Tag: South Korea
South Korea’s economic stimulus plan - wireless!
by Hans on Feb.11, 2009, under Government, Industry, News, Opinion
What's wrong with this picture? Nothing! It is just what we asked for.
An amazing post on the history of South Korea’s internet has been all but unobserved by most of the internet community in the US. This information should be part of the body of knowledge that is reviewed as a part of defining a strategic plan to get us where we need to be as a country for internet access. Based on current projections, we are already 13 years behind South Korea, as their first generation plan to get their country online was originally conceived and execution begun back in 1995. Fast forward to today, and they are already on Internet - generation II, while the US still sits on it’s thumbs, hoping that somehow if we keep doing what we have been doing that everything will be better. The problem is a fundamental one: Korea has a target of connecting their citizens to the world, and to be number one at it. The US has a goal as well: to provide support to existing companies that have built our internet infrastructure and hope that they do what is necessary to connect the citizens of the US. The one complicating factor is that the companies in control of this roadmap in the US have a different motivation than getting the best connectivity for all citizens - it is called making a profit.
An excerpt from the article:
How and why did South Korea become an overlord in Internet speed? In short; the South Korean government introduced a number of policy instruments to stimulate technological learning, aimed to strengthen international competitiveness of the economy. The government launched a five-year plan to create a ubiquitous networked world in 1995, meaning that the country developed a stunning 1.5 billion dollar wireless network to stimulate the use of the Internet.
