broadband is fixed wireless, which can be very good service. However, it’s usually really expensive, and you need line of sight to the provider’s tower from somewhere on your property to place the antenna.