Speed: My personal connectivity history

I think of this as my 24 year history of Internet access, except in 1983, I was connecting between home and work with no access to any computer that was "on the Internet."  I used Compuserve for most of the 1980s only getting a permanent connection to the Internet, via world.std.com, in late 1991.

The overall trend is a doubling in speed every 20-21 months, but of course actual data points are highly individualistic.  Here's the raw data.

The junp to cable modem speeds was dramatic but thereafter the cable modem crowd focused on adding subscribers, not better service — seven years without a speed increase!  In my neighborhood, there was no effective competition, as DSL services were never able to match cable modem speeds and RCN, our local cable overbuilder, entered bankrupcy before it reached my block.  All that changed with the advent of Verizon FiOS.  Today, there is access speed competition between Verizon FiOS and both Comcast and RCN cable modem services.  Hopefully I can count on continuing speed increases for some years to come.

Comments

[Stephen Smith]

Cool chart! But ugh, all those big numbers with lots of trailing zeros. Isn't gbps a better unit for indicating the usefulness of access speed. :-) But I'd say you're making good progress getting up to .02 gbps; I'm still stuck at .006.

And of course here in the US of A that's your down speed. I bet the up chart has a shallower trend.

[brough]

Steve, Yes, my current upload is around 2.7 Mbps, so looking over the past 24 years, my downstream speed has doubled every 20.3 months while my upstream speed has merely doubled every 25.6 months.