Matt Renck is spoiled.
Ever since moving here to teach English two years ago, Renck has had a
high-speed Internet connection of 8 megabits per second--only about average
for a South Korean apartment, but nearly eight times the typical broadband
speed in U.S. households. He watches TV shows over this connection, creates
multimedia projects for his class, and regularly updates a Weblog.
None of what he does is revolutionary; it just happens far faster than it
would in America. And that's a little revolutionary all by itself.
I didn't realize how much the Web had to offer until I got to Korea,
said Renck, a programmer by training. I couldn't appreciate it until I
got here and saw what true high-speed access does to change your perception
of how fast information truly moves.
For Americans, almost none of whom have access to speeds that Renck and
many South Koreans take for granted, this difference is jarring. The United
States considers itself the center of technological innovation, yet South
Korea has gone considerably further in making a mainstream reality out of
the futuristic promises of bygone dot-com days.
Many U.S. executives and policy makers are quick to dismiss the disparity,
noting correctly that South Korea's densely populated areas have made it
easier for telecommunications companies to offer extremely fast service to
large numbers of people. But even with such geographic and demographic
differences, the United States can learn some valuable lessons from South
Korea's experience in jump- starting a broadband powerhouse.
I think there are a quite a few lessons, said Taylor Reynolds, an
International Telecommunications Union analyst who recently completed a
survey of Internet and mobile services in South Korea. Most of the
growth is tied to effective competition, which you don't see in a lot of
places in the United States.
. . .
The vision of a broadband society is already here in Korea, said
Eric Kim, executive vice president of global marketing operations at
Samsung Electronics. We are two to three years ahead in wireless
broadband, and people are using it, too.
The country's achievements are even more impressive considering its
starting point in technology. In 1995, fewer than 1 percent of South Korean
residents used the Internet, though a larger number subscribed to
proprietary Korean-language networks that were somewhat like the closed
CompuServe and America Online networks of the late 1980s. By 2004, more
than 71 percent of South Korean households subscribed to broadband Net
services, according to local estimates.
The decision to focus on broadband began in the mid-1990s and intensified
after South Korea's economy was crippled by the collapse of the Asian
financial markets in 1997, when policy makers targeted technology as a key
sector for restoring the country's economic health.
Korean regulators set out a clear path for the network industry with
well-publicized national goals. All big office and apartment buildings
would be given a fiber connection by 1997. By 2000, 30 percent of
households would have broadband access through DSL or cable lines. By 2005,
more than 80 percent of households would have access to fast connections of
20mbps or more--about the rate needed for high-definition television.
. . .
The usage model is critical, said M.C. Kim, general manager for
Intel Korea. Online gaming is one of the killer apps.
In many ways, the most important question answered in the country's grand
broadband experiment has been one of demand. Broadband progress has long
been delayed in the United States and other countries as a result of
uncertainty about how much interest consumers would have in paying for the
expensive infrastructure needed for high-bandwidth services.
As a result, entire industries have been paralyzed for years by a classic
Catch-22, as content companies and network carriers waited for one another
to make the first move before investing in broadband products.
Telecommunications start-ups tried to break that stalemate in the 1990s by
investing large sums to offer rival high-speed connections to customers,
only to be gutted in the dot-com bust.
What South Korea showed is that, if you build it, they will definitely come.
The crazy fans are really crazy, said Guilliame Patry, a Canadian
national who moved to Seoul in 1999 after he became the world champion in
"StarCraft," a real- time strategy game. He's now a well-known figure in
South Korea, where as many as 30,000 people typically attend game tournaments.
Such cultural phenomena can be traced directly to the government's emphasis
on the importance of broadband for the advancement of society in South
Korea, as well as for its economic health. Part of that campaign involved
Internet training for the portion of the population deemed likely to be
left behind in the digital age.
About 10 million people fell into this category in the first round of the
government's initiative, including stay-at- home wives, military personnel,
disabled citizens, and even prison inmates. That program was ultimately
expanded to practically anyone who wanted it.
